Learn Like a Pirate: Empower Your Students to Collaborate, Lead, and Succeed - Softcover

Solarz, Paul

Softcover

ISBN 10: 098821766X ISBN 13: 9780988217669

Publisher: Dave Burgess Consulting, Incorporated, 2015

Synopsis

Collaboration. Empowerment. Student Leadership. These buzz words get a lot of press, but what do they really mean for today's students? Can students really handle the responsibility of leading the class? Can they actually learn what they need to if they are working together so often? Won't all this freedom cause chaos in the classroom? Not if you're teaching them to learn like PIRATES! Peer Collaboration builds community and supports teamwork and cooperation. Improvement-focused learning challenges students to constantly strive to be their best. Responsibility for daily tasks builds ownership in the classroom. Active learning turns boring lessons into fun and memorable experiences. Twenty-first century skills engage students now and prepare them for their futures. Empowerment allows students to become confident risk-takers who make bold decisions. In Learn Like a PIRATE, teachers will discover practical strategies for creating a student-led classroom in which students are inspired and empowered to take charge of their learning experience. You'll learn strategies for: - Crafting active, relevant, and interesting lessons - Creating opportunities for student leadership - Providing effective and beneficial feedback - Instilling confidence so students can take risks - Increasing curiosity and passion for learning Incorporate the techniques and strategies Paul Solarz uses in his student-led classroom and watch your students transform into confident, collaborative leaders.

About this title

About the Author

Paul Solarz has been teaching at Westgate Elementary School in Arlington Heights, Illinois, since 1999.  He advocates for student-centered teaching practices and a focus on 21st Century skills attainment.  Fortunately for Paul, his school and district administration have given him the autonomy to take risks and be innovative over the years. This has led to his unique style of teaching and the motivation to share his strategies with the broader education community. 

Recently, Paul was named a Top 50 Finalist for the Varkey GEMS Global Teacher Prize.  The Global Teacher Award seeks to do for education what the Nobel Prize has done for science, literature, and peace.  He was also named the 2014 Educator of the Year by ICE (Illinois Computing Educators) for his work with integrating technology effectively in his classroom.  He earned his masters degree in Curriculum and Instruction from Illinois State University and is a National Board Certified Teacher.  He also earned his bachelor's degree in Elementary Education from Winona State University in Minnesota.

Check out the Learn Like a PIRATE website with additional resources at learnlikeapirate.com/

Review

"For learning to be relevant and meaningful in the eyes of students today school experiences need to be more learner centric. Paul Solarz has crafted the perfect guide to help invigorate classroom learning experiences to empower students to take ownership over their learning."
- Eric Sheninger, Senior Fellow at the International Center for Leadership in Education and author of Digital Leadership

"Would your class fall apart without you? Could your students learn if you didn't speak for an entire day? In Learn Like a PIRATE, Paul Solarz shares methods you can use to create a student-led classroom -- and prepare your students for a lifetime of self-led learning."
- Daniel H. Pink, author of Drive and A Whole New Mind

"While many teachers tend to be at the helm of the ship, Learn Like a PIRATE is a model for teaching from the crow's nest: having a clear vantage point of the class and its direction, but letting students steer their learning. Paul has recaptured the "pirate" spirit in his own way. Diving into the activities of his classroom, we see how students take charge of their learning--and how daring teachers make it happen."
- Angela Maiers, Founder of Choose2Matter and author of The Passion Driven Classroom and Classroom Habitudes

There are countless books and articles on how to change school systems to pave the way for 21st Century Education, and most of them are, at best, wishful thinking for an implicitly distant future. Paul Solarz's book is invaluable in that it tells the real life story of how he is doing that right now in his classroom.
- Gabriel Rshaid, Professional Development Associate at The Leadership and Learning Center and author of The 21st-Century Classroom

About this edition

• Publisher: Dave Burgess Consulting, Incorporated
• Publication date: 2015
• ISBN 10: 098821766X
• ISBN 13: 9780988217669
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 274