Where would we be without conversation? Throughout history, conversations have allowed us to see different perspectives, build ideas, and solve... problems. Conversations, particularly those referred to in this book as academic conversations, push students to think and learn in lasting ways. Academic conversations are back-and-forth dialogues in which students focus on a topic and explore it by building, challenging, and negotiating relevant ideas.Unfortunately, academic conversations are rare in many classrooms. Talk is often dominated by the teacher and a few students, or it does not advance beyond short responses to the teacher's questions. Even certain teaching approaches and curriculum programs neglect to train students how to maintain a focused, respectful, and thoughtful conversation.To address these challenges, authors Jeff Zwiers and Marie Crawford have identified five core communication skills to help students hold productive academic conversations across content areas. These skills include: elaborating and clarifying, supporting ideas with evidence, building on and/or challenging ideas, paraphrasing, and synthesizing. This book shows teachers how to weave the cultivation of academic conversation skills and conversations into current teaching approaches. More specifically, it describes how to use conversations to build the following: Academic vocabulary and grammar Critical thinking skills such as persuasion, interpretation, consideration of multiple perspectives, evaluation, and application Literacy skills such as questioning, predicting, connecting to prior knowledge, and summarizing Complex and abstract essential understandings in content areas such as adaptation, human nature, bias, conservation of mass, energy, gravity, irony, democracy, greed, and more An academic classroom environment brimming with respect for others' ideas, equity of voice, engagement, and mutual supportThe ideas in this book stem from many hours of classroom practice, research, and video analysis across grade levels and content areas. Readers will find numerous practical activities for working on each conversation skill, crafting conversation-worthy tasks, and using conversations to teach and assess. Academic Conversations offers an in-depth approach to helping students develop into the future parents, teachers, and leaders who will collaborate to build a better world.

For better or for worse, the goal of securing tenure-track assistant professorships frames the graduate school experience for most students. Yet what... the graduate experience boasts in scholarly training it lacks in institutional training—that is, in guiding future faculty members to see and experience positively the wide variety of prospective professional identities rooted in assorted academic cultures. Academic Cultures: Professional Preparation and the Teaching Life gives voice to diversity in postsecondary education, a strength of the system rather than a problem to redress. Contributors, whether they work at a private high school or a public comprehensive university, an open-access institution or a religiously affiliated college, disclose to readers the details and outcomes of their cross-sector transitions. Their accounts show how faculty members from a range of institutions have built rewarding professional lives based on the traditional components of the professoriat—teaching, service, and scholarship.

The university today is under attack from all sides. Parents and students resent the escalating costs of education and wonder where the money is being... spent. Aspiring scholars feel betrayed by an institution that prepares them for nonexistent jobs. Critics on the right condemn the teachers who neglect "the canon" while critics on the left condemn the creeping corporatism on campus. Politicians seek greater control over the conduct of research and add new conditions to the use of government funds. Worst of all, the academics are increasingly uneasy in an environment that fosters competition, discourages cooperation, and has made "publish or perish" a condition of survival. Donald Kennedy, the former president of Stanford University and currently a member of its faculty, has been at the front lines of the issues confounding the academy today. In this important new book, he brings his experience and concern to bear on the present state of the university. He examines teaching, graduate training, research, and their ethical context in the research university. Aware of the numerous pressures that academics face, from the pursuit of open inquiry in the midst of culture wars, to confusion and controversy over the ownership of ideas, to the scramble for declining research funds and facilities, he explores the whys and wherefores of academic misconduct, be it scholarly, financial, or personal. Kennedy suggests that meaningful reform cannot take place until more rigorous standards of academic responsibility--to students, the university, and the public--are embraced by both faculty and the administration. With vision and compassion, he offers an important antidote to recent attacks from without that decry the university and the professoriate, and calls upon the college community to counter those attacks by looking within and fulfilling its duties.

The Academic Encounters series uses a sustained content approach to teach skills necessary for taking academic courses in English. There are two books... for each content area. Academic Encounters: American Studies engages students with academic readings, photos, graphs, and charts on stimulating topics from the field of American Studies that deal with important events and ideas in American history and culture that are relevant to life today. Topics include government, race relations, immigration, jazz and blues, movies, hip-hop, and the interplay of American culture with cultures from around the world. Students develop important skills such as reading for detail, skimming, reading critically, note taking, and test preparation. Each chapter ends with a guided academic writing assignment. Vocabulary and academic writing tasks occur throughout the book.

Academic Listening Encounters: Human Behavior is a high-intermediate to low advanced text that uses a sustained content approach to help students... develop the listening, note-taking, and discussion skills they need to take college courses in an English speaking environment. This book provides students with an introduction to psychology and communication, and covers high-interest topics such as stress, intelligence, and friendship. Each chapter explores one of these topics using a variety of listening materials, including informal interviews and academic lectures. These materials allow students to practice crucial listening skills, such as summarizing what they have heard and listening for implied information; they also serve as stimuli for discussion and note-taking activities.

The Academic Encounters series uses a sustained content approach to teach skills necessary for taking academic courses in English. There are two books... for each content area. Academic Encounters: Human Behavior engages students with authentic academic readings from college textbooks, photos, graphs, and charts on stimulating topics from the fields of psychology and communications. Topics include stress, health, and nonverbal communication. Students develop important skills such as skimming, reading for the main idea, reading for speed, understanding vocabulary in context, summarizing, note taking, and test preparation. By completing writing assignments of different lengths, students build academic writing skills, respond to the readings, and incorporate what they have learned. The topics correspond with those in Academic Listening Encounters: Human Behavior. The books may be used independently or together.

The Academic Encounters Second edition series uses a sustained content approach to teach skills necessary for taking academic courses in English. There... are two books for each content area. The Academic Encounters Level 4 2-Book set includes one copy of the Level 4 Student's Book Reading and Writing and one copy of the Level 4 Student's Book Listening and Speaking with DVD at a discounted price.

Academic Listening Encounters: Life in Society is an intermediate to high-intermediate text that uses a sustained-content approach to help students... develop the listening, note-taking, and discussion skills they need to take college courses in an English-speaking environment. Topics include American government, race relations, the history of U.S. immigration, and American values and culture. Each chapter begins with a warm-up activity, then presents two or more informal interviews, and concludes with a two-part academic lecture. Exercises that accompany the listenings develop important skills, such as listening for main ideas, listening for specific information, and making inferences. In preparation for the lectures, students practice note-taking skills such as using symbols and abbreviations and organizing their notes. There are many opportunities for students to discuss content, express their personal opinions, and make presentations to the class. An Audio CD with the lecture portion of the audio program is included with the book to provide extra listening practice. The complete class audio program is available for purchase separately, on three Audio CDs or Audio Cassettes. The Academic Encounters series is an excellent tool for TOEFL® preparation. Academic Encounters: Life in Society is the reading, study-skills, and writing companion text to the listening book described above. Each book may be used independently, or the two books may be used together to form a four-skills integrated course.

The Academic Encounters series uses a sustained content approach to teach skills necessary for taking academic courses in English. There are two books... for each content area. Academic Encounters: Life in Society engages students with authentic academic readings, photos, graphs, and charts on stimulating topics from the field of sociology. Topics include peer pressure, the influence of the media, and balancing home and work. Students develop important skills such as reading critically, examining graphic material, highlighting, note taking, and preparing for a quiz. By completing writing assignments of different lengths, students build academic writing skills, respond to the readings, and incorporate what they have learned. The topics correspond with those in Academic Listening Encounters: Life in Society. The books may be used independently or together.

The Academic Encounters series uses a sustained content approach to teach skills necessary for taking academic courses in English. There are two books... for each content area. This set includes one copy of the Student's Reading Book and one copy of the Student's Listening Book at a discounted price.