No sticks. No stones. No dissing. That’s the motto for No Name-Calling Week, a project inspired by The Misfits, a young adult novel written by popular author James Howe. The book tells the story of four friends who grow tired of being constantly teased in middle school and decide to run for student council on a no name-calling platform.
Inspired by this idea, GLSEN and Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing created the No Name-Calling Week Coalition, which now consists of over 50 national partnering organizations. In March 2004, the coalition organized the first No Name-Calling Week in schools across the nation. Since then the project has gained thousands of supporters who believe in its cause, which is to end name-calling of all kinds and provide schools with the tools and inspiration to launch an ongoing dialogue about ways to eliminate bullying in their communities.
As someone who has seen close family members suffer from the effects of bullying, I was thrilled to learn about this project and how I can participate. While it originally began in middle schools, the NNCW project has since been extended from kindergarten through twelfth grade because all students can benefit from learning how to be more understanding of one another and how to address name-calling and bullying.
Would you and your students like to participate in this powerful project? Here are 15 ways you can make the eighth annual No Name-Calling Week meaningful in your school or classroom:
If you’re like me, reading is something you’re passionate about. But it’s also the one thing that always gets bumped to the bottom of the to-do list. Scratch that. On most days, reading doesn’t even make it to the to-do list. So when holidays come around, I count those days as my time to catch up on some page turning. I’ve planned, prepared, shopped, wrapped, delivered, and packed. I’m ready for our holiday road trip and excited to have some uninterrupted reading time in the car. Now all I need is a good book list to guide my reading choices.
So I asked our instructional designers what books they’d recommend. Here’s a list of our top suggestions for your winter break reading list.
10 Favorite Education Books:
Milton Chen. Education Nation: Six Leading Edges of Innovation in our Schools. (2010)
Linda Darling-Hammond. The Flat World and Education: How America’s Commitment to Equity Will Determine Our Future. (2009)
Claudia Goldin and Lawrence Katz. The Race between Education and Technology. (2008)
Wendy Kopp. One Day, All Children: The Unlikely Triumph of Teach for America and What I Learned Along the Way. (2001)
Jay Mathews. Work Hard. Be Nice.: How Two Inspired Teachers Created the Most Promising Schools in America. (2009)
Deborah Meier. In Schools We Trust: Creating Communities of Learning in an Era of Testing and Standardization. (2002)
National Research Council. How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School. (2000)
Diane Ravitch. The Death and Life of the Great American School System: How Testing and Choice Are Undermining Education. (2010)
Theodore R. Sizer and Nancy Faust Sizer. The Students Are Watching: Schools and the Moral Contract. (2000)
James W. Stigler. The Teaching Gap: Best Ideas from the World’s Teachers for Improving Education in the Classroom. (1999)
But why stop at ten? Here are a few extras we couldn’t resist adding:
Donna Foote. Relentless Pursuit: A Year in the Trenches with Teach for America. (2008)
Shirley Sagawa. The American Way to Change: How National Service and Volunteers Are Transforming America. (2010)
Paul Tough. Whatever It Takes: Geoffrey Canada’s Quest to Change Harlem and America. (2008)
I know I’m stopping at the library on my way out of town. What will you be reading over the next few days and weeks? Do you have any books you’d recommend adding to our favorites list?
When a friend of mine first invited me to participate in her group blog about eight years ago, I was a little baffled about how to use it. And I couldn’t decide if I liked the format. The Bookity Book Book Club would hold online discussions of—yep, you got it—books. Even though I love reading and discussing books, my participation was minimal because I just didn’t get how to use the program, and, sadly, I was scared to learn something new.
But then my husband and I started having children while living far from our families, and suddenly blogging took on a new importance. It was a way to stay connected—to show parents and grandparents what was happening in the lives of our daughters. And it was a way for me to share my feelings and ideas with a broader audience than just “dear diary.”
There are other ways to use blogs beyond family life, and teachers around the world have discovered the value of classroom blogging as not only “an avenue for their communications, but also as a tool for giving voice to what their students are learning and how they are learning.” Have you considered the idea of starting a class blog? Maybe you’re not quite sure if it’s the right thing for your class, or how to start, or if it will be worth the effort when so many projects already tug at your time. To help out, I’ve done a little research for you. Here are ten reasons to have your class start blogging: Read more »
On October 28, 1886, the Statue of Liberty Enlightening the World was unveiled to the American people and dedicated in New York Harbor. There, she welcomes all visitors, immigrants, and Americans returning to the United States. She has become a symbol of friendship, freedom, democracy, and hope. And in two days, the Statue of Liberty will celebrate her 124th birthday.
So let’s celebrate! Here are five ways to make October 28th a monumental day in your classroom: Read more »
Do you know what today is? Besides being a Friday, and besides being September 24 (and my brother’s birthday), it’s National Punctuation Day.
Founded in 2004 by newsletter writer Jeff Rubin, National Punctuation Day is a “celebration of the lowly comma, correctly used quotation marks, and other proper uses of periods, semicolons, and the ever-mysterious ellipsis.”
To promote proper punctuation awareness, Jeff and his wife, Norma, maintain their website, nationalpunctuationday.com. They also visit elementary schools, where they perform a punctuation assembly. Their theme: “Punctuation is important in helping children learn to read and write with clarity.” Dressed as a caped punctuation superhero, Jeff shows kids how learning punctuation can be fun. So what can you do to make learning punctuation fun for your students?
No sticks. No stones. No dissing. That’s the motto for No Name-Calling Week, a project inspired by The Misfits, a young adult novel written by popular author James Howe. The book tells the story of four friends who grow tired of being constantly teased in middle school and decide to run for student council on a no name-calling platform.
When a friend of mine first invited me to participate in her group blog about eight years ago, I was a little baffled about how to use it. And I couldn’t decide if I liked the format. The 
