Routledge Working Hard, Working Happy: Cultivating a Culture of Effort and Joy in the Classroom

In this new book from Routledge and MiddleWeb, author Rita Platt shows how you can create a joyful classroom community in which students are determined to work hard, be resilient, and never give up. She describes how to help build students’ purpose, mastery, and autonomy, so they take ownership over their work and develop a growth mindset for success. Topics covered include: Why joy and effort go hand in hand How to build a classroom climate of caring and achievement Why mastery and goal setting are important How to work with differentiated instruction How to work with cooperative and collaborative learning Why parent-teacher connection is vital How to take your practice of joy and effort beyond the classroom And much more! Each chapter includes practical tools, tips, and ideas that you can use immediately to develop these skills in students, so they find more joy and success in the learning process. Review "If you want to bring more joy into your classroom (and what teacher doesn't?), you can't go wrong with Rita Platt's book, Working Hard, Working Happy. She brings her experience from working in diverse classrooms to bear in offering practical ideas and showing how challenging academic content is not incompatible with fun, laughter, and sanity." ― Larry Ferlazzo, teacher, blogger, and author of several books, including Building a Community of Self-Motivated Learners (Routledge) "Rita Platt’s new book captures the complexities of the teaching career with relevant research while maintaining that "joy and rigor can take many different forms, and there are many different teacher styles or approaches that work to create happy classrooms." This book doesn’t aim to change who you are as a teacher so much as it sets about shining a light on the many paths towards a happy classroom. Teachers will be thrilled to find themselves within the pages of this book, being celebrated and guided in pursuit of a learning environment that works."--Amber Chandler, NBCT, Frontier Central Teachers Association President, and author of The Flexible ELA Classroom and The Flexible SEL Classroom (Routledge) "Working Hard, Working Happy will help you be a better teacher. The big ideas are research-backed best-practices and the strategies for implementing them are practical and powerful. Whether you read it alone, with a book study group, or as a part of formal professional development, Rita's book is an excellent resource."--Dr. Todd Whitaker, Professor of Educational Leadership at the University of Missouri and author of more than 50 books, including the international bestseller What Great Teachers Do Differently "I've admired Rita Platt's insightful, honest writing for a long time. Now she's written a rare book that equally speaks to novice and veteran educators because it emphasizes the elemental components of learning: effort and enjoyment. Platt's love of teaching is as contagious as it is clear headed, and every reader will benefit from her wise, practical, and impassioned advice."--Robert Ward, author of Teaching the Benefit Mindset "Rita Platt wrote a book that would be perfect for any teacher, any content area, any grade level. This was one of the most enjoyable reads I’ve had in a long time! As I read this book, I could feel the joy that Platt poured into it. Her love of students, teachers, and education exude from the pages. You will be inspired by her words and the practical ways to infuse happiness in everyday lessons."-- Valentina Gonzalez, ELL Educator and National Consultant "This is a book every educator - whether veteran, aspiring, or somewhere in between - should read. In fact, if you could only read one book in your whole teaching career, I would recommend this one. With her engaging style and vast expertise, Rita Platt invites readers to embrace both joy and earnest learning in a classroom where every student (and teacher!) will thrive. In an era where the value of joy is o