Professional Books — Review

Tutoring Adolescent Readers

by Deborah Berrill, Laura Doucette & Dirk Verhulst
Pembroke Publishers, 2006
ISBN 978-1-55138-208-1
$24.95, 158 p., adult
www.pembrokepublishers.com

Ever been frustrated by not having enough time to give individual help to a student who is experiencing difficulties with reading? This book is for you! One-to-one instruction with volunteer tutors is a proven, effective way for students to improve reading skills and this book is an excellent guide on how to recruit, organize, train and support tutors to become the resource that fills the time gap for teachers, and the instructional gap for students. Although titled “Tutoring Adolescent Readers,” this book is suitable for teachers of elementary age readers as well. It contains information on setting up your tutoring program, identifying and working with dependent readers, using explicit instruction and setting goals to monitor and assess student progress. Tips are given for students with specific learning needs. The tutoring model is one that reinforces the IRA premise that no single method or single combination of methods can successfully teach children to read. It advocates a combination of approaches, tailored to the learner’s precise needs. The book is well outlined to follow a natural progression of the tutoring session. After a beginning chapter on how to get started and examining the principles of effective tutoring, the next chapters present instructional strategies for what tutors and students should be doing before, during and after reading, followed by a final chapter on how to promote fluency and word recognition. This practical, hands-on book is an excellent resource for teachers who want to incorporate individual tutoring into their programs, or simply want to review best practices for working with students who need instructional support to improve their reading ability.

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