Classroom Habitudes

by Angela Maiers

Is it possible to teach students the learning habits and attitudes it takes for them to become 21st century learners, critical thinkers, and successful members of the workforce after graduating? Yes! And this book includes lessons and lesson plans teachers can implement right now!

Genres: Education, Professional Development, Nonfiction, Teaching, School

156 pages, Paperback

First published December 3, 2008

Reviews

[Joy Kirr · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is what teachers need if they want to know how to teach PEOPLE. This book tells you - with explicit lessons if you’d like - how to teach students traits / habitudes that they will need to be successful humans. It is not about content or a subject area, and yet it is ALL about your content. If you want your students to grow up to be fabulous people, you want to start with this book. It is the most closely aligned to what I’m trying to accomplish during Genius Hour than any other book I’ve read so far (but I still haven’t read DRIVE by Daniel Pink, and I hear that’s a hot one)! My biggest take-away is the questions she asks near the start... What will students remember most about their time in my classroom and with me? What legacy do I wish to leave? And after every week, I need to be asking, “What is the most important thing that I tried to teach my students this week?” Maybe more importantly, I need to put in my plans, “What is the most important thing I need to try to teach my students this week?”

[Hanna · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is intended for grade school learners and teachers of those learners, and so I'm going to guess that the annoying tone in which the book was written was in part due to the intended audience. But in all seriousness, the first few chapters and concluding thoughts [as well as many of the lessons] read more like self help than pedagogy. I'm not going to even go into how over-quoted Einstein is [without even the decency to go to a reliable work on him- she cites brainyquote.com in her bibliography].

That leads me to another issue with this text- the vast majority of her claims about the habitudes are unsubstantiated with even weak evidence. She openly snub-nosed research in her conclusion.

Finally, the content of the book itself, which rich with feel-good ideas, falls apart at the lesson level. While I understand that educators can be reasonably expected to take lessons and make them work together, shouldn't a book of lessons themselves already do that? The lessons generally to not fit together from one stage onto the next- and while she claims that the children are going to learn these things for themselves, she does not really implement inductive pedagogy. As for the model lectures throughout the book [besides being incredibly self-centered] are extremely condescending [to both teachers and pupils].

Those are my major criticisms- yet I will not totally discount this book because its focus on holistic teaching is important and I guess this could be one approach to "teaching the whole child".

[Cynthia · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this for a book study at school, and I learned a lot from it. There are many sentences I wanted to highlight!

[Marcia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Concrete ways to bring key 21st Century Skills into the classroom.

[Mark Moran · Rating 5 out of 5]

As someone who is writing his own book for teachers and students, I've found that an understanding of the Classroom Habitudes is essential to helping people learn. We must set the conditions for learning; just as a student who is tired, hungry or emotional upset will find it difficult to learn, so will a student who lacks curiosity or imagination or self-awareness.

In this book, Angela Maiers describes 7 essential habitudes that teachers should model and students must acquire and practice, in order to create optimal learning conditions. The book provides dozens of easy-to-use lesson plans and activities that make it easy to implement.

[Jenni · Rating 3 out of 5]

If you are new to the idea of habitudes a.k.a. learning dispositions, Habits of Mind, practice standards, etc. then this book would be 5 stars...easy to read & great ideas for getting started.

If you are more experienced with this concept, the book certainly has some ideas to add to your collection. I especially appreciated the bibliographies at the end for books to use with kids as well as with teachers. However, most of this ground has been covered by other folks such as Art Costa's Habits of Mind.

[Ted Mallory · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've been teaching for 20 years and in all that time the main thing I've heard teachers beg for in professional development is how to motivate students. Instead we get aligning to standards & preparing for standardized testing. Now, FINALLY, Angela Maiers offers practical, meaningful ways to help kids actually value and desire to become lifelong learners. If more schools would adopt this program, tests might mean something. Results are bound to be skewed and inaccurate so long as students don't want to learn and don't care about the tests results.

[Lorelle · Rating 3 out of 5]

Angela Maiers obviously feels strongly about teaching attitudes that make positive changes in the lives of her students. The seven habitudes she teaches are imagination, curiosity,self-awareness, perserverance, courage, and adaptability. Her book is laid out simply and has distinct lesson examples that can be adapted to even the youngest children. There are adults that could use a good dose of many of these habitudes!

[Beth Robertson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Valuable insights for beginning a new school year and community of learners.

[Katie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Phenomenal classroom resource that will shape my future encounters with students!