Here are 100 books that The Elephant in the Classroom fans have personally recommended if you like
The Elephant in the Classroom.
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I am a former primary teacher, now a gardener and more recently an author of children’s books–maths features heavily in my writing! My love of maths began when I started teaching it and really took off when I explored maths alongside the concept of Growth Mindsets. Through much study I found that the majority of children can access a good level of maths by adopting a Growth Mindset. Maths is a fascinating subject area, full of beauty and patterns, complexity and wonder; hopefully, over the years, I have inspired at least a few children to feel the same.
I love this book because it presents complex data in the most stunning and visually appealing way. It focuses on a subject (animals of the world) that is almost universally popular with children.
The originality in the way in which animal statistics are presented is magnetic—I could dip in and out of this book for hours! Every page is a revelation, every page is beautiful, and every page is packed with information about animals.
How many species are there across the globe? How much do all of the insects in the world collectively weigh? How far can animals travel?
Steve Jenkins answers these questions and many more with numbers, images, innovation, and authoritative science in his latest work of illustrated nonfiction. Jenkins layers his signature cut-paper illustrations alongside computer graphics and a text that is teeming with fresh, unexpected, and accurate zoological information ready for readers to easily devour. The level of scientific research paired with Jenkins’ creativity and accessible infographics is unmatched and sure to wow fans old and new.
The dragons of Yuro have been hunted to extinction.
On a small, isolated island, in a reclusive forest, lives bandit leader Marani and her brother Jacks. With their outlaw band they rob from the rich to feed themselves, raiding carriages and dodging the occasional vindictive…
I am a former primary teacher, now a gardener and more recently an author of children’s books–maths features heavily in my writing! My love of maths began when I started teaching it and really took off when I explored maths alongside the concept of Growth Mindsets. Through much study I found that the majority of children can access a good level of maths by adopting a Growth Mindset. Maths is a fascinating subject area, full of beauty and patterns, complexity and wonder; hopefully, over the years, I have inspired at least a few children to feel the same.
I love this book for the same reason that I loved the 1970s TV series of the same name: Johnny Ball loves maths, and his infectious enthusiasm for the subject is enough to make the most reluctant mathematician raise a smile.
This book delves into the history of maths and ancient peoples from all over the world. It shows how ridiculously complicated our daily lives would be without some way of counting and generally shows maths to be magical, fascinating, and sometimes funny!
Maths isn't just about sums and calculations, number can take you anywhere. With Think of a Number you'll explore a fantastic world of wonder that is full of surprises. Join Johnny Ball on a dazzling adventure to infinity and beyond -crack codes, unravel mazes and discover why finding a prime number could make you a millionaire. Test your friends with magic tricks and mind-reading techniques and find out about the simple puzzles that stumped the world's brainiest mathematicians for centuries. Think maths is boring? Think again!
I am a former primary teacher, now a gardener and more recently an author of children’s books–maths features heavily in my writing! My love of maths began when I started teaching it and really took off when I explored maths alongside the concept of Growth Mindsets. Through much study I found that the majority of children can access a good level of maths by adopting a Growth Mindset. Maths is a fascinating subject area, full of beauty and patterns, complexity and wonder; hopefully, over the years, I have inspired at least a few children to feel the same.
I love this book because it involves delicious rhymes, bewildered teachers and backward counting. It’s ideal for children who are learning to count up to and backward from ten. An example of the rhyming pattern:
‘Six delicious teachers, stalking through the grass,
Singing songs and waving sticks and marching extra fast.’
The illustrations of the monsters and teachers are as comedic as the story; it’s a great romp of an adventure with a satisfying twist to finish.
An irreverent and zany counting book that is gently thrilling and written in a deliciously infectious rhyme with witty and whimsical illustrations.
Ten silly teachers have missed the last bus home. But LOOK - a shortcut through the forest! They'll be back in time for tea! Off they skip, unaware that in the woods a hungry horde of mischievous and hilariously goofy monsters is waiting... An irreverent and zany counting book that is gently thrilling with witty and whimsical illustrations.
Jake Sledge, a rugged ex-cop turned private eye, teams up with his colossal partner Bobo to navigate the gritty streets of River City.
A murdered lawyer drags them into a web of political intrigue, neo-Nazi thugs, and bloody showdowns. With sharp wit and hard-hitting action, Jake tackles scumbags the only…
I am a former primary teacher, now a gardener and more recently an author of children’s books–maths features heavily in my writing! My love of maths began when I started teaching it and really took off when I explored maths alongside the concept of Growth Mindsets. Through much study I found that the majority of children can access a good level of maths by adopting a Growth Mindset. Maths is a fascinating subject area, full of beauty and patterns, complexity and wonder; hopefully, over the years, I have inspired at least a few children to feel the same.
I love this book for its inventive way of making a potentially hum-drum area of maths (place value) into a problem-solving adventure. An ever-increasing number of party guests threatens to scupper the organization of the royal catering team until someone has the genius idea of corralling everyone into groups of tens, hundreds, and even thousands as more and more people arrive.
The combination of medieval royalty, a comedy crisis, and expressive illustrations carry the reader along, with the maths being an essential part of the problem-solving and eventually saving the day (naturally!)
Join Sir Cumference and the gang for more wordplay, puns, and problem solving in the clever math adventure about place-value and counting by tens. Sir Cumference and Lady Di planned a surprise birthday party for King Arthur, but they didn’t expect so many guests to show up. How many lunches will they need? And with more guests arriving by the minute, what about dinner? Sir Cumference and Lady Di count guests by tens, hundreds, and even thousands to help young readers learn place-value. Fans will love this new installment of the Sir Cumference series that makes math fun and accessible…
I'm the mother of three children, ages 6, 3, and 1, and because I tend to write about what interests me, started to investigate the world of parenting when my eldest was born. (Prior to that, I was a food reporter and editor.) As my husband, a tech entrepreneur, kept bringing home pieces of technology that were supposed to make my life easier (spoiler alert: they rarely did), I found myself urgently trying to figure out what was best for my kids, and myself: the boring pile of blocks, or the flashy, sexy iPad? I spent years delving into the fields of neurobiology, psychology, philosophy, and pediatrics to get a better handle on these questions.
Alison Gopnik is a towering figure in the field of developmental psychology, and interviewing her at her Berkeley lab was one of the highlights of my reporting for my own book. She tackles parenting from a particularly erudite and academic angle, pulling on psychology, evolutionary biology, and more to persuade parents that parenting is, in fact—and in her words—“a mug’s game.” We may think we are carpenters, building a perfect specimen of child, but in fact the best way to raise resilient, successful kids is to act like a gardener, providing the right environment in which they can thrive. I found it to be a particularly calming message, and one that will resonate with anyone who agonizes over minute decisions.
In The Gardener and the Carpenter, Alison Gopnik, one of the world's leading child psychologists, illuminates the paradoxes of parenthood from a scientific perspective and shatters the myth of "good parenting".
Caring deeply about our children is part of what makes us human. Yet the thing we call “parenting” is a surprisingly new invention. In the past thirty years, the concept of parenting and the multibillion-dollar industry surrounding it have transformed child care into obsessive, controlling, and goal-oriented labor intended to create a particular kind of child and therefore a particular kind of adult.
Childhood is a special time but can also be wrought with severe challenges for some children. Children vary in emotional health and resilience, so we must provide extra support to those who struggle. I learned so much from the parents and therapists I interviewed for my book, about their experiences building resilience and emotional health in adopted children. I have a PhD in social work and have worked on federally funded child welfare and child trauma grants. Currently, I am a freelance writer and researcher and teach social policy and research courses at several graduate schools of social work, but my most demanding and rewarding job is being a mom!
Mindfulness has become a more popular concept in the realm of relaxation training, wellness, spirituality, and health, but many books are focused on adults. Children can also practice mindfulness which is having a reflective stance in daily life including appreciating experiences in the moment, being mindful of how you speak to people and of your relationships, incorporating a meditative element to daily life, and reflecting deeply on experiences and learning from those experiences. The author was involved in developing a mindfulness curriculum for school children which has been deemed quite effective in increasing focus and calm and decreasing discord and behavioral problems among children in the toughest classrooms. Check out this book, then try a book on mindful parenting!
Mindful Awareness is a widely used stress-reduction technique that works by enabling people to pay closer attention to what is happening within them - thoughts, feelings, emotions - so that they can better understand what is happening to them. In The Mindful Child, Susan Kaiser Greenland extends her internationally known program to children, showing how they can be taught to be kinder and more compassionate to themselves and others.
Caroline Herschel has always lived in the shadows. Beholden to her wildly popular older brother, William, who rescued her from servitude, she's worked hard to build a life for herself – one where she can go unnoticed and repay the debt she believes she owes him. But when her brother…
I'm the mother of three children, ages 6, 3, and 1, and because I tend to write about what interests me, started to investigate the world of parenting when my eldest was born. (Prior to that, I was a food reporter and editor.) As my husband, a tech entrepreneur, kept bringing home pieces of technology that were supposed to make my life easier (spoiler alert: they rarely did), I found myself urgently trying to figure out what was best for my kids, and myself: the boring pile of blocks, or the flashy, sexy iPad? I spent years delving into the fields of neurobiology, psychology, philosophy, and pediatrics to get a better handle on these questions.
This enjoyable, first-person romp about raising kids in France is a must-read for any francophile. Druckerman is an American who married a Brit, and they relocated to Paris, where they had three children. With a reporter’s eye, Druckerman tackles such questions as, how on earth do French parents have their kids sleeping through the night at a few weeks old, and how is it that French children sit down to civilized three-course meals when they aren’t yet three feet tall?
"On questions of how to live, the French never disappoint. . . . Maybe it all starts with childhood. That is the conclusion that readers may draw from Bringing Up Bebe." -The Wall Street Journal
"I've been a parent now for more than eight years, and-confession-I've never actually made it all the way through a parenting book. But I found Bringing Up Bebe to be irresistible." -Slate
The runaway New York Times bestseller that shows American parents the secrets behind France's amazingly well-behaved children, from the author of There Are No Grown-ups.
When American journalist Pamela Druckerman had a baby…
I’m a developmental psychologist and former professor of education. My life’s work and 10 books have focused on helping families and schools foster good character in kids. Educating for Character: How Our Schools Can Teach Respect and Responsibility is credited with helping launch the national character education movement. My first book for parents, Raising Good Children, described how to guide kids through the stages of moral development from birth through adulthood. My focus these days is kindness and its supporting virtues. My wife Judith and I have two grown sons and 15 grandchildren, and with William Boudreau, MD, co-authored Sex, Love, and You: Making the Right Decision, a book for teens.
This thought-provoking book by Bill Stixrud (a clinical neuropsychologist) and Ned Johnson (an SAT tutor) pops up on other “best books” lists on parenting. It deserves to be there. But it’s not, as the title might suggest, a prescription for “hands-off” parenting. On the contrary, it shows us how to actively help our kids become better decision-makers by giving them lots of guided practice in making decisions they’re capable of handling, such as: “Should I take on the challenge of moving to the next grade in school, or spend another year learning the important skills I didn’t learn very well this year?” (but definitely not decisions where, for example, danger is involved—like going to an unsupervised party).
In short, raising a “self-driven” child means doing more of a different kind of parenting—in a collaborative, mutually respectful relationship that’s more rewarding for both parent and child. It means looking for opportunities…
"Instead of trusting kids with choices . . . many parents insist on micromanaging everything from homework to friendships. For these parents, Stixrud and Johnson have a simple message: Stop." -NPR
"This humane, thoughtful book turns the latest brain science into valuable practical advice for parents." -Paul Tough, New York Times bestselling author of How Children Succeed
A few years ago, Bill Stixrud and Ned Johnson started noticing the same problem from different angles: Even high-performing kids were coming to them acutely stressed and lacking motivation. Many complained they had no control over their lives. Some stumbled in high school…
As a child, I grew up with a mom and dad who, like just about every parent, did the best they could with the tools they had. Unknowingly, though, they also carried forward into their roles as parents their own unhealed wounds from the past. Luckily for me, my parents sought to become more self-aware as I grew from child to adult. In this book, we aim to share some of the tools and practices that can help parents find wholeness in themselves from the beginning of the parent-child relationship, and avoid many of the pitfalls that can cause unnecessary conflicts and suffering in family living.
A very practical guide on how to unlock yourself from the inevitable battle of wills that crop up in the parent-child relationship, and instead become the “captain of the ship” who is able to co-regulate your child through the ups and downs of difficult moods and behavior. Stiffelman explains in clear language how co-regulating in this way, over time, helps your child build skills of self-regulation and problem solving - bringing a natural feeling of peace of harmony both in your child and in your relationship.
“I trust Susan Stiffelman with my heart, my family, and my community. She knows that what goes on in my home every day is brutal and beautiful and hard and holy. She understands that while we are raising our children, we are still raising ourselves.” —Glennon Doyle Melton, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Love Warrior
From a family therapist, parenting expert and respected advice columnist for AOL’s HuffPost Parents comes a unique approach to parenting that can help eliminate drama, meltdowns, and power struggles.
Rodney Bradford comes into Lindsay's restaurant, offers to buy her small house for double its value, eats her brownies, and drops dead on the sidewalk in front. Next, her almost-ex-husband offers to sign the divorce papers, but only if she'll give him her small,…
I am a writer who lived in Germany for more than six years with my family. That experience opened my eyes to a different way of parenting in a country that had learned hard lessons about too much authoritarian control. It also taught me that much of what we believe is “true” about raising kids is actually cultural—and therefore, can be changed. In addition to my book about raising kids in Germany, Achtung Baby, I’ve written extensively on raising self-reliant kids, including articles in The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and Time.com among others.
No other book – and arguably no other personality – has done more to help loosen the lock-hold helicopter parenting has on our kids than Free-Range Kids and Lenore Skenazy. The book is a primer on ways to give your kids the freedom to grow up while it tears apart many of the paranoid parenting myths: from child predators lurking on every corner to the overblown dangers of choking on uncut grapes. Even better, Skenazy is hilarious and her book is great fun to read.
Free Range Kids has become a national movement, sparked by the incredible response to Lenore Skenazy's piece about allowing her 9-year-old to ride the subway alone in NYC. Parent groups argued about it, bloggers blogged, spouses became uncivil with each other, and the media jumped all over it.
A lot of parents today, Skenazy says, see no difference between letting their kids walk to school and letting them walk through a firing range. Any risk is seen as too much risk. But if you try to prevent every possible danger or difficulty in your child's everyday life, that child never…
