By Sam Swope

In 1995, writer Sam Swope gave a workshop to a third-grade class in a Queens school bursting at the seams with kids from around the world. So enchanted was he with his twenty-eight students that he \"adopted\" the class for three years, teaching them to write stories and poems. I Am a Pencil is the story of his years with this very special group of students. It is as funny, warm, heartbreaking, and hopeful as the children themselves. Swope follows his coloring troop of resilient writers from grades three to five, coaxing out their stories, watching their talents blossom, explode, and sometimes fizzle. We meet MeiKai (whose mom is a Taoist priestess), Aaron (who cannot seem to tell the truth), and Noelia (a wacky Dominican chatterbox). Preparing his students for a world of adult dangers, Swope is astonished by their courage, their humanity, and, most of all, their strength. I Am a Pencil is a book about the power and magic of imagination, providing a unique window on the immigrant experience as seen through the lives of children.

By Vivian Gussin Paley

In this fascinating look at the moral dimensions of the classroom, MacArthur Prize-winning educator Vivian Paley introduces a new rule- "You can't say you can't play"- to her kindergarten students. The struggle that ensues presents a great teacher with her greatest challenge- and her best book yet.

By Vivian Gussin Paley

As she enters her final year of teaching, Vivian Gussin Paley tells in this book a story of her own farewell, as well as a story of self-discovery of Reeny, a little girl with a fondness for the color brown. Led by Reeny, Paley and the children develop a passion for the books of Italian author Leo Lionni, and reinvent their classroom around discussions of these stories. Through Frederick the mouse and Lionni's other characters they explore themes of race, identity, gender, and the essential human needs to create and to belong.

By Vivian Gussin Paley

Visiting a London nursery school, Vivian Paley observes the school children's reception of another visitor, a handicapped boy named Teddy. A predicament arises, and the children's response offers Paley the purest evidence of kindness she has ever seen. In subsequent encounters, "the Teddy story" draws forth other tales of impulsive goodness from Paley's listeners, and resonates through this book as one story leads to another.

By Vivian Gussin Paley

Vivian Paley presents a moving personal account of her experiences teaching kindergarten in an integrated school within a predominantly white, middle-class neighborhood. In a new preface, she reflects on the way that even simple terminology can convey unintended meanings and show a speaker's blind spots. She also vividly describes what her readers have taught her over the years about herself as a "white teacher."

By Vivian Gussin Paley

The Boy Who Would Be a Helicopter focuses on the challenge posed by the isolated child to teachers and classmates alike in the unique community of the classroom. It is the dramatic story of Jason - the loner and the outsider - and of his ultimate triumph and homecoming into the society of his classmates. As we follow Jason's struggle, we see that the classroom is indeed the crucible within which the young discover themselves and learn to confront new problems in their daily experience.

By Vivian Gussin Paley

In her latest book, Vivian Paley sets out to discover the truth about the multicultural classroom from those who participate in it. Here are the voices of black teachers and minority parents, immigrant families, a Native American educator, and the children themselves, whose stories mingle with the author's to create a candid picture of the successes and failures of the integrated classroom.

By Vivian Gussin Paley

Wally's Stories is Vivial Paley's lively account of her kindergarten classroom, a classroom where children are encouraged to learn by using their fantasies and stories. The book describes the evolution of both teacher and students as they grow to understand each other through this unusual teaching method. The author shows that in the course of creating their own dramatic world, five-year-olds are capable of thought and language far in advance of what they accomplish in traditional classroom exericises.

By Vivian Gussin Paley

Bad guys, birthdays, and babies are the self-selected themes of preschoolers' fantasy play. The children in Bad Guys Don't Have Birthdays use fantasy play to portray fear in order to prove that fear can be conquered: I pretend therefore I am not afraid. They invent chaos in order to show that everything is under control: I pretend therefore I am, I pretend therefore I know.

By Vivian Gussin Paley

Foreword by Philip W. Jackson

In Boys & Girls, Vivian Paley has re-created a year of kindergarten teaching in which she explored the differences in the ways children play and fantasize. Each year, swords and purses in hand, the children rush to proclaim themselves boys or girls. Watching the Cinderellas and Darth Vaders pursue their separate fantasies, Paley questions the clichés and prejudices of the teacher's curriculum that reward girls' domestic play while discouraging boys' adventurous fantasies. The children's own conversations, stories, playacting, and scuffles are interwoven with Paley's observations and accounts of her attempts to alter the children's stereotyped play. Their search for self-definition will reawaken our own childhood memories, and Paley's sensitive efforts to uncover her prejudices will illuminate our own biases, values, and expectations for our children.

Illustrated by Vivian Gussin Paley

'Paley's vivid and accurate descriptions depict both spontaneous and recurring incidents and outline increasingly complex interactions among the children. Included in the narrative are questions or ideas to challenge the reader to gain more insight and understanding into the motives and conceptualizations of Mollie and other children.'-Karen L. Peterson, Young Children

By Read to Me Program 2005

This video presents 50 families as they read with their children under two. The babies have their own delightful ideas about what to do with books. Their parents do their best to keep up!

By Iona and Peter Opie

The Lore and Language of Schoolchildren, based on contributions from 5,000 schoolchildren all over Britain, was the first book in which children themselves were consulted about their traditions and beliefs. The result was a revelation, and the book has remained the Opies' best known.