Schools That Learn: A Fieldbook for Teachers, Administrators, Parents and Everyone Who Cares About Education

Since the Fifth Discipline principles were defined they have been used by many educators. Now Peter Senge and the Fifth Discipline team have produced Schools that Learn, focusing specifically on schools and education, which can help reclaim schools even in the most depressed or badly-managed areas. This book brings together practices which are being used in the real world as schools attempt to learn, grow and reinvent themselves using learning organisation principles, and features numerous case studies from prominent educators. In a fast-changing world where: school violence is not uncommon, the value of standardised tests is questioned, rapid advances in science and technology threaten to leave students woefully unprepared, and increased pressures cause many teachers to burn out long before retirement age, Schools that Learn offers a much-needed foundation for the dialogue about the future of educating children, and a wealth of practical tools, anecdotes and advice which parents and educators can use to make schools better.

About the Author :
Peter Senge is the author of The Fifth Discipline, and together with Arthur D Little executive Bryan Smith and editorial director Art Kleiner he is also a co-author of The Fifth Discipline Fieldbook and The Dance of Change. Nelda H Cambron-McCabe is Chair of the Department of Educational Leadership at Miami University; Timothy Lucas is the superintendant of the Ho-ho-kus school system in New Jersey, and Janis Dutton is a local government official and education writer.

Review :
Advance Acclaim for Schools That Learn: "Today, more than ever, all the forces within society must join together to prepare our children to meet the challenges of our rapidly changing world. Schools That Learn is an important resource for all those wanting to tackle the challenge of integrating family, school, faith community, and policymakers into one coalition on behalf of children." --Dr. James P. Comer, Maurice Falk Professor of Child Psychiatry, Yale Child Study Center, Associate Dean, Yale School of Medicine "I don't know of a country that is happy with its educational system. That is because most schools are crafted for the mass production ethic of industrial society. Changing this obsolete state of affairs is the best investment that a government or community can make. This book can help; it shows how schools can reorient themselves to emphasize humanity, adventure, entrepreneurship, leadership, teamwork, problem-solving, and experimentation, instead of rote learning." --Kenichi Ohmae, author of The Mind of the Strategist and The Invisible Continent "I plan to read long passages to my daughter. Whenever I think about the world in which she (and her children) will grow up, the educational system seems to be the locus of both hope and despair. Reading this book is like opening the curtains and letting in rays of hope, illuminating an entire, systemic, detailed map for change." --Howard Rheingold, author, The Virtual Community What Educators and Students Say About How Our Schools Work "It took us three years to define the standards we expected of students, because we engaged the community from the beginning. It mattered to us that [the people ofMemphis] own the standards." --1999 U.S. Superintendent of the Year Gerry House "Ordinarily, teachers are taught to work as individuals, so staff development has to help them learn to work together. And it needs to be an ongoing process, with enough time to learn new ways of teaching, to develop esprit de corps, and to unlearn old habits." --Ed Joyner, executive director of the Yale School Development Program "We work harder than kids in other schools. But we have more fun doing it. All the kids have different rates of learning, so the teachers keep up different rates of training." --Students at a "five disciplines" -oriented middle school in Chelmsford, Massachusetts