CCSSO State Consortium on Educator Effectiveness scee.groupsite.com

As a continuation of the new blog series, Irv Richardson, the newest member of the Educator Workforce team as the Program Director for Shared and Effective Leadership, suggests the following books as good "summer reads" or "listen tos."

1.       Your Brain at Work: Strategies for Overcoming Distraction, Regaining Focus, and Working Smarter All Day Long  by David Rock

Did you ever wonder why you are so productive at certain times of the day and at other times even the simple projects make you feel like you are walking in quicksand? In this book, David Rock, uses neuroscience research to explore why we often feel mentally exhausted and how we might re-organize our work to take advantage of when we are most mentally productive. It explains why it is sometimes hard to focus. It offers insights into how to collaborate with, and influence, others.  With the multiple demands placed upon our time and our mental energies as educators, this book provides insights into how we might restructure our approach to work in order to be more productive and have work be less stressful.

2.       Trust in Schools: A Core Resource for Improvement Anthony S. Bryk and Barbara Schneider

In this book, Bryk and Schneider use their research from reform efforts in the Chicago Public Schools to explore the idea that the amount of trust among adults in a school has a great impact on the education that these same adults provide for children attending the school. The book explains different types of research on the role of trust in schools.  The importance of trust is another lens through which we can look at the resources we have in schools. It can help us to reconsider the ways in which we interact with others and the effect that these interactions can have on school reform.

3.       The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business Charles Duhigg

In The Power of Habit, Charles Duhigg uses scientific research to examine how our brains create habits and how these habits can be an advantage, or disadvantage, to our daily lives.  The book explains in detail how you can replace negative habits with more positive ones.  Duhigg not only discusses the habits of individuals but also considers that habits that businesses and societies develop and how these habits can be altered. The insights from this book can be applied to schools to examine the habits we form in our schools and the ways that we might go about changing the negative ones.