Teach Like a Champion: 49 Techniques that Put Students on the Path to College

I am an experienced educator who has been a teacher, assistant principal and principal. This book put together in a complete package what I believe good teaching looks like for all students. Not only do you get detailed ideas on strategies, but you receive video clips to help you see what it should look like in a classroom. The book covers all parts of a classroom from questioning techniques to classroom management. In addition, the book emphasizes what I have always believed which is all teachers are reading teachers. I will be using this book as a basis for staff development for my staff for the end of this year and next year. I have already ordered it for all of my teachers. I am thrilled to have in my possession a book that finally will help me help my teachers and move my students to the level that I know they can achieve. Thanks for writing the book Mr. Lemov. Rebecca Dahl

This is a must have for new teachers. I can not say this strongly enough. The tips given in this book will put you on the road to success with simple attention to how you run your classroom. I am a retired teacher of 40 years!

You simply won't find a more usable, clear-headed break down of the moves that great teachers use everyday to drive academic achievement in schools that serve low-income kids. I've been training and coaching teachers for the past 10 years, and there's nothing out there that holds a candle to Doug Lemov's work. The key is that Lemov's stuff is highly observable and practiceable. As a teacher or a teacher coach, you can put your finger on specific actions that were or were not taken -- and then you can practice those actions -- literally out loud, in the mirror, with a partner -- to make measurable improvements in the next lesson you teach. Most teacher education deals in the realm of the abstract or the long-term. Lemov's material has tremendous long-term benefits and a powerful, cohesive philosophical underpinning -- just like some of the things you learn in a traditional Ed School setting. But he makes these abstract ideas actionable and repeatable. And it's the combination of "get better now" while working toward a long-term vision of great teaching that makes this book absolutely indispensible. Essential.

This book takes the incredibly complex art of teaching and breaks it down into clear, simple, easy to replicate techniques. It does a tremendous job--better than any resource I have found of explaining what makes great teachers great--and demonstrating how aspiring great teachers can progress. Part of the beauty of Teach Like a Champion is how clearly structured and organized it is. You'll find yourself saying time and again while reading a section, "Oh yeah..." You'll think back to many of the best teachers you've had and see many of their strengths and skills in the techniques that Lemov describes. As a relatively young teacher myself (I've been doing it for 6 years), I've already found ideas in this book that have immediately improved my class. If you're an experienced teacher, if you're a brand new teacher, if you're thinking of becoming a teacher, even if you're simply somebody who's interested in how people achieve greatness in a field, buy this book! You won't regret it.

This book spells out in detail so many things that you've been told, heard, sort of know or have stumbled onto in teaching. But, instead of just suggesting a broad strategy (ask a question before choosing who will answer it, for instance), it really drills down into all the different ways to ask questions, how to plan ahead so that students know whether you want a class response or an individual response, how to decide if you want hands up or down, and the pros and cons of each. These are the specifics I realized I needed once I had my own classroom -- and by then it's harder to observe other teachers and harder to get ideas. Observations are wasted on student teachers! It's the new teachers that really know what they need to look for and the questions they want answered. So far (I'm about halfway, because it definitely requires that you stop, think and process some of the distinctions and differences he makes between techniques), this book is exactly that resource.