Books That Help Make You A Better Teacher: The SSR Handbook by Janice L. Pilgreen

 

BLURB:

It comes as no surprise that the students who read often are the students who read well. How, then, can we get the rest of our students reading? Is it enough to set aside in-class time for sustained silent reading? Or should we set up a more structured program-one that ensures all of our students are engaged in their reading and that they do so on a regular basis for the pleasure of it?

Janice Pilgreen knows from hard-won experience that it takes a lot of time, effort, and know-how to put an effective sustained silent reading program into practice. In The SSR Handbook, she's done most of the work for you, not only providing an overview of the underlying research, but also reviewing eight essential factors that ensure a program's success. Pilgreen explicitly identifies these factors, then explains in detail how to incorporate them into your own program. The book also features lots of resources to help you implement your program, including support organizations, book clubs, classroom magazine subscription titles/addresses, favorite young adult series books within various genres, comic book titles, lower-level reading books for adolescents, and publishing company names, addresses, and phone numbers. Best of all, there are reproducible student and parent inventories, reading records, and other forms to assist you with the process.

Readers will come away from this book with an understanding of what SSR is, why it's important, and how to implement it in their own schools and classrooms. Just as important, they will be motivated and energized enough to want to develop new programs or modify existing programs right away.

Turning students onto reading is one of the most important jobs we do as English teachers. I really believe this. Being a good reader is valuable for so many reasons, and I address those reasons here. This book by Janice Pilgreen helped me really think through my Sustained Silent Reading program and how I wanted to implement it into my classroom. It gives the eight factors for success in an SSR program: access to books, appeal, conducive environment, reading encouragement, staff training, non-accountability, follow-up activities, and daily reading time. I honestly don't know what I would have done without it. There were other teachers in my building trying something similiar but who didn't have the success I did because they weren't following the guidance I got from this book. If you've been thinking about implementing SSR in your own classroom, or if you're already doing it but feel like it isn't working like you want it to, I'd highly recommend The SSR Handbook.