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Breakthroughs in Literacy

Book Examines Ways to Teach Struggling Readers and Writers

Aug 14, 2009 Sheila Gaquin

Author Susan Israel uses a series of teacher essays to examine strategies to help struggling and special needs students develop as readers and writers.

Susan Israel structures Breakthroughs in Literacy: Teacher Success Stories and Strategies, around 29 essays, each written by a veteran classroom educator. If experience is the best teacher, then Israel has put together a very useful how-to book for anyone looking for innovative, research-based, ideas to help motivate and support under-achieving students.

Organization of Breakthroughs in Literacy

A book of essays could easily become a nothing more than a series of interesting, but disconnected stories. However, Israel has grouped the essays into four sections creating a wholistic and practical manual for teaching literacy. The four major themes are:

Connection: Knowing the Learner
Motivations: The right book can make a difference
Engagement: Using multi sensory experiences
Transformation: Learning together.

Model of Reflective Journal for Teachers

Israel introduces each section with an overview that unifies the selected essays around one of her four themes. She ends each section with her personal response to the ideas presented in that section. This response is written in a personal narrative style that lets the reader follow Israel’s thought process as she evaluates the strategies discussed in the essays. It also provides an excellent model of reflective journaling for teachers to follow.

Reflective Questions for Self-Analysis of Teaching Practices

Even though most teachers know the importance of self-reflection for continued professional growth and development, finding time for self-reflection is difficult, so unfortunately, this important professional practice often falls to the bottom of a teacher's to-do list. Each section of Breatkthroughs in Literacy provides a handy list of reflective questions that even the busiest teacher can use on a regular basis to assess and refine his or her teaching practice.

Lessons Learned and Literacy Actions Teachers Can Take to Improve Student Success

Israel summarizes the take-away lessons for each group of essays, and then based on the ideas presented in the essays, formulates a list of ten practical, and often quite simple, actions that classroom teachers can implement to improve literacy instruction. Finally, Israel concludes each section with an annotated bibliography for further reading. The reading selections are a mix of research and practical classroom-based ideas.

Book has Lots of Ideas for Working With Struggling and Special Needs Students

Helping all students succeed as readers and writers is a challenging task for every teacher. Often teachers feel they have tried everything they can think of and still haven’t reached the struggling learner. Israel’s book is a useful manual of research-based ideas, that read more like a visit with fellow teachers in the staff room, than a scholarly tome. Her comments, suggestions, and reflective questions enrich the teacher stories and unite them into an idea packed book that can be readily implemented in classrooms serving a wide range of students.

Israel, Susan E., Breakthroughs in Literacy: Teacher Success Stories and Strategies, Somerset, NJ: Jossey-Bass, August 2009.

The copyright of the article Breakthroughs in Literacy in Teacher Tips/Training is owned by Sheila Gaquin. Permission to republish Breakthroughs in Literacy in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.

New Book Packed With Ideas for Teaching Literacy