RESOURCES
New and Free Online:
Designing Powerful Professional Development
Online this fall from the National Staff Development Council (NSDC) is an entire book offered free to educators to be used for school improvement. It is Dennis Sparks’ Designing Powerful Professional Development for Teachers and Principals. It can be read online and also downloaded by chapter or in its entirety.
 Author Sparks is nationally known as a speaker and writer and is the executive director of NSDC. He and NSDC offer this book in the hope that it will benefit many of us. Divided into five sections, the book’s focus ranges from setting the stage for professional development to getting to the heart of the matter.
The book is clearly written and beautifully laid out and edited, giving us two key understandings. We receive both a broad picture of what is important in professional development today and a fine rendering of the details that each of us needs to know and understand to function highly in our own profession. The references are wide, the research base clear, and each chapter is prefaced with an inspiring quote which serves as the word inspiring is intended to—we take a breath after reading it. This is a book worthy of extended study. To find it go to www.nsdc.org.
Photo: Author Dennis Sparks at the UFT Teacher Center Advanced Professional Development Academy in New York City in 2000.
Recommended in Print:
Handbook of Research on Improving Student Achievement
2nd Edition
After an introduction by editor Gordon Cawelti, this enormously helpful book (in its second edition) is organized into ten chapters focused on summaries of research about student achievement. Included are generic practices, the arts, foreign language, health education, language arts, oral communication, mathematics, physical education, science, social studies and a staff development chapter by Dennis Sparks.
Each chapter has its own introduction and is then further divided into subtopics in which the reader can find “Research Findings,” “In the Classroom” and “References.” There is an extensive additional reference list at the end of each chapter. This book can be used many ways and all of us can benefit from the chapter on generic practices by Herbert J. Walberg and the chapter on professional development by Dennis Sparks. Handbook is an excellent reference and it is also worthy of extended study.
Gordon Cawelti. (Ed.). (1999). Handbook of Research on Improving Student Achievement (2nd ed.). Arlington, VA: Educational Research Service. Online: www.ers.org.
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