THE NEW HOOKED ON BOOKS, Rev. ed.

It's been a little over ten years since Hooked on Books, expanded by popular clamor from a University of Michigan Bureau of School Services pamphlet, changed the thinking of English teachers and school librarians across the country--but (thanks partly to Fader himself) it seems more like 100 since the idea of basing a reading program on uncensored, student-selected, paperback books and popular magazines was considered refreshingly radical. Alas, the resultant changes have not been so widespread that Fader's case studies of illiterate, incarcerated delinquents transformed by books aren't worth re-reading for inspiration--and well worth pushing on those institutions still unreformed. This edition, besides reprinting most of the original 1966 Hooked on Books and Elton B. McNeil's assessment, Hooked on Research, added in 1968, includes a brand new reading list by James Duggins and Tom Finn (popularity remains the sole criterion for inclusion among their ""A Thousand Authors""); new essays by Duggins and Finn on the program's application in the public secondary school and the elementary school self-contained classroom; new material from Fader on his system of grouping for ""a fellowship of care"" and on the teaching of writing in general (all the more important, he notes, in light of the inroads of TV and the declinining writing skills among students entering even the most selective colleges); and, again from Fader, a plea for a professionalism which puts children first, requires solid teacher evaluation, and eliminates tenure as ""a fungus of longevity."" Clearly, no fungus has been allowed to grow on this fervent, humanistic expression of faith in the possibility of turning all kids on to reading.