Hugging the Middle--How Teachers Teach in an Era of Testing and Accountability

Larry Cuban's How Teachers Taught has been widely acclaimed as a pathbreaking text on the history and evolution of classroom teaching. Now Cuban brings his great experience as a classroom teacher, superintendent, and researcher to this highly anticipated follow-up. Focusing on three diverse school districts (Arlington, Virginia; Denver, Colorado; Oakland, California), Hugging the Middle offers an incisive portrayal of how teachers teach now. It is a revealing look at a range of current, workable pedagogical options educators are using to engage students while satisfying parents and policymakers--options that succeed by creating hybrid practices that combine both teacher-centered approaches (e.g., mostly direct instruction, textbooks, lectures) with student-centered ones (e.g., team projects on real-world problems, independent learning, small-group work).

A state-of-the-profession assessment in this era of top-down educational policy, Hugging the Middle:

• Brings Larry Cuban's years of experience and keen historian's eye to an analysis of teaching today.
• Looks at teachers' continuing adaptations to standards-based education reform and the No Child Left Behind Act.
• Compares classroom practices in a cross section of U.S. urban schools.
• Gauges the impact of technology (or lack thereof) in the contemporary classroom.

Praise for Larry Cuban's classic How Teachers Taught:

" How Teachers Taught is one of the most important books on educational history in years and one that has considerable implications for improving the practice of teaching." --Michael W. Sedlak, Book Review, The Elementary School Journal, Vol. 86, No. 2 (Nov., 1985)