Best Practices in Adolescent Literacy Instruction. Edited by Kathleen Hinchman & Heather Sheridan-Thomas, $42.75

Covering everything from day-to-day learning activities to school-wide goals, this engaging book reviews key topics in literacy instruction for grades 5–12 and provides research-based recommendations for practice. Leading scholars present culturally responsive strategies for motivating adolescents; using multiple texts and digital media; integrating literacy instruction with science, social studies, and math; and teaching English language learners and struggling readers.

Breaking the Word Barrier: Stories of Adults Learning to Read. Marilyn Lerch & Angela Ranson, Editors, $16.95

Each success related in these stories has helped a dream come within reach — from helping a child with homework to landing a job with better pay. The stories in this collection are inspirational and demonstrate a generosity of spirit and hope for others in similar circumstances.

Fresh Takes on Teaching Literary Elements. Michael Smith & Jeffrey Wilhelm, $29.99 Grades 6-12

Got Grammar? Ready-to-Use Lessons and Activities That Make Grammar Fun! Jack Umstatter, $35.99 (Grades 6 to 12)

Each of the over 60 lessons in Got Grammar are ready-to-use and reproducible, and each begins with helpful teaching pages that define, explain, and illustrate grammar, usage, or mechanics concepts. These lessons and the many ready-to-use student activities include 15 diagnostic tests, 15 section-review activities, 18 final tests, and over 100 other creative reinforcement activities, including diagramming.

The Grammar Teacher’s Activity-a-Day, Grades 5-12. Jack Umstatter, $23.95

180 ready-to-use lessons to teach grammar and usage.

In this concise, practical book, Marilyn Reynolds shares techniques she has used and personal anecdotes that reveal much about reluctant readers and teachers who struggle daily to engage them. Among many other key topics, Reynolds discusses the importance of respect for students' attitudes, experiences, perceptions and choices regarding reading.

In addition to insightful analysis, Reynolds devotes a good portion of her book to practical, immediately usable resources, including answers to frequently asked questions, prompts for teaching, and a separate section of "Tricks of the Trade" with logs, forms, an extensive list of "hit" books, and much more.

It's Critical! Classroom Strategies for Deepening and Extending Comprehension. David Booth, $24.95

It’s Critical shows teachers how to plan literacy events that recognize and interpret the factors that readers and writers bring to the text. It offers successful strategies for becoming caring mentors who support and encourage students as they explore a variety of text forms - from poems to novels, from speeches to blogs, from art to invention. Based on extensive classroom experience, the book shows you how to engage students in brainstorming, researching, interpreting, problem-solving, discussing, presenting, composing, conducting inquiries, publishing reports, writing poems and scripts, critically examining issues and concerns, and reflecting on their learning.

Nonfiction Reading Power. Adrienne Gear, $24.95

Teaching students how to think while they read all kinds of information.

Parallel Curriculum Units for Language Arts, Grades 6-12. Jeanne Purcell & Jann Leppien, $58.95

Parallel Curriculum Units for Language Arts provides sample language arts units written by practicing teachers to demonstrate what high-quality curriculum looks like within a PCM framework. Covering a variety of topics—including narrative voice, literary criticism, and writing original pieces—these field-tested units help you to design your own units and deepen your understanding of how the PCM framework helps tailor curriculum to the abilities, interests, and learning preferences of each learner.

Prompted to Write: Building On-Demand Writing Skills, Grades 6-12. Meredith Pike-Baky & Gerald Fleming, $29.99

Prompted to Write offers help for teachers who are preparing students for "high-stakes" writing tests. Features in-depth and reproducible lesson units to help student develop proficiency in crafting essays, building vocabulary and reading comprehension skills.

Reading Success for Struggling Adolescent Learners. Edited by Susan Lenski & Jill Lewis, $36.50

Comprehensive, up to date, and highly practical, this volume discusses factors that affect struggling readers in grades 7–12 and provides research-based strategies for improving their reading and writing skills … Essential topics include assessment; building core competencies, such as fluency, comprehension, and vocabulary; and working with struggling adolescent English language learners.

Real-Life Reading Activities for Grades 6-12. James Silver, $32.99

Over 200 ready-to-use lessons and activities to help students master practical reading skills.

Teaching Adolescents Who Struggle with Reading: Practical Strategies. David Moore & Kathleen Hinchman, $35.95

Teaching Adolescents Who Struggle with Reading presents practical classroom strategies for teaching middle and high school students who struggle as readers and writers.

Teaching Adolescent Writers. Kelly Gallagher, $27.95

This thoughtful book shoes how students can be taught to write effectively with a number of classroom-tested strategies that enable teachers to:

• understand the importance of teaching and modeling writing
• understand how providing choice motivates and elevates adolescent writing
• help students recognize the importance of purpose and audience
• assess in ways the drive better writing performance

Infused with humour and illuminating anecdotes, the book offers both practical ways to incorporate writing instruction into everyday teaching, and compelling reasons to do so.

Teaching Reading to Black Adolescent Males: Closing the Achievement Gap. Alfred Tatum, $24.95

The race and gender achievement gap in literacy is one of the most difficult issues in education today. Providing a first-hand perspective, Alfred Tatum brings together his various experiences as a black male student, middle school teacher working with struggling black male readers, reading specialist in an urban elementary school, and staff developer in classrooms across the nation to offer insights on ways teachers and schools can re-conceptualize literacy instruction for those who need it most.

Tutoring Adolescent Readers. Deborah Berrill, Laura Doucette & Dirk Verhulst, $24.95

A comprehensive, hands-on manual for teachers and peer tutors working with struggling readers from ages 12 to 18. The book offers simple solutions for a variety of student needs, from students who are turned off or learning English for the first time to students who have a learning problem or a different learning style. This practical book promotes fluency and word recognition with innovative suggestions for all phases of reading — setting up a tutoring program, techniques to use while reading, and meaningful follow-up activities. Reproducible resources explain the essentials of reading instruction and investigate a variety of effective reading strategies.

"You Gotta BE the Book": Teaching Engaged and Reflective Reading with Adolescents, 2nd Edition. Jeffrey Wilhelm, $24.95

Through textured case studies of engaged and reluctant readers, the 2nd Edition of “You Gotta BE the Book” once again addresses enduring issues, such as:

• What do highly engaged, adolescent readers DO as they read?
• What is it about traditional schooling and reading instruction that deters engaged reading and serves to disenfranchise young readers?
• What types of interventions can be used in the classroom to help all students, especially reluctant ones, to become successful readers?

In this expanded edition, Wilhelm adds a new commentary to each chapter in which he reflects on the research and insights he introduced in his now classic text.

You Hear Me? Poems and Writing by Teenage Boys. Edited by Betsy Franco, $8.00

In a powerful collection of more than seventy uncensored poems and essays, more than fifty teenage boys from across the country explore their many-layered concerns: identity, love, envy, gratitude, sex, anger, competition, fear, hope. Here, unadorned and without the filter of adult sensibility, is the raw stuff of their lives, in their own words.