School improvement begins with self-examination and honest dialogue about socialization, bias, discrimination, and cultural insensitivity. The authors acknowledge both the structural and sociological issues that contribute to low-performing schools and offer multiple tools and strategies to assess and improve classroom management, increase literacy, establish academic vocabulary, and contribute to a healthier school culture. Benefits: Reflect on current practices, and identify areas for improvement. - Spot the factors that can be harmful to school cultures. - Identify your school as high will/low skill, high skill/low will, low will/low skill, or high will/high skill. - Develop a blueprint for achieving skilled pedagogy and successful school improvement. - Gain practical classroom management strategies and activities. Contents: Part I: Will and Skill Chapter 1: The Two Parts of a Positive School Environment Part II: The Will to Lead Chapter 2: Conflicting Wills Chapter 3: Frustration in a Toxic Culture Chapter 4: The School Culture Framework: Creating a Culture of Collaboration Chapter 5: Leadership at Every Level Part III: The Skill to Teach Chapter 6: Developing a Responsive Pedagogy Chapter 7: The Steps to Responsive Pedagogy Chapter 8: Responsive Classroom Management Chapter 9: Responsive Academic Vocabulary Chapter 10: Responsive Academic Literacy Chapter 11: Responsive Learning Environment "Muhammad and Hollie write from experience. Both have led the transformation of traditional schools into exemplary schools by demonstrating the will to challenge the prevailing culture and by helping their staffs develop the skills to better meet student needs. I urge educators to embrace the ideas they present for changing their practices and to work together collaboratively to develop and implement the powerful instructional strategies offered in this book." -- Richard DuFour , Author and Education Consultant "With uncommon candor and clarity, Muhammad and Hollie challenge us as educators to examine our underlying beliefs, accept responsibility for building a school culture that ensures adult and student learning, and employ the practical and proven instructional practices needed to achieve these goals. I implore every educator, from classroom teachers to policymakers, to read this book and act on its compelling, common-sense recommendations." -- Mike Mattos , Educator and Author " The Will to Lead, the Skill to Teach puts into words, backed by facts, what some of us in education have intuitively felt for a very long while: positive motivation to make a difference in children's lives combined with the tools for effective instruction is absolutely essential to improve the quality of our children s education. This book does not stop with research it outlines specific techniques teachers can use in their classrooms and schools. Muhammad and Hollie have produced a beautiful combination of theory into practice that should be in the hands of every educator." -- Bob Howe , Executive Director, Michigan Elementary & Middle School Principals Association "Dr. Muhammad has done it again! With Dr. Hollie, he has created another practical, informational book for any principal who wishes to transform his or her school culture." -- Debra L. Jones , superintendent, Waverly Community Schools, Michigan Anthony Muhammad, PhD , is a much sought-after consultant. A practitioner for nearly 20 years, he has served as a middle school teacher, assistant principal, and principal, and as a high school principal. His Transforming School Culture approach explores the root causes of staff resistance to change. Dr. Muhammad's tenure as a practitioner has earned him several awards as both a teacher and a principal. His most notable accomplishment came as principal of Levey Middle School in Southfield, Michigan, a National School of Excellence, where student proficiency on state assessments more than doubled in five years. Dr. Muhammad and the staff at Levey used the Professional Learning Communities at Work™ process for school improvement, and they have been recognized in several videos and articles as a model high-performing PLC. As a researcher, Dr. Muhammad has published articles in several publications in both the United States and Canada. Dr. Sharroky Hollie is a national educator who provides professional development to thousands of educators in the area of cultural responsiveness. Since 2000, Dr. Hollie has trained over 150,000 educators and worked in nearly 2,000 classrooms. Going back 25 years, he has been a classroom teacher at the middle and high school levels, a central office professional development coordinator in Los Angeles Unified School District, a school founder and administrator, and university professor in teacher education at the Cal State University. Dr. Hollie has also been a visiting professor for Webster University in St. Louis and a guest lecturer at Stanford and UCLA. In addition to his ex