We love reading!
Resource for
all Readers
Resources & Materials for Teachers of Struggling Readers
Early Childhood Teachers
Books/Articles:
"When Readers Struggle: Teaching That Works" by Gay Su Pinnell and Irene Fountas (2009)
When Readers Struggle: Teaching That Works is a comprehensive resource on struggling readers. It's filled with specific teaching ideas for helping children in kindergarten through Grade 3 who are having difficulty in reading and writing. Gay Su Pinnell and Irene Fountas offer numerous examples and descriptions of instruction that can help initially struggling readers become strategic readers. The book focuses on small-group intervention and individual interactions during reading and writing. Pinnell and Fountas also illustrate how to closely observe readers to make the best possible teaching decisions for them as well as how to support struggling readers in whole-class settings.
"Supporting Struggling Readers: Using Interactive Read-Alouds and Graphic Organizers" by Jennifer Barrett, Mary Jane Moran, and Deborah Tegano (2010)
This article addresses a study that reports the role of storybook read-alouds. One of the authors investigates the role of collaborative discussion combined with the use of graphic organizers as a way to increase children's comprehension.
Digital Resources: Click on the name of the website to take you there!!
Reading Rockets
This website contains researched-based teaching strategies, Common Core resources for teachers, writing samples from real kids grades K-3, and specific articles and strategies/methods related to struggling readers.
Starfall
Starfall was designed with beginning and struggling readers in mind. Focused on elementary students, children can go through multiple activities to help them learn to read and improve their reading skills. Students who need help with beginning reading skills will find animated stories and games designed to teach phonics, vowel sounds and sight words. Once students master these concepts, they move up to short poems and simple picture stories that focus on key words and short sentences. Longer passages and stories are available for students who become more confident readers.
With Tumblebooks, students and teachers have access to a large selection of animated picture books for students to read or have read to them. A selection of read-along books and graphic novels are also available for older students.
Scholastic offers help for struggling readers with its selection of Listen and Read books and articles from Scholastic magazines. Both collections provide struggling readers with engaging non-fiction texts. The Listen and Read books offer audio narration for struggling readers. The magazine articles put complex topics in kid-friendly terms and provide teachers of all subjects with materials they can incorporate in their lessons to help struggling readers without compromising their standards.
Middle Childhood Teachers
Books/Articles:
"Using Books They Can and Want to Read" by Lori Jamison Rog and Paul Kropp (1998)
This book discusses one of the keys to helping struggling readers, which is to provide them with books that they can and want to read. The book emphasizes using fiction books for struggling readers because they contain textual integrity: realistic characters, readable and convincing text, and a sense of the readers' interests and needs. Texts such as non-fiction books, newspapers, magazines and even comic books can also hook students into reading.
"Teaching Readers Who Struggle: A Pragmatic Middle School Framework" by Gwynne Ellen Ash (2002)
This article suggests a pragmatic framework for reading instruction that attends to the needs of learners aged 11 to 14 years who struggle. Five practices-daily oral or shared reading, guided reading in flexible groups, word study, self-selected extended reading and writing, and explicit comprehension strategy instruction—form the basis of the framework. Its origin is in classroom experience, work with middle school teachers, and a synthesis of successful tutoring programs and critical literacy theories. The framework is suggested to guide classroom teachers in planning and organizing literacy instruction for young adolescent students at all levels of literacy development.
Digital Resources:
Funbrain
Funbrain’s reading section contains games and online versions of popular books for kids. Struggling readers can practice their parts of speech by filling in MadLibs and creating silly stories or playing a round of Grammar Gorillas. Other games reinforce word roots, commonly confused words and key vocabulary words to help students develop their reading skills.
Reading in the Real World: The Sports Network
The Sports Network 2 (TSN-2) grew out of a Next Generation Learning Challenges grant funded by the Gates and Hewlett Foundations. It is among the very first learning games developed around key Common Core State Standards (CCSS) in ELA & Literacy. Their mission statement aims to close the academic achievement gap by using technology and the world of work to engage, teach, inspire, and empower middle and high school students.
Code Invaders
Online games using high-frequency social studies and science words to help students develop vocabulary skills.
Adolescent Young Adult Teachers
Books/Articles:
"Older Students Struggling With Reading" by Sebastian Wren (2002)
The article discusses how to motivate high school students, explains specific ways to help these students with assessments, gives various instructional strategies and resources to help teachers of these grade levels.
"Literacy Strategies for Grades 4-12" by Karen Tankersley (2005)
This book provides a multiplicity of practical, research-based reading strategies tailored specifically for use with older students. These students may no longer have a reading class as part of the school day, but they are still developing their reading skills—and every teacher contributes to that effort. Tankersley focuses on the six foundational "threads" necessary for effective reading. These include phonemic awareness, phonics and decoding, vocabulary, fluency, comprehension, and higher-order thinking—only this time with a focus on the last four threads, which are especially pertinent to the higher grades. By examining the criteria necessary for success in each thread, she shows how we can better teach struggling readers to:
* Develop and expand on content-specific vocabulary.
* Read text accurately, smoothly, and with proper phrasing.
* Extract and construct meaning through reading.
* Critically evaluate, synthesize, analyze, and interpret text.
Digital Resources:
TumbleReadables is a collection of read-along books for students at the elementary, middle school and high school levels. All books come with audio narration and sentences are highlighted as the books are read.
OverDrive
You can find, borrow, enjoy and return eBooks and audiobooks on a wide variety of compatible tablets, phones and computers, all for zero dollars per month!
Discovery Education offers a broad range of free classroom resources that compliment and extend learning beyond the bell. These resources also foster deeper engagement and opportunities for students to take charge of their own learning with high quality, engaging, relevant tools designed for today’s busy teachers and parents. There are resources for any grade level and specific materials for English, Math, Science, and Social Studies.
Local/State/National Support Organizations for Struggling Readers
Reading is Essential for All People (REAP)
Reading is Essential for All People is a non-profit corporation dedicated to improving reading proficiency through teacher training and enrichment. REAP provides public school teachers with specialized training that reinforces the foundations of reading. These training approaches are helpful for any child, in any classroom, small group, or one-on-one situation, and are especially critical for struggling readers.
Nashville Predators Foundation
The Nashville Predators Foundation strives to meet the educational, social, health and cultural needs of our community by offering unique resources and financial support to local youth-oriented organizations.
National Education Association (NEA)
The NEA's mission is to advocate for education professionals and to unite members and the nation to fulfill the promise of public education to prepare every student to succeed in a diverse and interdependent world.
FirstBook
A national nonprofit organization with a single mission: to give disadvantaged children the opportunity to read and own their first new books.
Last Updated August 4, 2014
