Confessions of an Elementary School Principal – Meril R. Smith | Reviewed by: Michaela Gordoni, Hollywood Book Reviews

Confessions of an Elementary School Principal by author Meril R. Smith is a collection of experiences and life lessons for teaching, learned by the author. It also includes a few experiences and testimonies from other teachers, secretaries, and students of Meril Smith. Through the author’s challenges and experiences, the reader can see how Meril’s success at being an educator, principal, and mentor impacted the lives of children that came from struggling Californian communities. The book also demonstrates that really listening and observing are key qualities in a principal; in the education system, listening, observing, and having creativity are important in order to come up with solutions to unique and difficult problems. It also contains brief illustrations as well as photos of people mentioned.

Confessions of an Elementary School Principal is not just full of instructive educational insight, but it also contains many humorous anecdotes that will bring a smile to readers’ faces. One such anecdote relays the creation of a school cookbook with a second grader’s original and especially appetizing recipe: “Cooked Carrots: 1. Put a bunch of carrots in a pot, 2. Put some water in the pot, 3. Put the pot on the stove, 4. Boil the carrots for 45 minutes.” It also covers serious issues that Meril has faced: school shooting drills, being seen with the parents of students that had morally questionable careers, and condoms being passed around in an elementary school.

I thought that this contained a lot of amusing and useful things that can be used for education. I enjoyed learning about all of the creative solutions that Meril and his staff came up with. There were so many great examples of great teaching and school programs, but one thing I particularly liked is the “green ticket” incentive mentioned in the book. When a teacher saw a child demonstrating a good behavior or action, they gave them a green piece of paper that the kids could use as raffle tickets for school assembly prizes.

The great thing about this book is that educational insight can be taken away – not just by those that are involved in elementary education, but all the way up to the college level. Confessions of an Elementary School Principal shows that all it takes is one good educator to make a huge influence on thousands of children.

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