Resources > Reading List

Boys' education
  • Teaching the Male Brain: How Boys Think, Feel & Learn in School: This book is a practical guide to teaching boys, combining classic and cutting-edge research to show you why boys learn differently than girls, and how  teachers can help the boys in their classroom succeed.
  • He'll Be OK: Growing Gorgeous Boys into Good Men: How do you raise boys to men in a world where trouble beckons at every turn? How do you make sure they learn the 'right' lessons, stay out of danger, find a path to follow? How do you ensure they'll be OK?Celia reveals what goes on inside the world of boys. With clarity and insight, she offers parents - especially mothers - practical and reassuring advice on raising their boys to become good, loving, articulate men.
  • I Can Learn From You: Boys as Relational Learners: The book shows how teachers can help boys form productive learning relationships and how schools can support the development of teachers’ relational capacities. At the heart of the book is the belief that educators must—and can—put relational teaching at the center of school life.
  • Real Boys: Rescuing our Sons from the Myths of Boyhood: Based on William Pollack's groundbreaking research at Harvard Medical School over two decades, Real Boys explores this generation's "silent crisis": why many boys are sad, lonely, and confused although they may appear tough, cheerful, and confident. Pollack challenges conventional expectations about manhood and masculinity that encourage parents to treat boys as little men, raising them through a toughening process that drives their true emotions underground. ​

Engagement and motivation
  • Active Lessons Active Brains : Co-authored by Abigail James with Sandra Allison and Caitlin McKenzie, this workbook was created to help teachers effectively teach the experiential learners in their classrooms.
  • Blended: Using Disruptive Innovation to Improve Schools: Blended is the practical field guide for implementing blended learning techniques in K-12 classrooms. A follow-up to the bestseller Disrupting Class by Clayton M. Christensen, Michael Horn, and Curtis Johnson, this hands-on guide expands upon the blended learning ideas presented in that book to provide practical implementation guidance for educators seeking to incorporate online learning with traditional classroom time.

Experiential education
  • Learning together: Kolb's experiential theory and its application: This paper aims to make a limited contribution to Kolb's Experiential Learning Theory. An evaluation has been made of an empirically based personal narrative of the author's experiences, reflections and problems as an instructor of a management elective course at the undergraduate level. The paper examines the process of reflection, correction and learning from the perspective of the instructor and how the issue of race and origin of the student learners' can stimulate or hinder assimilation of knowledge within a classroom. The study reveals that it is essential for an educator to be critically reflective of his/her culture and that of his/her students to be able to assess their learning styles and adopt suitable and appropriate teaching pedagogies within the classroom. This paper draws attention towards types of teaching pedagogies, non traditional methods and aids and their effectiveness in educating students of diverse backgrounds. It provides insights about diversity within classrooms and its impact on teaching, pedagogies and learning styles of both educators and students, by portraying the journey of an educator and her process of self improvement.
  • Applying Kolb's experiential learning cycle for laboratory education: This paper describes a model for laboratory education based on Kolb's experiential learning theory. The method is implemented using modern teaching technologies and a combination of remote, virtual, and hands‐on laboratory sessions and have been applied to the teaching of the undergraduate process control laboratory at the Chemical Engineering Department at Loughborough University, United Kingdom. An argument that poor learning in the laboratory is due to insufficient activation of the prehension dimension of Kolb's cycle was suggested and verified, providing a pedagogical explanation. The quantitative analysis showed significant enhancement of the learning outcomes of the experimental group compared with the control group. Apart from the hands‐on session, the proposed model involves additional activities, such as pre‐ and post‐lab tests and virtual laboratory sessions, which are associated with Kolb's cycle to facilitate constructivist learning. The paper provides the first laboratory education model that builds thoroughly on Kolb's experiential learning theory.​

Expert teaching
  • How We Learn: The Surprising Truth About When, Where, and Why It Happens: In How We Learn, award-winning science reporter Benedict Carey sifts through decades of education research and landmark studies to uncover the truth about how our brains absorb and retain information. What he discovers is that, from the moment we are born, we are all learning quickly, efficiently, and automatically; but in our zeal to systematize the process we have ignored valuable, naturally enjoyable learning tools like forgetting, sleeping, and daydreaming. Is a dedicated desk in a quiet room really the best way to study? Can altering your routine improve your recall? Are there times when distraction is good? Is repetition necessary? Carey’s search for answers to these questions yields a wealth of strategies that make learning more a part of our everyday lives—and less of a chore.
  • Make It Stick: The Science of Successful Learning: To most of us, learning something "the hard way" implies wasted time and effort. Good teaching, we believe, should be creatively tailored to the different learning styles of students and should use strategies that make learning easier. Make It Stick turns fashionable ideas like these on their head. Drawing on recent discoveries in cognitive psychology and other disciplines, the authors offer concrete techniques for becoming more productive learners.

Design Thinking and Creativity
  • Launch: Using Design Thinking to Boost Creativity and Bring Out the Maker in Every Student: Educators John Spencer and A.J. Juliani know firsthand the challenges teachers face every day: School can be busy. Materials can be scarce. The creative process can seem confusing. Curriculum requirements can feel limiting. Those challenges too often bully creativity, pushing it to the side as an "enrichment activity" that gets put off or squeezed into the tiniest time block. We can do better. We must do better if we're going to prepare students for their future.
  • Creative Development: Transforming Education through Design Thinking, Innovation, and Invention: In Creative Development: Transforming Education through Design Thinking, Innovation, and Invention, Robert Kelly equips educators with the theory, strategies, and tactics that allow creativity to flourish. Creative Development features voices from the field to showcase practical, real-life examples of successfully fostering creative development in education.

Character and Care
  • Character Matters: How to Help Our Children Develop Good Judgment, Integrity, and Other Essential Virtue: Succeeding in life takes character, and Lickona shows how irresponsible and destructive behavior can invariably be traced to the absence of good character and its ten essential qualities: wisdom, justice, fortitude, self-control, love, a positive attitude, hard work, integrity, gratitude, and humility.
  • How to Raise Kind Kids: And Get Respect, Gratitude, and a Happier Family in the Bargain: We all want our kids to be kind. But that is not the same as knowing what to do when you catch your son being unkind.  A world-renowned developmental psychologist, Dr. Thomas Lickona has led the character education movement in schools for forty years. Now he shares with parents the vital tools they need to bring peace and foster cooperation at home. Kindness doesn’t stand on its own. It needs a supporting cast of other essential virtues—like courage, self-control, respect, and gratitude.
  • A Framework for Character Education in Schools: The Framework for Character Education in Schools sets out the Jubilee Centre's position on character education and calls for all schools to be explicit about how they develop the character virtues of their students
  • ​​Schools of Character: Schools of Character showcases seven schools, both private and state, that make character education a conscious part of their day to day practice through a variety of approaches.