In I Can Learn from You , Michael Reichert and Richard Hawley—the authors of Reaching Boys, Teaching Boys —set out to probe deeply into the relational dynamics that help boys succeed as learners.
Drawing on interviews with students and teachers in thirty-five schools across six countries, they examine the particular ways boys extend and receive empathy—modes of interaction that remain consistent across a wide range of schools, teachers, countries, and cultures.
The book shows how teachers can help boys form productive learning relationships and how schools can support the development of teachers’ relational capacities. At the heart of the book is the belief that educators must—and can—put relational teaching at the center of school life.
Michael C. Reichert, Ph.D., is founding director of the Center for the Study of Boys’ and Girls’ Lives at the University of Pennsylvania, and a clinical practitioner specializing in boys and men who has conducted extensive research globally.
There is some interesting qualitative data in this book, but I’m not sure it leads very clearly to less-than-obvious conclusions. Gets the big picture right, but doesn’t string together enough of the details.
This book was fine and had some good information to consider about how to connect with students. But, despite not being too long, the book dragged. The personal accounts were good at first, but became monotonous and made you almost forget the key messages the book was trying to convey.