PRODUCTS

Social studies education over its hundred-year history has often focused on predominantly white and male narratives. This has not only been detrimental to the increasingly diverse population of the U.S., but it has also meant that social studies as a field of scholarship has systematically excluded and marginalized the voices, teaching, and research of women, scholars of color, queer scholars, and scholars whose politics challenge the dominant traditions of history, geography, economics, and civics education.

Insurgent Social Studies intervenes in the field of social studies education by highlighting those whose work has often been deemed “too radical.” Insurgent Social Studies is essential reading to all researchers and practitioners in social studies, and is perfect as an adopted text in the social studies curriculum at Colleges of Education.

Perfect for courses such as:  Foundations of Education │ Social Studies Methods │ Multicultural Education │ Critical Studies of Education │ Culturally Relevant Pedagogy │ Social Education

Those who are younger continue to be objects of injustice and inequity; those who are younger, people of color, females, and human beings living in poverty have never been included in equitable performances of justice, care, respect, and fairness.

The authors in this international volume use existing social values and institutions--and the strengths of these varied perspectives--to address justice in ways that have not previously been considered. The aim is to create more just worlds for those who are young--as well as for the rest of us.

The first set of chapters, Bodies, Beings, and Relations in More Just Worlds, place at the forefront the lives of those who are younger who are commonly situated in positions of invisibility, disqualification, and even erasure. In the second section, Performances of Care and Education for More Just Worlds, the authors acknowledge that needed (re)conceptualizations of those who are younger, along with appreciation for human diversity and entanglements between the so-called human and nonhuman worlds, are the foundations for more just care and education environments. From the critique of neoliberal reform discourses to reconceptualizing human relations with nonhuman animal and material worlds, care and learning environments are rethought. The set of chapters in the final section, Stir of Echoes: 20th Century Childhoods in the 21st, take-up the 20th century critical concerns with constructions of “child” that have dominated and continue to govern perspectives imposed on those who are younger. Suggestions for becoming-with those who are younger through resources like reconceptualist scholarship, Black and Indigenous Studies, and various posthuman perspectives are provided throughout.

Whatever the emphasis or focus of a section or chapter, throughout the volume is the recognition that dominant discourses (e.g. neoliberal capitalism, conservativism, progressivism, human exceptionalism) and the policies they create (and that facilitate them), influence possibilities for, and limitations to, more just childhood worlds. Therefore, each section includes chapters that address these complex discourses and policy issues. The reader is invited to engage with these complexities, to become-with the various texts, and to generate unthought possibilities for childhoods in more just worlds.

Perfect for courses such as: Curriculum Theory │ Multicultural Education │ Cultural Knowledge of Teachers and Teaching │ Sociocultural Foundations │ Anthropology of Education │ Identity, Agency, and Education │ Race and Ethnic Relations in Schools │ Philosophical Foundations of Education │ Educational Epistemologies │ Theorizing and Researching Teaching and Learning │ Qualitative Research in Education: Paradigms, Theories, and Exemplars │ Epistemologies and Theories in Multicultural and Equity Studies │ Curricular Approaches to Multicultural and Equity Studies in Education │ Culturally Relevant Pedagogy (3) │ Multicultural and Global Perspectives in Teaching and Learning │ Teaching for Social Justice │ Diversity and Equity in Education │ 21st Century Childhood Curriculum │ Childhood and Globalization

A 2022 SPE Outstanding Book Honorable Mention

Improvement Science: Promoting Equity in Schools is intended for classroom teachers, school leaders, and district leaders charged with leading improvement efforts in schools. From questions such as “how do I develop a love of reading in my classroom?” to “how can I better manage student behavior during independent learning time?” to “what should we do to make sure kids of all races read at grade level by 3rd grade” to “how could we include families of all backgrounds as partners in learning” or “how do we increase our graduation rate among underserved students," this book shares real-life examples from those who are currently leading equity-focused improvement in our classrooms and schools. If you are curious about how Improvement Science has been used, or how others have succeeded—or failed—at equity-focused improvement efforts in our classrooms and in our schools, or if you’re wondering how to spur discussions in school districts, universities, and communities about leading equity-focused improvement, this book is for you. Teachers, students, family members, community members, principals and superintendents will be inspired to embrace Improvement Science as a method to improve equity in their schools.

The book helps people new to Improvement Science to understand the basic steps to implement the process. If you’re a beginner, it provides some basic steps and a resource (https://www.carnegiefoundation.org/our-ideas/six-core-principles-improvement/) to help you understand the process better; for those with some experience, the book will be an excellent refresher and tool with functional suggestions to take your practice further.

1.       Form a Team.

2.       Examine Data.

3.       Ask Why.

4.       Read Research.

5.       Get Perspective of Those Closest to the Problem.

6.       Plan the Change.

Click HERE to watch the Pedagogies of With-ness book discussion.

Navigating Media Literacy: A Pedagogical Tour of Disneyland is an education playbook applied to the vast mediated universe of Disney. Readers of all ages can critically apply media literacy principles while still conscientiously participating as consumer-citizens, media creators, and agents of change. Media literacy is defined throughout this book as an instructional method rather than a political movement.

The book counterbalances the frequently myopic critiques of cultural scholars and the critical exemption granted by those across the world who find Disney to be a source of great pleasure. Integrated theory and practical examples allow readers to investigate of themselves and draw their own conclusions based on real inquisitive, observatory, and creative experiences that constitute media literacy (access, analyze, evaluate, create, reflect and act). Each chapter is ideologically mapped to an actual physical realm of Disneyland (e.g., Main Street, USA; Adventureland; Tomorrowland; Frontierland; Fantasyland). Each site provides a pedagogical playground for experimenting with each media literacy concept (e.g., context, audience, language, ownership, representation). The reader will come away with a deeper pedagogical understanding of how to cultivate media literacy using any context or subject—not just Disney. Each chapter includes discursive excerpts from students, along with assignments, discussion prompts, and classroom exercises, making it a valuable resource as a classroom textbook.

Perfect for courses such as: Media Literacy | Communication and Media Arts | Film Studies | Media History | Transmedia Studies | Business | Marketing

For the past 35 years, Scott Mandel has been teaching students in an urban Los Angeles school district. In addition, he instructs teachers in professional development courses. In those classes, he’s known for telling stories—stories gleaned from his time spent in the classroom. Classrooms in the Real World is a collection of many of those stories, presented as a set of teachable moments—a practical how-to book for new teachers, one based on interacting with kids on a daily basis. Rather than providing educational theories about what should be, Mandel shares real-life stories of how to relate to your students, administrators and parents, along with his thoughts on how to deal with the multiple curricular and classroom challenges that all teachers face in the real world. Chapters such as "Kids Don't Care How Much You Know As Long As They Know You Care," "Take Curricular Chances," "Administrators Want You To Succeed," "Keeping My Sanity All These Years," and “What Have I Learned” will give you the reader practical ideas, philosophies and encouragement from a long-time classroom teacher, someone still in the classroom sharing the lived experience of teaching in today’s school environment.

Perfect for courses such as: Introduction to Teaching | Classroom Management | Student Teaching

This extensive overview first surveys the history of general education in the United States. It discusses how the recommendations of stakeholder groups have shaped general education in recent decades. Subsequent chapters detail best practices and findings in the assessment of student learning as it relates to the general education curriculum across institutional types. The discussion then turns to the larger impact of general education on culture and society as students navigate life beyond the undergraduate experience. The final chapters will provide insight into how various institutions are innovating through the general education curriculum, as well as a discussion on the keys to maintaining the relevancy of this curriculum throughout the 21st century and beyond.

Perfect for courses such as:
Assessment of Student Learning | Higher Education Administration
Academic Issues in Higher Education | Introduction to/Foundations of Higher Education

A 2020 SPE Outstanding Book Award Honorable Mention

Many people believe that “education” has a disproportionately negative effect on them and those close to them. With so much wealth, technological prowess, innovation, and economic development, why do we still have marginalization, social inequalities, conflict, mass incarceration and generational poverty?

The connection to democracy, Education for Democracy (EfD) and social justice is, for Carr and Thésée, clear, and this volume interweaves a narrative within these themes based on a Freirian theoretical backdrop. This book presents a vision for transformative education and EfD, seeking to cultivate, stimulate and support political and media literacy, critical engagement and a re-conceptualization of what education is, and, importantly, how it can address entrenched, systemic and institutional problems that plague society. Based on over a decade of empirical research in a range of contexts and jurisdictions, the authors strive to link teaching and learning with agency, solidarity, action and transformative change within the conceptual framework of a critically-engaged EfD.   

Perfect for courses in: Sociology of Education; Social Justice and Education; Democracy and Civics; Community Engagement; Education Policy; Service Learning; Education Reform; Citizenship Education; Transformative Education; Politics of Education.

This new release of the classic text Pragmatism is absolutely timely. James' seminal statement of pragmatism's underpinnings and its treatment of essential philosophical questions (the nature of truth; the one and the many; free will; etc.) could not come at a more appropriate time. In a “post-truth” era of fake news, alternative facts, and a belief that "truth isn't truth," James' presentation of pragmatism as a method of adjudicating truth-claims is a must-read.

Perfect for courses in: Philosophy of Education (Graduate Level), American Philosophy (Graduate and Upper-Level Undergraduate), American Studies, Special topics class on William James or Pragmatism, Sociology of Education (Graduate Level), Religious Studies.