An ATF raid, a moonshot gone wrong, a busload of female cancer victims determined to live life to the fullest—these are the compelling terrains Adam... Johnson explores in his electrifying debut collection. A lovesick teenage Cajun girl, a gay Canadian astrophysicist, a teenage sniper on the LAPD payroll, a post-apocalyptic bulletproof-vest salesman—each seeks connection and meaning in landscapes made uncertain by the voids that parents and lovers should fill. With imaginative grace and verbal acuity, Johnson is satirical without being cold, clever without being cloying, and heartbreaking without being sentimental. He shreds the veneer of our media-saturated, self-help society, revealing the lonely isolation that binds us all together.

The first and only text to address the teaching of braille reading and writing in the context of literacy in general, the whole language approach, and... the way in which print reading and writing are taught. Both a theoretical framework and practical applications for instruction in braille literacy are provided. Designed for use by university training programs and practicing educators of children and adults who are visually impaired, Foundations of Braille Literacy is an important resource for regular reading and literacy educators, administrators, parents, and transcribers as well. An invaluable overview, it can also be used as a training tool with the companion video Understanding Braille Literacy.

You've seen or heard the promises: The lure of success can be seductive, and the adoption of secular standards or methods to achieve it may seem a... small but necessary price to pay. Brian J. Dodd, however, holds out a different model for us, the model of the apostle Paul who acted in accord with kingdom principles and was empowered by the Spirit of God. Worldly standards are stood on their head in order that ministry reflect the power and presence of the Lord. Dodd helps you to see the necessity of prayer, followership, partnership, servanthood and willingness to run against the current if you are to lead where God wants you to lead. Here is a book for all who want to put church leadership on an apostolic footing.

Why have thousands of young Jews, otherwise unengaged with formal Jewish life, started more than sixty prayer communities across the United States? ... What crucial lessons for all Jews can these grassroots communities provide? Rabbi Elie Kaunfer, one of the leaders of this phenomenon, offers refreshingly new analysis of ageold questions of how to build Jewish community by examining the independent minyan movement and its relevant lessons on prayer, community organizing, volunteer leadership and how they impact wider issues in American Judaism. Covers Communities in: * Atlanta * Boston * Chicago * Denver * Los Angeles * New Haven, CT * New York * San Francisco * ... and more

Aligned with TESOL standards, this research-based guide shows how teachers can use today’s Web tools to help their English language learners build... language proficiency.

While many adolescent girls in today's culture successfully navigate the transition to adulthood, many are not provided with adequate support and... opportunity to achieve their potential.In Empowering Adolescent Girls, LeCroy and Daley outline the issues, review the research, and offer specific strategies for social workers, psychologists, and educators to use in their work with adolescent girls. Mary Pipher's Reviving Ophelia awakened the social service and education communities to the need for gender-specific programs tailored to the unique issues girls face. LeCroy and Daley provide a systematic approach to addressing those issues. Their framework incorporates new information and research about adolescent girls and conceptualizes gender-specific developmental tasks as part of a Go Girls curriculum. These developmental tasks for girls in early adolescence include: achieving a competent gender role identification, establishing an acceptable body image, developing a positive self-image, developing satisfactory peer relationships, establishing independence through responsible decision making, understanding sexuality, learning to obtain help and access resources, and learning to plan for the future. There is a companion workbook for participants in the Go Girls program, or for therapists, parents, and educators working with girls.

Ira Shor is a pioneer in the field of critical education who for over twenty years has been experimenting with learning methods. His work creatively... adapts the ideas of Brazilian educator Paulo Freire for North American classrooms. In Empowering Education Shor offers a comprehensive theory and practice for critical pedagogy.For Shor, empowering education is a student-centered, critical and democratic pedagogy for studying any subject matter and for self and social change. It takes shape as a dialogue in which teachers and students mutually investigate everyday themes, social issues, and academic knowledge. Through dialogue and problem-posing, students become active agents of their learning. This book shows how students can develop as critical thinkers, inspired learners, skilled workers, and involved citizens.Shor carefully analyzes obstacles to and resources for empowering education, suggesting ways for teachers to transform traditional approaches into critical and democratic ones. He offers many examples and applications for the elementary grades through college and adult education.

Empowering Family-Teacher Partnerships: Building Connections Within Diverse Communities by Thomas M. Coleman prepares students to work collaboratively... with families and community professionals in support of children’s early education and development. The author takes a student-centered approach to delivering substantive information and framing activities. Students are invited to develop a personal philosophy of family involvement to guide their work with families and to join a community of learners in relying upon their collective insights and problem-solving skills to address family involvement challenges.

This is an essential resource for anyone designing or facilitating online learning. It introduces an easy, practical model (R2D2: read, reflect,... display, and do) that will show online educators how to deliver content in ways that benefit all types of learners (visual, auditory, observational, and kinesthetic) from a wide variety of backgrounds and skill levels. With a solid theoretical foundation and concrete guidance and examples, this book can be used as a handy reference, a professional guidebook, or a course text. The authors intend for it to help online instructors and instructional designers as well as those contemplating such positions design, develop, and deliver learner-centered online instruction.Empowering Online Learning has 25 unique activities for each phase of the R2D2 model as well as summary tables helping you pick and choose what to use whenever you need it. Each activity lists a description, skills addressed, advice, variations, cost, risk, and time index, and much more.This title is loaded with current information about emerging technologies (e.g., simulations, podcasts, wikis, blogs) and the Web 2.0. With a useful model, more than 100 online activities, the latest information on emerging technologies, hundreds of quickly accessible Web resources, and relevance to all types and ages of learners--Empowering Online Learning is a book whose time has come.

The concept of empowerment has become increasingly popular with mental health professionals. But while it is a frequently cited goal in the helping... professions, empowerment is often nothing more than a buzzword that lacks specificity and grounding in real-world applications. Consequently, little practical guidance exists demonstrating how to achieve it in specific instances with specific groups of people. This book is the first professional guide that operationalizes the theory of empowerment, outlines the conditions under which it is likely to occur, and applies a practical model for working with people with severe mental illness. In this unique and thoroughly researched volume, Donald Linhorst analyzes the conditions that facilitate empowerment and provides the framework necessary to bolster this historically powerless population's access to the material and cultural resources they need to regain control of their lives. Chapters illustrate how to foster empowerment in treatment planning, housing selection, organizational decision making, mental health service planning and policy making, employment, participation in research and evaluation, and consumer provision of mental health and support services. Case studies from a public psychiatric hospital and a community mental health agency illustrate each of the seven areas and present evidence of the model's efficacy. Finally, the book maps out the roles that service providers, administrators, policy makers, advocacy groups, researchers, and clients can play in the empowerment process. Checklists, step-by-step instructions, historical overviews, and vivid examples make this a valuable teaching tool, planning guide, and everyday reference for mental health professionals seeking an innovative and evidence-based approach to working with their clients with severe mental illness.

Social workers are frequently the first responders in situations that require assessment of an older person's capacity for independent decision making... and self-care, yet there is limited professional literature to inform and guide social work practice in the area of assessing capacity and working with vulnerable and at-risk older adults. Empowering Social Workers for Practice with Vulnerable Older Adults by Barbara Soniat and Monica Melady Micklos teaches the generalist social worker how to work with vulnerable older adults and presents a useful model to guide social workers in assessing capacity and making intervention decisions. Soniat and Micklos write: At times, social workers face challenging situations when the vulnerable older adult they are prepared to assist does not want help and refuses offered intervention and services. This can leave a social worker feeling frustrated, professionally inadequate and with great concern for the well-being of the older adult. Social workers often experience internal and external pressure to 'do something' from their own value system, the referral source, or others in the older adults' network. Feeling frustration that one will have to 'wait for the next crisis' before intervening is common. Empowering Social Workers for Practice with Vulnerable Older Adults deals with an emerging practice in geriatric social work-the assessment of capacity-and promotes the 'person-in-environment' perspective, which is well suited to this area of practice. In addition to chapters on hoarding working with elders with Alzheimer's disease and other dementias who live alone, the book's core features include: * Introduction to geriatric social work * Discussion of values and ethical dilemmas * Success factors in relationship building * Assessment using the capacity risk model Empowering Social Workers for Practice with Vulnerable Older Adults makes an excellent and timely graduate text, not only for specialized courses in geriatrics and gerontology, but also in core coursework to infuse content related to older adults into the social work curricula. In addition, the book will be a tremendous resource for practitioners in continuing education and certificate programs, educational initiatives for establishing core competencies in geriatric social work, and compliance training for state Adult Protective Service workers. The book is also relevant for other professionals outside of the social work profession who work with older adults, such as physicians, psychiatrists, nurses, and attorneys.NASW Press NASW Press, a division of National Association of Social Workers (NASW), is a leading scholarly press in the social sciences. We serve faculty, practitioners, agencies, libraries, clinicians, and researchers throughout the United States and abroad. Known for attracting expert authors, the NASW Press delivers professional information to hundreds of thousands of readers through its scholarly journals, books, and reference works.Some of the areas we publish in include:-Social work in the field of aging-Models of social work-Social work with children and adolescents-Ethics in social work-Community organization-Professional development

This book provides classroom-tested methods for engaging struggling middle grade readers—even those who appear to have given up—and fostering their... success. The emphasis is on constructing respectful, encouraging learning environments that incorporate students' diverse literacies, cultural interests, and prior knowledge and skills into instruction. Chapters outline effective, innovative strategies for instruction and assessment in comprehension, vocabulary, text-based discussion, critical reading, and other core areas. Realistic classroom examples are included throughout, including applications of nontraditional texts. Other useful features include reflection questions at the end of each chapter.

Fifty Web sites, lesson ideas, new resources, and real-life examples help educators use technology to expand classroom experiences and strengthen... students’ critical thinking, research, and problem-solving skills.