Stirring the Head, Heart, and Soul: Redefining Curriculum, Instruction, and Concept-Based Learning

If you are serious about teaching for deep understanding this is perhaps the most important book you could ever read. It has influenced my teaching more than any other book I have ever read. Lynn Erickson explains how to place concepts in the centre of your lesson planning in a way which ensures that you will be planning experiences for your students that have the highest probability of helping them deepen their conceptual understanding of the world around them in a way that lends itself to generalizing and conditionalizing knowledge. Knowledge learned in this way is more likely to be transferable, and what more noble goal for teachers in the 21st century could there be than transfer. The speed of technological change and the exponential growth of information mean that our students are going to face a world that we cannot even begin to imagine. Teaching facts for their own sake should have ended years ago, but sadly is still common in our schools. Lynn Erickson is a veritable goddess when it comes to helping teachers move forward in learning to teach the thinking skills and understandings necessary for the 21st Century. If you read one book about creating curriculum for your students, make it this one.