Some students hate school, and some students love it. Some students enter classrooms with an I dare you try to teach me look on their faces, and others bounce into class excited to learn and anxious to please the teacher. We know we can’t automatically blame teachers or schools when students don’t want to learn. But we also know that sometimes teachers and schools don’t always set students up for success, and they don’t always help them love what they’re learning. And that’s not supposed to happen.

Why Kids Love (and Hate) School: Reflections on Practice investigates some of the school and classroom practices that help students love school-and some that send students in the opposite direction. Intended for classroom teachers, teacher education students, and school administrators, chapters in the book investigate a variety of topics: how schools can build effective school cultures, the struggle students encounter in learning, practices of other countries that help students love school, testing practices that cause students to hate school-and much more.