My passion has always been caring for and educating young children. I spent over 20 years in the classroom as a child care professional and much of that time was with toddlers. I discovered that the stereotype of the terrible twos was truly misguided. I chose books that will shed new light on why toddlers behave the way that they do. These books will show the reader what an important time this is in a child’s growth and learning. I believe that these books will help convince you that toddlers are not terrible; they are terrific!
There are many opinions and schools of thought on how to best raise and care for young children. The author lays her discussion firmly on the solid foundation of research. Beyond academic skills or ability, Ms. Galinsky identifies seven skills that will lead to the child’s success in the future. Skills such as making connections or critical thinking need to be fostered for a child to do well in school as well as in interactions and endeavors later in life. This book is sometimes used as a text in college classes. And yet, parents will easily find this content accessible with concrete ideas to develop these essential life skills.
Ellen Galinsky has spent her entire career studying early childhood development, first at Vassar College, then for twenty-five years at the Bank Street College of Education, and for the past twenty years as the founder and now president of the Families and Work Institute. What she has found is that there is an enormous gap between what researchers have discovered and what parents have been told about those discoveries. "Minds in the Making" bridges this gap, bringing the work of more than a hundred scientists into a form that parents everywhere can use. Galinsky has divided this information into the…
I’m a journalist and a social media prof. I talk to thousands of kids every year about what they read on the Internet. And frankly, they’re confused—as we all are—about what’s true online and what isn’t. To spot misinformation, kids have to become better critical thinkers. That’s why I wrote Can You Believe It? and it’s why I’m recommending these great books. It’s also helpful to know what credible journalism looks like. My TeachingKidsNews.com (TKN) is a kid-friendly news source that kids and teachers can trust. In addition to publishing TKN, I’ve authored six children’s books and I have a Master’s degree in Creative and Critical Writing.
To encourage young readers to think critically, Vampenguin is a good choice. The misdirection isn’t quite so obvious. A family of vampires is at the zoo. The smallest vampire gets switched with a penguin (hilarious drawings make this sleight-of-hand possible). The child reader can see what the family in the story doesn’t—their “baby” is actually a penguin. Even better, the baby vampire and the penguin switch themselves back and the family never finds out. Once again, the young reader has out-smarted everyone by thinking critically. Nice!
From the critically acclaimed author and illustrator of A Hungry Lion and Stumpkin comes a charming, wryly humorous story of adventure, mistaken identity, and a vampire family's day at the zoo.
On a Saturday morning, baby Dracula visits the zoo with his family, where baby Penguin lives with hers. But these intrepid young adventurers are not content with staying in their proper places.
Instead, baby Dracula slips into the Penguin House to spend the day eating, swimming, and hanging around, while baby Penguin waddles into the stroller to explore the rest of the zoo. Dracula's family doesn't even notice the…
I am a native Bostonian and I have been working in the field of negotiation for over 25 years. I have been very fortunate to have been a member of the Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School for all that time. As a result, I have had the privilege to work with some amazing colleagues and have been given the opportunity to engage in many fascinating negotiations in the international, governmental, corporate, and nonprofit worlds. I truly love the field because it has the potential to do so much good in the world and because it is exceedingly challenging. For me, the more I learn the more I want to know. That quest continues to this day…
I am recommending this book because Ury turns the mirror on negotiators and gets them to look at themselves and why they do what they do at the negotiating table. This is critically important because I believe half our problems in negotiation are with the other party and the other half are within us. Ury gets people to really take this very seriously and to look in a place most ignore.
In his highly anticipated follow up to the bestselling "Getting to Yes: Negotiation Agreement Without Giving", Harvard University's world renowned negotiation expert William Ury provides the definitive guide to attaining success at work and at home.
Drawing upon decades of experience in some of the world's most challenging conflict areas - from million-dollar corporate mergers to high profile Middle Eastern struggles - Ury highlights a previously unexamined issue which affects us all, personally and professionally: the biggest obstacle to achieving what we want comes from our own self-destructive actions.
In his brilliant new book, Ury outlines practical strategies for dealing…
I’m an author, tech philosopher, father, geek, pianist, and novelist; and I'm fascinated by what it means to think clearly and well. Our world is bristling with complexities and crises; with staggering technologies, opportunities, and threats. What does it mean to find some kind of clarity, focus, and community amid this maelstrom? How can we hope to grasp, together, the nature of our times? These are the questions that keep me up at night—and that have driven me to write books that, I hope, can help and support people in rigorously exploring such questions for themselves.
Mary Midgley was in her nineties when she wrote this book, yet it’s alive with ideas and energy – and the insistence that philosophy should be “for” something in the most urgent, practical sense; that it should help us explore such questions as to how to live and to do good. Midgley was both highly scientifically literate and fiercely opposed to the claim that science will ever answer every question. We humans, she believed, are brilliant animals who need to understand our biological heritage as richly as possible if we’re to grapple fruitfully with our planetary future. I can think of few more urgent themes for the present century.
Why should anybody take an interest in philosophy? Is it just another detailed study like metallurgy? Or is it similar to history, literature and even religion: a study meant to do some personal good and influence our lives?
In her last published work, Mary Midgley addresses provocative questions, interrogating the various forms of our current intellectual anxieties and confusions and how we might deal with them. In doing so, she provides a robust, yet not uncritical, defence of philosophy and the life of the mind.
This defence is expertly placed in the context of contemporary debates about science, religion, and…
I have been working in critical thinking since 1987. This work has taken me to many countries in the world, working with both teachers and students, business people and other decision-makers, and it continues to excite me greatly. I always stress that critical thinking shouldn’t be seen as just a set of technical skills, but that it should make a real difference to people. For example, I’ve used it in working with juvenile offenders who had committed violent crimes and was impressed by how it got them to look at their lives in a much more positive way. These books provide a range of ways into and around the subject.
This book was one of the first to take critical thinking beyond a purely academic focus on informal logic, so that it deals with ‘real-world’ material (even including cartoon strips).
As the author explains, he was concerned that, though his students could learn from informal logic books how to identify and label errors in reasoning, they were unable to transfer this understanding to their own writing and to everyday material.
There are many useful exercises after each chapter, enabling the reader to apply their understanding of the content. The author hopes that the book is both rigorous and accessible, and this hope is indeed vindicated.
Building Arguments' offers a fresh new approach to informal logic - successfully combining an accessible style with a rigorous, systematic treatment of argument: -It integrates reasoning and writing, teaching readers to argue effectively and communicate ideas in persuasive prose. -It combines fundamental topics of critical thinking into broader discussions of reasoning. So where other books may treat fallacy identification and avoidance, induction and deduction, and validity and soundness as ends in themselves, 'Building Arguments' presents these topics in a practical yet philosophically sound context. -It includes entertaining and relevant examples and exercises drawn from sports, popular advertising, current events, and…
As an award-winning author of nonfiction books for kids, I’m passionate about discovering titles by other authors that introduce a topic innovatively and engagingly. I obtained a B.S. in Biology, with an emphasis in Ecology, from the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh. I received the 2023 Stephen Fraser Encouragement Award and a 2023 finalist for the Russel Freedman Award. I feel that it’s important to plant seeds of curiosity and encourage children to look at the world around them through a different lens. I love reading books that present complicated ideas in a way that young readers (and adults!) can understand.
I was hooked (pun intended) after reading only a few pages of this book! It tells the story of the hookworm, a parasite that caused thousands of Americans living in the South to become deathly ill in the late 1800s, and the efforts of scientists to educate those individuals in order to prevent even more from becoming sick.
The photographs of real people infected with hookworms allowed me to connect even deeper to the story.
Included on NPR's 2022 "Books We Love" List Finalist, 2023 YALSA Award for Excellence in Nonfiction ALSC Notable Children's Book
What made workers in the American South so tired and feeble during the 19th and early 20th centuries? This exciting medical mystery uncovers the secrets of the parasite hookworm, commonly known as the “American Murderer,” and is the latest title in Gail Jarrow’s (YALSA Excellence in Nonfiction for Young Adults award-winning author) Medical Fiascoes series.
Imagine microscopic worms living in the soil. They enter your body through your bare feet, travel to your intestines, and stay there for years sucking…
As a student, one day, I noticed that something was wrong with our world. Older people are separated from younger ones and sometimes almost invisible. I decided to focus on researching whether and how older people organize themselves into groups and influence important areas of social, economic, and political life. The study of the social capital of older adults led me to research on age discrimination, intergenerational relationships, age-friendly communities and cities, social innovation, co-design, citizen science, and public policy on ageing. I am convinced that only multi-sectoral and multi-level cooperation can lead to the implementation of constructive responses to today’s global challenges.
This is probably the most unconventional textbook in the field of social gerontology.
It does not just provide introductions to topics that are usually linked to population ageing, such as care, health, and pensions. Moody and Sasser go further by provoking readers with a mix of basic concepts and related controversies.
The book focuses on discussing various questions, such as “Should older people be protected from bad choices?” and “Should we ration health care for older people?”
Of course, reading all chapters lead readers to ask even more questions.
Aging: Concepts and Controversies is structured to encourage a style of teaching and learning that goes beyond conveying facts and methods. This innovative text focuses on controversies and questions rather than on assimilating facts or creating a single "correct" view about aging or older people. Drawing on their extensive expertise, authors Harry R. Moody and Jennifer R. Sasser first provide an overview of aging in three domains: aging over the life course, health care, and socioeconomic trends. Each section then includes data and conceptual frameworks, helping readers to make sense of the controversies and understand their origin, engage in critical…
I have been working in critical thinking since 1987. This work has taken me to many countries in the world, working with both teachers and students, business people and other decision-makers, and it continues to excite me greatly. I always stress that critical thinking shouldn’t be seen as just a set of technical skills, but that it should make a real difference to people. For example, I’ve used it in working with juvenile offenders who had committed violent crimes and was impressed by how it got them to look at their lives in a much more positive way. These books provide a range of ways into and around the subject.
This book provides a very important background to how critical thinking needs to be seen in terms of how it fits with the ancient skills of rhetoric.
The author demonstrates how the skills of argumentation (central to critical thinking) were central to how classical scholars (including Aristotle, Protagoras, Quintilian, and Cicero) saw the huge value in being skilled in rhetoric. For example, the maxim of Protagoras that there are two sides to every question is given (with a worry for us -is there?).
The celebrated discussion between God and Moses in the Midrash is a wonderful example of how one’s position with regard to power and authority cannot trump the quality of an argument (such that Moses wins the day). This is a lively and thrilling ride in critical thinking.
Michael Billig's rhetorical approach has been key to the discursive turn in the social sciences. His witty and original book examines argumentation and its psychological importance in human conduct, and traces the connections between ancient rhetorical ideas and modern social psychology. In a new introduction, he offers further reflections on rhetoric and social psychology, discusses the recent scholarship, and allows some forgotten voices in the history of rhetoric to be heard.
As an award-winning author of nonfiction books for kids, I’m passionate about discovering titles by other authors that introduce a topic innovatively and engagingly. I obtained a B.S. in Biology, with an emphasis in Ecology, from the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh. I received the 2023 Stephen Fraser Encouragement Award and a 2023 finalist for the Russel Freedman Award. I feel that it’s important to plant seeds of curiosity and encourage children to look at the world around them through a different lens. I love reading books that present complicated ideas in a way that young readers (and adults!) can understand.
This book was a really interesting read highlighting insects' role in feeding people worldwide. There were many times I said, “Eww,” while reading this, but I also had many opportunities to examine what is typical in other societies compared to what we consider normal in our own.
I love that the included recipes provide an interactive element to this book.
Most North Americans would rather squish a bug than eat it.
But mopane worms are a tasty snack in Zimbabwe, baby bees are eaten right out of the can in Japan, and grasshopper tacos are popular in Mexico. More than one-fourth of the world’s population eats insects—a practice called entomophagy. Bugs for Breakfast helps middle-grade readers understand the role insects fill in feeding people around the world.
Readers will be introduced to the insect specialties and traditions around the globe. They'll discover how nutritious bugs can be and why dining on insects is more environmentally friendly than eating traditional protein…
As a licensed mental health professional, I once had a client claiming to be demonically possessed, and requested that I get an exorcist to drive the evil spirits out of her body. Instead, I utilized a therapeutic approach to challenge “irrational” beliefs. The problem was gone. I realized that people were prone to strange beliefs and started to read and listen to “experts” who were skeptical in nature. To my surprise, I saw Carl Sagan distinguishing astrology (pseudoscience) from astronomy (science). His talk was clear, convincing, and logical. I was hooked.
David Buss combines the fields and research provided by both psychology and biology to examine human behavior from an evolutionary vantage point. And he makes a compelling case. Critical thinking questions and case studies are included in the book. He explains human behavior from an evolutionary perspective, based on what is “adaptive.”
What are the mechanisms of mind that define what it means to be a human being?
Evolutionary psychology is a revolutionary new science, a true synthesis of modern principles of psychology and evolutionary biology. Since the publication of the award-winning first edition of Evolutionary Psychology, there has been an explosion of research within the field. In this book, David M. Buss examines human behavior from an evolutionary perspective, providing students with the conceptual tools needed to study evolutionary psychology and apply them to empirical research on the…
