“ Teaching in the Cracks creates a ‘big tent’ for ‘student-centered, action-focused curriculum.’ Teachers will likely find some version of their school context portrayed to help them imagine how social action curricula could take root in their classrooms.”
—Urban Education
“Schultz acknowledges that his proposal sounds great on paper but is hard to implement in the classroom, and so throughout he offers numerous practical examples of proposed curricula and how they are working around the nation. Examples vary, covering everything from a single classroom, the entire school’s curriculum, forming close partnerships with surrounding communities, and specific topics, to teacher preparation. Together they make this book an invaluable reference for field educators.”
—The Wabash Center Journal on Teaching
“It does an exceptional job of providing information on progressive education and is a welcome contribution to the field…a tight and efficiently written exploration of progressive teaching in action...(the book) presents many dynamic thoughts for how to educate and prepare students to participate actively in a democratic society."
—Mid-Western Educational Researcher
“Through compelling examples, Brian shares how educators can help students use their powers. The stories he shares are of teachers disrupting the all-too-common top-down approach for an alternative, an alternative that allows students’ ideas to guide action, to engage in democratic processes and disagreement, and to make changes in their communities.”
—From the Foreword by Deborah Meier
"This book is an invitation—an invitation to rethink teaching from top to bottom, to dive into classroom life as a passionate adventure in discovery and surprise, and to explore an approach to teaching that’s grounded first and foremost in the lives and experiences of children."
—From the afterword by William Ayers, bestselling author of Teaching the Taboo: Courage and Imagination in the Classroom (with Rick Ayers)
“In this hopeful and creative new book, Brian Schultz offers strategies that come directly from practitioners on how to provide an education that engages, motivates, and stimulates students. For teachers who genuinely seek to make a difference through their work, this book will be a helpful resource.”
—Pedro A. Noguera, University of California, Los Angeles
“This book reminds us that curriculum should be conceived and practiced as dynamic, living, evolving, and responsive to the very essence of students’ identity and being. Emerging from real teachers working with students in classrooms, this book shepherds readers into reimagining an 'expected curriculum' that carefully examines what is taught and why in a complex political landscape. Curriculum scholars interested in deepening their understanding and knowledge of the micro-, meso-, and macrolevel issues that influence students’ opportunities to learn should read this book!”
—H. Richard Milner IV, University of Pittsburgh
“Brian Schultz has done it again. His unique ability to realistically and informatively engage with teachers about curriculum that inspires students’ learning is exceptional.”
—Carl Grant, University of Wisconsin-Madison
"In this inspirational and invaluable book, Brian Schultz and a group of invigorating teachers, scholars, and activists invite us to keep the interests of our students at heart. It calls on us to teach with courage, hope, and love in spite of the increasingly oppressive demands, absurdities, and impossibilities we experience daily in this trembling world." --Ming Fang He, Georgia Southern University
