Engaging Young Children with Informational Books

A Developmental Approach to Educating Young Children

Denise H. Daniels and Patricia K. Clarkson

Transforming Teaching and Learning Through Data-Driven Decision Making

Ellen B. Mandinach and Sharnell S. Jackson

An Interpersonal Approach to Classroom Management: Strategies for Improving Student Engagement

Heather A. Davis, Jessica J. Summers, and Lauren M. Miller

Engaging Young Children With Informational Books

Helen Patrick and Panayota Mantzicopoulos

Division 15, Educational Psychology, of the American Psychological Association and Corwin partnered to create the Classroom Insights from Educational Psychology series for teachers in an effort to reduce the widening gap between research and theory on learning, teaching, and classroom practice. Educational psychology is a discipline that seeks to understand the integration among human development and learning, classroom learning environments and instructional strategies, and student learning and assessment. In this way, the field of educational psychology is among the most relevant and applicable for teachers.

Although we have seen great advances in our understanding of student learning and instructional practices over the last decade, these advances are not highly visible in today's classrooms, preservice and graduate teacher education programs, or professional development for teachers. Consequently, classroom practice for the most part does not seem to be highly influenced by current research and theory in educational psychology. Yet there are international calls for “scientifically based practices,” “research-based methods,” or “evidence-based decisions” in our schools. As part of the solution to this problem, this series of short, easily accessible [Page viii]books for teachers is designed to synthesize in-depth, high-quality research to be used in a variety of educational settings, and it is endorsed by Division 15.

As the Classroom Insights series evolves from its first volumes under founding editor Dr. Barbara McCombs, we as editors continue to work with teachers and researchers to identify the topics that are most relevant to educators. We are guided by research that honors the highest quality learning environments with practices proven to support all students, help them succeed in their schooling, and sustain their love of learning. The goals of this series are threefold:

• To give practicing and preservice teachers access to current advances in research and theory on classroom teaching and learning in an easily understood and usable form
• To align educator preparation, graduate study, and professional development with current advances in research and theory, which have not been widely shared with teachers
• To highlight how the most effective teaching practices are based upon a substantial research base and created within classrooms, rather than applied in a “one-size-fits-all” or “silver-bullet” approach across classrooms

Classroom Insights provides a series of specialized books to inform teaching and learning in PK–12 classrooms by focusing on what is most important and relevant to today's teachers. In some volumes, the applications are limited to specific age levels or characteristics of students, while in most volumes the ideas can be broadly applied across PK–12 settings. Classroom strategies are integrated throughout every book, and each one includes a wide array of resources for teachers to use to study their practices and improve student achievement and classroom learning environments. Finally, many of these research-based applications will be new [Page ix]approaches and frameworks that have never been published in a series for teachers.

As series editors, our goal is to provide the most up-to-date professional series of teacher resources for connecting teachers with the highest quality and most relevant research in our field of educational psychology. We have planned for every page to provide useful insights for teachers into their current practices to transform classroom learning for their students, themselves, and their school communities.