Editorial Reviews
Book Description
Seeking Diversity is the result of watching, listening to, and learning from adolescents. It is also about a teacher, a learner engaged in the process of coming to know herself as a reader and writer in her own classroom.
Great for all levels of teachers, January 3, 2001 - Reviewer: Matthew Cheney from New Hampton, NH USA
If you're looking for the perfect book for a new English teacher, this is it. But it's also great if you're looking for inspiration yourself -- and by no means do you need to be a middle school teacher to benefit from it.
My copy of this book is falling apart, because I have fled to it more frequently in times of woe than any other text on teaching. Nancie Atwell's In the Middle is also close to my heart, but Rief's book is more direct and less overwhelming and so more useful in emergencies.
I teach 11th and 12th grade English, but never has this kept Seeking Diversity from being useful, even though Rief is describing her middle school classes. The environment that helps students reach their potential is the same at almost all levels, regardless of who your students are, where they're from, or how old they are. (A qualifier: I know nothing about elementary education, and so won't presume to speak to that.)
If you're looking for lots of theory and post-structuralist analysis, this is the wrong book. But if you're after nuts and bolts, and lots of them, then Seeking Diversity is what you want. It's inspiring, empowering, and tremendously useful. |
