The Creative Teaching and Learning Toolkit (Practical Teaching Guides)

ReviewThis book is timely and refreshingly engaging. Forget your preconceptions of collage and mime; this book looks at 360º creativity, from the perspectives of pupils, teachers and school systems. This book is about real change, not just about new teaching initiatives. In the introduction it identifies creativity as the principle factor that binds together all effective teachers; and states loudly and clearly that effective teaching enables better learning. Having acknowledged this, the book becomes a blueprint for teachers who wish to push themselves and the system to create significantly better opportunities and outcomes for children and young people. At one level it provides practical pedagogic approaches to exploit and enhance pupils' creativity; such as encouraging pupils to generate and share analogies and metaphors relevant to them when they learn new concepts and processes. At another level it outlines creative approaches which can be employed to change the climate for learning by translating values into action, for example with respect to the ways that teachers communicate with pupils. Attention is also paid to teachers' learning; promoting an understanding of the qualities of effective teachers, and highlighting the value of creative and reflective thinking in individual and school development. The book concludes with a valuable self-evaluation tool (also found on the CDRom accompanying the book), and a glossary of buzz-words. (Rachel Lofthouse, Learning & Teaching Update)"Whether you are a student teacher starting out, or an experienced teacher looking to spruce up your teaching methods, then The Creative Teaching and Learning Toolkit needs to be on your bookshelf... It has an impecible pedigree, being built of the pioneering work of Eric Jensen, Colin Rose, Alistair Smith and Barry Teare, and places creativity and innovation at the heart of teaching and learning but is still 'rooted in academic rigour'... This is the beauty of this co-authored book; it brings together the best teaching approaches aligned with performance coaching, so that being creative in the classroom becomes natural for both teacher and learner."Classroom, Spring 2008Listed as the 9th out of the 10 top titles for newly qualified teachersHeadteacher Update, 1 January 2009 (Lisa Donegan)'A larger and an extremely diverse collection of activity ideas.' (The Teacher Trainer)This book is timely and refreshingly engaging. Forget your preconceptions of collage and mime; this book looks at 360º creativity, from the perspectives of pupils, teachers and school systems. This book is about real change, not just about new teaching initiatives. In the introduction it identifies creativity as the principle factor that binds together all effective teachers; and states loudly and clearly that effective teaching enables better learning. Having acknowledged this, the book becomes a blueprint for teachers who wish to push themselves and the system to create significantly better opportunities and outcomes for children and young people. At one level it provides practical pedagogic approaches to exploit and enhance pupils’ creativity; such as encouraging pupils to generate and share analogies and metaphors relevant to them when they learn new concepts and processes. At another level it outlines creative approaches which can be employed to change the climate for learning by translating values into action, for example with respect to the ways that teachers communicate with pupils. Attention is also paid to teachers’ learning; promoting an understanding of the qualities of effective teachers, and highlighting the value of creative and reflective thinking in individual and school development. The book concludes with a valuable self-evaluation tool (also found on the CDRom accompanying the book), and a glossary of buzz-words. (Sanford Lakoff)Listed as the 9th out of the 10 top titles for newly qualified teachersHeadteacher Update, 1 January 2009 (Sanford