The New York Times Book Review - Sebastian Stockman
[Green's] project is both a history of the research on effective teaching as well as a consideration of how that research might best be implemented. What emerges is the gaping chasm between what the best teachers do and how we go about evaluating what they've done.
Judith Shulevitz
"Everyone who cares about teaching should read [Building a Better Teacher]. Right away."
USA Today - Greg Toppo
"Green has spent years looking at what makes a great teacher—and whether the teachers we remember most fondly were born great or simply learned key skills."
Howard Gardner
"In vivid detail, Elizabeth Green chronicles the long, uncertain, but ultimately promising efforts, based on research, to improve teaching in American schools."
The Washington Post - Michael S. Roth
"[S]hould be part of every new teacher's education."
Psychology Today - Jonathan Wai
"Elizabeth Green draws upon years of interviews and research as an education writer and CEO of Chalkbeat to make the case for why teaching is a craft and that it can be taught to anyone. Her excellent book should be read for a detailed account of the history of teacher education, an international context, and an entertaining narrative."
The Atlantic - Sara Mosle
"At the heart of Green’s exploration is a powerfully simple idea: that teaching is not some mystical talent but a set of best practices that can be codified and learned through extensive hands-on coaching, self-scrutiny, and collaboration."
Nicholas Lemann
"In this fascinating and accessible book, Elizabeth Green tells the story of the country's leading researchers on the all-important questions of what makes for an effective classroom teacher and how teachers can be trained to do their jobs better. That the story feels completely fresh is testament not only to Green’s skill as a reporter and writer but also to how beside-the-point much of the national conversation about education is. Green’s book ought to persuade the country to focus on what really matters in education."
Amanda Ripley
"Elizabeth Green reveals, in cinematic detail, what makes great teaching such a dazzling intellectual challenge—and why it has taken us so unforgivably long to care. A must-read book for every American teacher and taxpayer."
Adam Grant
"Great education is the foundation of a flourishing society, and it depends on great teachers. Building a Better Teacher illuminates how we can develop gifted educators who prepare children for a brighter future. With strong evidence and compelling cases, Elizabeth Green has written an important book that every educator ought to read."
City Journal - Sol Stern
"Timely… Elizabeth Green shows herself to be a talented young journalist."
Boston Globe - Kate Tuttle
"Peek[s] into real classrooms, allowing readers to observe what great teachers do and how."
Sebastian Stockman
"Both a history of the research on effective teaching as well as a consideration of how that research might best be implemented. What emerges is the gaping chasm between what the best teachers do and how we go about evaluating what they’ve done."
Bookpage - Angela Leeper
"[Green] makes the case through thoughtful details that great teachers are made, not born… she brings hope and renewal to the field."
Paul Tough
"We romanticize teachers, and we vilify them, but we don't do much to help. This beautifully written, defiantly hopeful book points the way to a better future for American teachers and the children they teach."
Kirkus Reviews
2014-07-02
Ideas from a former principal on what makes for anexceptional teacher.Accountability and autonomy are the two guiding lights forprescribing changes in our schools, and as Green notes early on in this book,the two principles are often at loggerheads. Accountability proponents believein leveraging the power of data to study which teachers' students are meetingor exceeding goals; opponents claim that it stultifies educators, diminishingthe profession, and ineffectively measuring teacher and student "success."Autonomy proponents believe that if you elevate the profession and let theteachers steer their ships, the trust, freedom and respect will enable them todo their very best. Green gives both of these views credence but goes furtherto suggest that the reverence surrounding the best teachers is misguided, inthat it elevates the "natural born educator" mythos that suggests an inborntalent. Green deflates the "I could never do what they do" aura of the bestteachers, but in a good way. In extensive conversations and observations thatuncover the approaches that the best educators share, she distills how theyapply those approaches in similar ways despite differences inextraversion/introversion, humorous/serious teaching approaches, and flexible/rigidstandards. Green goes deeper than bromides about student engagement and motivation,digging into data about student success as well as examining the means used tocollect the data. She also chronicles her visits with professionals at multiplelevels (administrative, support, frontline teachers) through various successesand failures, gleaning wisdom from both—just as the best teachers would havetheir students do.A powerful, rational guidebook to creating genuinelyeffective education, written in a manner useful not just for schoolteachers,but everyone involved in the care of children.
