A Holistic Approach For Cultural Change: Character Education for Ages 13-15

by Marc Levitt

Overview

Marc Levitt's A Holistic Approach for Cultural Change: Character Education for Ages 13-15 asks educators to consider how our contemporary curriculum and pedagogy supports isolation and competition, rather than our goals for school culture change. Mr. Levitt explores themes such as 'vengeance,' 'prejudice,' 'communications in relationships,' 'trapping oneself in past behaviors,' 'respecting one's heritage,' and 'learning to embrace one's own story' through his original stories. Suggestions for curriculum and pedagogical changes follow, helping educators share the larger personal and social implications of Mr. Levitt’s stories, while teaching and demonstrating how we are ‘All in it Together’. A Holistic Approach for School-Based Culture Change: Character Education for Ages 13-15 helps educators build a caring and socially intelligent community of students in a way that is neither 'preachy' nor condescending, acknowledging and encouraging our ‘mutuality of interests.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781475835946
Publisher:	Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
Publication date:	05/17/2017
Pages:	118
Product dimensions:	6.07(w) x 9.10(h) x 0.39(d)

About the Author

Marc Levitt is an author/consultant/filmmaker/radio host and producer who has worked in over sixty countries. His films, Stories in Stone and Woven in Time have been seen on PBS and at film festivals around the United States and his radio show,Action Speaks, Underappreciated Dates that Changed America, has been broadcast on over 200 Public and Independent stations.

Table of Contents

Preface
Introduction
How Can You Use This Book
Stories, Thoughts and Curriculum/Pedagogical Suggestions
Chapter One: The Bridge under the Highway Overpass; Connecting Neighborhoods and People
Questions for Students
Thoughts for Students
Thoughts for Teachers
Curriculum and Pedagogical Suggestions; American and Global History, Science, and Media Literacy
Chapter Two: Palisades Park and the Roller Coaster Ride of Having Pride in One's Heritage
Questions for Students
Thoughts for Students
Thoughts for Teachers
Curriculum and Pedagogical Suggestions; Immigrant History, Civil Rights, Global History, World Literature, and Bio-Diversity
Chapter Three: The Storyteller's Vest
Questions for Students
Thoughts for Students
Thoughts for Teachers
Curriculum and Pedagogical Suggestions; Literacy
Chapter Four: Vengeance Highway; A Fast Road to Trouble
Questions for Students
Thoughts for Students
Thoughts for Teachers
Curriculum and Pedagogical Suggestions; Social Studies and Global Studies
Chapter Five: A Neighbor's Secret
Questions for Students
Thoughts for Students
Thoughts for Teachers
Curriculum and Pedagogical Suggestions; US and Global History, Holocaust Studies, Civil Rights
Chapter Six: A New Student Stops Our World
Questions for Students
Thoughts for Students
Thoughts for Teachers
Curriculum and Pedagogical Suggestions; English and Geography
Chapter Seven: Two Stubborn College Kids (Based on an Appalachian Folktale)
Questions for Students
Thoughts for Students
Thoughts for Teachers
Curriculum and Pedagogical Suggestions; Mythology
Chapter Eight: The King and the Spider Caught in Their Traps
Questions for Students
Thoughts for Students
Thoughts for Teachers
Curriculum and Pedagogical Suggestions; Diplomacy and Military History, History of Anti-War Movements
Chapter Nine: The World's Fair and How Joel Learned the World Wasn't Fair
Questions for Students
Thoughts for Students
Thoughts for Teachers
Curriculum and Pedagogical Suggestions; History, Service Learning, Philosophy, and Economics
Conclusion
Conclusion for Students
Conclusion for Teachers
A Bonus Story for Completing This Book... for Students and Teachers!

Editorial Reviews

Holistic Approach for School Based Culture Change:  Character Education for Ages 13-15 uses stories to engage students on a variety of issues such a stereotyping that can lead to bullying.  The stories include questions for students to consider along with  suggestions for teachers on how they can stimulate further discussion and inquiry.  I believe teachers will find this book very helpful in engaging students  to discuss and reflect on important issues in their lives.

John P. Miller

Restorative Justice in Education is grounded in the notion that we are all valued and interconnected. Eschewing the notion of rugged individualism that plagues our world, Marc uses his creative energy to design a resource for middle school educators who are wanting to build a more interconnected and restorative world. I see this resource as a great way to begin conversations about how we do that. May we all work to help the next generation do this better.

Katherine Evans

Marc Levitt has created a useful resource for any educator who works with newly-minted teenagers in A Holistic Approach for Cultural Change: Character Education for Ages 13-15. With an increased focus on diversity, historical complexity, and contextualization in our school system and beyond, Levitt offers specific examples, strategies, and questions for teachers and students that will help start and continue challenging conversations.

Hilary Levey Friedman

Marc Levitt offers a powerful new perspective on the complex pedagogical and curricular issues surrounding character education. With courage, clarity and conviction, Levitt pleads with us to understand that it is only in authentic concern for the wellbeing of others that one rises to one’s full stature as a rich and authentic individual. This, he concludes, is the foundation upon which character education must be built if the schools are to play a vital role in helping us not only navigate the multiplicity of ethical visions and cultural constructs that now contentiously abound in the 21st century, but in turning that diversity into an opportunity for each to be edified and nurtured by each in a grand synthesis that, in Tennyson’s words, will empower us, individually and collectively, “to seek a newer world.

Clifford Mayes