Teaching What Matters - by Steve A Banno (Paperback)

About the Book

Teaching What Matters is a comprehensive guidebook distilling that course with emerging research in the science of happiness and altruism.

Book Synopsis

Teaching What Matters is a comprehensive guidebook distilling that course with emerging research in the science of happiness and altruism.

Review Quotes

In a world of endless access to infinite data, we need to free teachers to do what they set out to do in the first place-help us raise connected, engaged and healthy children.

Steve Banno, Jr. has written a groundbreaking book for educators that will surely transform the lives of their students. In Teaching What Matters he skillfully and comprehensively integrates what we know from Positive Psychology about how to live a happy and meaningful life and translates it into a ready-made course that may be the most impactful course one ever teaches. Through his careful weaving together of evidence-based research with thoughtful activities and reflections that invite students into hands-on experiences, the course laid out in this book inspires the best in students and empowers them to discover for themselves what it means to live an authentic, valued, and meaningful life.

There is a lot of heavy lifting in education. One of the biggest challenges is helping students grow into their true potential. Steve Banno, Jr. has created a practical classroom guide to doing exactly that. This book will help focus on what truly matters enabling students not only to be successful, but to make the world a better place.

What does it mean to be educated? "Knowing how to be happy" may not be a common response to this question. Yet, happiness is what we all seek in life. Steve Banno, Jr. provides a blueprint for educators and those who work with youth on how to teach the "soft skills" of success in life: happiness and altruism. This book expertly intertwines the science of happiness, educational research, personal experience, and suggested lessons to provide a strong argument for teaching happiness in primary and secondary schools. Banno illustrates a different model for education than the model currently provided by the academic industrial complex. Teaching What Matters helps those of us who have thought, "I wish someone had taught me this earlier," put words into actions by teaching the next generation the true meaning of success.

About the Author

Steve A. Banno, Jr. is an award-winning social studies educator and creator of the widely-popular high school course exploring the science of happiness, kindness, and altruism, which he has taught over his twenty-five-year career. He lives near Cape Cod, Massachusetts with his wife, son and their dog.