Compelling Conversations: Connecting Leadership to Student Achievement.

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Compelling Conversations: Connecting Leadership to Student Achievement by Thomasina D. Piercy, Advanced Learning Press, Englewood, Colo., 2006, 162 pp. with index, $24.95 softcover 

Compelling Conversations is an explicit how-to-book that building principals can use to create dialogue with teachers about changing the slope of achievement by affecting each child's learning, one child at a time.

Throughout the book, principals are coached to work with teachers as they analyze student achievement data and predict June achievement results as the school year gets under way in September. Individual student goals are established and assessed, measured and monitored throughout the year.

Teachers' knowledge and experiences are valued in this approach as they work with the principal and with each other to improve students' learning in their classrooms.

Included in the book are numerous charts and examples of coaching questions and techniques that are most applicable. Suggestions of how to create the time needed for reflection and for conversation among colleagues during a busy school day also are explained.

Author Thomasina Piercy's experience as a professional development associate with the Center for Performance Assessment shows in the book's concrete examples. Piercy spent eight years as principal of Mount Airy Elementary School in Carroll County. Md.

The principals in our school district will be using the book as a guide this year when they work as educational leaders to assist our teachers in meeting the needs of each child. To me that is what education is about, teaching each child to high levels of achievement, and Piercy's book is a valuable resource for that endeavor.

Reviewed by Linda Gray Smith, superintendent, Worth County Rill Schools, Grant City, Mo.