Connie Hamilton

Support, celebrate, and grow your best teachers so that they stay in your school and continue to have maximum impact. Burnout and teacher turnover are on the rise, yet we often spend more of our energy on the underperformers. In this powerful book from bestselling authors Todd Whitaker, Connie Hamilton, Joseph Jones, and T. J. Vari, you'll learn why it’s crucial to recognize your best teachers, going beyond superficial gestures of appreciation and investing in them in deeper ways. The authors show school leaders how to identify their best teachers and then reveal strategies for supporting them, including recognizing the value-cost of teachers’ time; prioritizing appreciation; controlling the narrative; tailoring professional learning; helping teachers grow through peer observations as well as beyond the school; applying data informed feedback; and nurturing self- and collective-efficacy. Each chapter begins with a powerful story, an overview of our blind spots, strategies on what we should invest in, and how to ensure that the whole school profits from your efforts. There’s also an Initial Deposits feature that provides a quick, tangible way to get started with each idea. With the helpful models, tips, and tricks in this book, you won’t just be inspired to make a change but will be well equipped to take action. As your best teachers get better-and-better, your students and the entire school culture will benefit!

Support, celebrate, and grow your best teachers so that they stay in your school and continue to have maximum impact. Burnout and teacher turnover are on the rise, yet we often spend more of our energy on the underperformers. In this powerful book from bestselling authors Todd Whitaker, Connie Hamilton, Joseph Jones, and T. J. Vari, you'll learn why it’s crucial to recognize your best teachers, going beyond superficial gestures of appreciation and investing in them in deeper ways. The authors show school leaders how to identify their best teachers and then reveal strategies for supporting them, including recognizing the value-cost of teachers’ time; prioritizing appreciation; controlling the narrative; tailoring professional learning; helping teachers grow through peer observations as well as beyond the school; applying data informed feedback; and nurturing self- and collective-efficacy. Each chapter begins with a powerful story, an overview of our blind spots, strategies on what we should invest in, and how to ensure that the whole school profits from your efforts. There’s also an Initial Deposits feature that provides a quick, tangible way to get started with each idea. With the helpful models, tips, and tricks in this book, you won’t just be inspired to make a change but will be well equipped to take action. As your best teachers get better-and-better, your students and the entire school culture will benefit!

Group work is a staple of the modern classroom, but it can be difficult to get students engaged and working together effectively. Connie Hamilton provides 11 proven strategies for designing and managing student collaborative teams, including: Design student groups so they are all engaged and contribute to the team's learning. Use a variety of grouping strategies to ensure that all students have the opportunity to participate and contribute. Accommodate lessons to help introverts be more comfortable in social learning tasks. Give introverts opportunities to contribute in ways that are comfortable for them, such as writing or presenting their work individually. Foster productive listening and questioning to elevate student talk. Teach students how to listen attentively and ask clarifying questions. Develop activities that encourage self-awareness and allow students to learn from resources and each other and depend less on you. Give students opportunities to reflect on their own learning and to learn from each other. Set up protocols that support interdependence and student ownership of their learning. Create a culture of collaboration in your classroom and teach students how to work together effectively. Accurately assess individual student's content knowledge, group communication and collaboration skills. Use a variety of assessment strategies to track student progress and to provide feedback on their group work. With these strategies, you can create a classroom where students are engaged, accountable, and cooperative.

With the right approach, no problem is unsolvable. How do you approach and solve problems in education that have been around so long that they just feel…normal? Perpetual issues—numeracy, reading ability, equity, grading, and teacher retention—are often continually managed, but not solved like the crises they are for future sustainability. This innovative guide introduces seven mindshifts that will help you engage with your community, access diverse resources, embrace radical new ideas, create equity, and chart a course of school improvement to solve those "unsolvable issues" so that your students and teachers learn and grow. Features include Seven adaptable models—one per mindshift—for finding your own solutions to perennial problemsStories highlighting the successful implementation of each mindshiftDiscussions to help you match mindshifts to particular problemsTechnical tips and reflection questions Persistent problems in education can only be solved if we approach them as the crises that they are. This book gives you the tools you need to become a new kind of school leader—one empowered to not just deal with the outcomes of perennial complex issues, but extinguish them altogether so that your students can thrive.

Teaching is not a job, it’s a passion. Caring and compassionate educators will stop at nothing to be sure their students have everything they need to flourish. As teaching demands increase, the attention teachers give to their own needs is often sacrificed. The pressures of teaching are forcing educators to choose between what they love to do and their own well-being. The levels of stress are so high that teacher shortages are considered a crisis in the United States. Authors Connie Hamilton and Dorothy VanderJagt share an alternative. They believe it’s possible to be a highly effective teacher and focus on yourself. Strained and Drained: Tools for Overworked Teachers describes five areas of wellness and offers realistic and practical ways that teachers can create habits to support each one. You’ll find effective ways to take care of YOU, both in and out of the classroom. Wellness is not an isolated activity, it’s a way of life and requires a mindset that values and prioritizes it. The strategies you gain from this book will support your physical, emotional, social, cognitive, and spiritual health and will put you at your best so you can enjoy what the authors still believe is the most important and rewarding profession on earth.

Teaching is not a job, it’s a passion. Caring and compassionate educators will stop at nothing to be sure their students have everything they need to flourish. As teaching demands increase, the attention teachers give to their own needs is often sacrificed. The pressures of teaching are forcing educators to choose between what they love to do and their own well-being. The levels of stress are so high that teacher shortages are considered a crisis in the United States. Authors Connie Hamilton and Dorothy VanderJagt share an alternative. They believe it’s possible to be a highly effective teacher and focus on yourself. Strained and Drained: Tools for Overworked Teachers describes five areas of wellness and offers realistic and practical ways that teachers can create habits to support each one. You’ll find effective ways to take care of YOU, both in and out of the classroom. Wellness is not an isolated activity, it’s a way of life and requires a mindset that values and prioritizes it. The strategies you gain from this book will support your physical, emotional, social, cognitive, and spiritual health and will put you at your best so you can enjoy what the authors still believe is the most important and rewarding profession on earth.

"Look out, Socrates Here comes Connie Hamilton, the newest innovator of questionology -- Marcia Guti rrez, High School EducatorA fresh perspective on the art of questioningQuestions are the driving force of learning in classrooms. Hacking Questions digs into framing, delivering, and maximizing questions in the classroom to keep students engaged in learning. Known in education circles as the "Questioning Guru," Connie Hamilton shows teachers of all subjects and grades how to: Hear the music: listen for correct answers Scaffold to trigger student thinking without doing it for them Kick the IDK bucket to avoid "I don't know" as the final answer Punctuate your learning time to end with reflection questions Spin the throttle to fuel students to ask the questions Fill your back pocket with engagement questions Make yourself invisible by establishing student-centered protocols Be a Pinball Wizard and turn students into facilitators Praise for Connie Hamilton and Hacking Questions "Connie Hamilton is known by teachers and leaders as the Questioning Guru. She offers minor tweaks and major perspective shifts. You will be a better questioner tomorrow." -Dr. Dorothy VanderJagt, Professional Learning Coordinator "Connie Hamilton is a world-class presenter with expertise in the art of questioning. She provides a fresh perspective and practical tips on integrating research-based strategies." -Melisa Mulder, Intervention Teacher "Connie is an incredible driver of change in our focus on classroom questioning as a best practice instructional strategy." -Troy VanderLaan, Middle School Administrator Answers to your questions about questions Hacking Questions provides practical solutions to the universal questioning problems that teachers face daily. Find your answers now.