Teaching What They Learn, Learning What They Live

Reviews / Votes

"Reads like a fast-paced novel revealing layers of complexity. ... Brad Olsen's intelligent book ... takes on the growth and development of beginning teachers, focusing on a broader view of what counts as teacher knowledge. ... His analysis is grounded in two years of investigation providing us with a cogent, interesting and provocative explanation of the significant questions that he poses. His book enriches us all about the work that needs to be accomplished to improve teaching, teacher education, and, ultimately, our schools."
-from the foreword by Ann Lieberman

"Brad Olsen richly portrays how beginning teachers draw on a range of knowledge sources - family, past schooling, and other personal experiences - to navigate the process of learning to teach. Teachers' personal resources and dispositions loom large here, mediating or trumping the lessons of formal teacher education. Olsen's illuminating account should be of interest to anyone seeking to influence what teachers know and do."
-Judith Warren Little, University of California, Berkeley

"Who chooses to teach? Who stays? Who learns to teach well? Why? With another teacher shortage on the horizon, policymakers can learn a great deal from Brad Olsen. His up-close accounts of new teachers provide fresh and powerful insights into these critical education policy questions."
-Jeannie Oakes, UCLA