Putting the Textbook in its Place—Your Students' Hands
Donna E. Alvermann · Intervention in School and Clinic · 1983
If you answered yes to any of the above questions, or if you teach disabled readers at the intermediate or middle school level, chances are the content area textbook is underused and undervalued. This is not surprising given the prevalence of text, a term used by Bonnie Armbruster and Tom Anderson to describe the product of an author's inattention to four necessary text characteristics: structure, coherence, unity, and audience appropriateness (1981). Because inconsiderate text only aggravates the disabled learner's reading problems, the teacher often chooses to work around the subject area textbook rather than work with it.