In the second volume in the Turning Around Turnaround Schools series, called Embracing the Rhythm of the Learner Year, the authors explore the neuroscience of how students learn and then use those insights to recommend a powerful and proven methodology for planning the school year around student need. Teachers don’t take state tests or college readiness tests – students do. Therefore, our metric of success in K-12 education cannot be how much is taught, but rather, how much is learned.

While the Rhythm of the Learner Year process is not focused on increasing test scores, it stands to reason that if we are creating independent learners who can perform at high levels and are willing to give best effort, increases on high-stakes testing should be a natural byproduct.

The Learner Year teaches the reader (K-12 teachers, principals, superintendents, and other educational leaders) to consider the whole child in program design, taking into account both cognitive and noncognitive abilities and indicators. Ultimately, the authors make the case for a just-in-time approach to:
– Developing a school’s culture and climate – Unpacking standards – Building independent learners – Making those learners performers – Winning hearts and minds to get best effort for assessments – Mitigating the summer losses of content and process.

The Learner Year starts with summer planning, which involves reviewing what worked this past academic year, what didn’t, where the faculty were strong, and where professional development might be most useful. This all goes into the opening of school, critical to setting the culture and climate for learning. The authors write that you can’t win the school year in the opening of school, but sometimes you can lose it with a bad start.

In the fall, we increase a student’s potential to learn and store that learning in long-term memory. In the spring, we continue the learning but equally focus on retrieving that learning and performing tasks at the level the students will ultimately be assessed. As testing rolls around, we must make sure that we have hearts and minds to get best effort, and the new school year actually starts with the last few weeks of closing the current school year. It’s a continuous, thoughtful, strategic, and proven way to do exactly what the book’s title suggests – Embrace the Rhythm of the Learner Year.

Like the first volume in this breakthrough book series for K-12 educators, the authors present the practice in manageable chunks and then provide checklists, tool kits, and planning protocols to help the reader put the ideas into action. This book is good for both the novice teacher or administrator looking for higher student engagement, as well as the seasoned superintendent or principal looking to redesign curricula and scheduling. This book is also a good self-study companion piece for educators attending the Ed Directions’ year-long Rhythm of the Learner Year professional development series.