Call me mean, but on receiving these slim booklets (or long pamphlets) I felt a Victor Meldrew mood coming on. “I don’t believe it,” I exclaimed. “pound;12 each with a ‘bargain’ pound;60 for a set of seven, none more than 25 pages long? You must be joking.” Moreover, a random dip into Boys are DifferentI Or Are They?, one of a mini-series of three booklets on learning, reveals that we need more male teachers.

But the skill with which the author explores the issue of what constitutes the “right kind of man” as he exposes the confrontational consequences of too much testosterone, gave me pause for thought.

I read them at one gulp in an evening. Each volume is accessible for the busy teacher or head. The digests of well-listed research and suggestions for further reading are jargon-free. Each begins with an arresting description of the problem. Whether the topic is boys, discipline, building strong motivation, positive thinking or self-esteem - “not soft and not an option” - the reader is hooked. In these five volumes - the same is not true of the other two papers on learning, How the Brain Works and Changing our Minds about Intelligence - are helpful sections on what schools can do and individual teachers might like to try.

There is nothing prescriptive: Ian Smith, like the good trainer he is, raises questions, speculates about evidence, clarifies issues and explores ways of resolving them.

The volume on building motivation is typical. Smith exposes issues that the teacher can do little or nothing much about - lack of parental support or job prospects, poor housing, peer group pressure outside school during adolescence, and a sometimes inappropriate nationally prescribed curriculum. He then focuses on what the teacher can influence, alone or in concert with colleagues. This passage reminds me of a visit I once made to a school where staff were bemoaning the sort of children attending the school from their challenged locality. I told the headteacher: “There are many changes we can make, but I fear these are the only children we have got for you.”

The best volume has the teasing title Can Schools get Beyond Discipline?. There you will learn about the limits of “assertive (positive) discipline”, the self-defeating nature of familiar punishments and, finally, of the misguided nature of rewards. Once all the reader’s familiar props have been removed, the volume goes on to outline an approach which, after a good staff debate, most schools will see as a helpful re-focus on the essentials of a good school ethos. You and your colleagues will come away from each volume energised by a clear agreement on the way forward.

So the Meldrew in me was wrong. I would certainly buy a set of these booklets for the staffroom library and use extracts forin-service discussions and as reading for new staff. Most schools are beginning to use their standards funding to create staff libraries as they realise that, if staff can be enabled to read texts that are short and worthwhile rather than the bureaucratic dross they are sometimes forced to contemplate in our over-accountable present day, this is a powerful nectar of school improvement.

Tim Brighouse

Professor Tim Brighouse is chief education officer for Birmingham