Reading Suggestions for Teacher Book Clubs (or personal reading)

In most cases, the bibliographic information given is for the paperback edition.

Click here for a printable PDF version of this list.

Autobiographies/Memoirs about Culture/Teaching/Writing

Alvarez, Julia. Something to Declare. New York: Algonquin, 1998.

Angelou, Maya. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. New York: Bantam, 1969.
    Gather Together in My Name. New York: Bantam, 1974.

Arana, Marie. American Chica: Two Worlds, One Childhood. New York: Dell, 2001.

Behar, Ruth. Translated Woman: Crossing the Border with Esperanza's Story. Boston: Beacon Press, 1993.

Codell, Esme Raji. Educating Esme: Diary of a Teacher's First Year. Chapel Hill, NC: Algonquin Books, 1999.

Conway, Jill Ker. The Road from Coorain. New York: Vintage, 1989.
    True North. New York: Random House, 1994.

Edelman, Marian Wright. Lanterns: A Memoir of Mentors. New York: HarperCollins, 2000.

Freedom Writers with Erin Gruwell. The Freedom Writers Diary: How a Teacher and 150 Teens Used Writing to Change Themselves and the World Around Them. Main Street Books, 1999.

Hoffman, Eva. Lost in Translation: A Life in a New Language. New York: Penguin, 1989.

Hurston, Zora Neale. Dust Tracks in the Road. New York: HarperCollins, 1995.
   Their Eyes Were Watching God. New York: Harper & Row, 1937.

Liu, Eric. The Accidental Asian: Notes of a Native Speaker. New York: Vintage, 1998.

McBride, James. The Color of Water. New York: Riverhead, 1996.

McCourt, Frank. Teacher Man. New York: Scribner, 2005.

Mar, Elaine. Paper Daughter: A Memoir. New York: HarperCollins, 1999.

Moody, Anne. Coming of Age in Mississippi. New York: Dell, 1980.

Nafisi, Azar. Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books. New York: Random House, 2004.

Paley, Vivian. White Teacher. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1989.

Pennac, Daniel. Better than Life. Translated by David Homel. Markham, Ont.: Pembroke Publishers Limited, 1999.

Pipher, Mary. The Middle of Everywhere: Helping Refugees Enter the American Community. Orlando: Harcourt Brace, 2002.

Quindlan, Anna. How Reading Changed My Life. New York: Ballantine, 1998.

Reid, T.R. Confucius Lives Next Door: What Living the East Teaches Us about Living in the West. New York: Vintage, 1999.

Rodriguez, Richard. Hunger of Memory: The Education of Richard Rodriquez. New York: Bantam, 1982.
    Days of Obligation: An Argument with My Mexican Father. New York: Penguin, 1992.

Rose, Mike. Lives on the Boundary. New York: Penguin, 1989.

Salzman, Mark. True Notebooks: A Writer's Year at Juvenile Hall. New York: Random House, 2003.

Santiago, Esmeralda. When I Was Puerto Rican. New York: Vintage, 1993.
   Almost a Woman. New York: Vintage, 1999.

Tan, Amy. The Opposite of Fate: Memories of a Writing Life. New York: Penguin Books, 2003.

Welty, Eudora. One Writer's Beginnings. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1983.

Fiction about Culture/Teaching

Cather, Willa. My Antonia. New York: Mariner Books, 1995.

Cisneros, Sandra. The House on Mango Street. New York: Vintage, 1991.
   Caramelo. New York: Vintage, 2003.

Divakaruni, Chitra Banerjee. Arranged Marriage: Stories. New York: Anchor, 1996.

Dubus, Andre, III. House of Sand and Fog. New York: Vintage, 2000.

Jimenez, Francisco. Breaking Through. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2001.

Lahiri, Jhumpa. The Namesake. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2003.

Lee, Chang-rae. Native Speaker. New York: Penguin, 1995.

Tan, Amy. The Joy Luck Club. New York: Ivy Books, 1989.

Books about Teachers/Teaching (Issues in Education or Teaching Today)

Albom, Mitch. Tuesdays with Morrie. New York: Broadway Books, 1997.

Allit, Patrick. I'm the Teacher, You're the Student: A Semester in the University Classroom. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania, 2005.

Auerbach, Elsa. Making Meaning, Making Change: Guide to Participatory Curriculum Development for Adult ESL Literacy. Chicago, Delta Systems, 1997.

Bateson, Mary Catherine. Composing a Life. New York: Penguin, 1989.
   Peripheral Visions: Learning Along the Way. New York: HarperCollins, 1994.
   Full Circles, Overlapping Lives: Culture and Generation in Transition. New York: Random House, 2000.

Burkett, Elinor. Another Planet: A Year in the Life of a Suburban High School. New York: HarperCollins, 2002.

Clarke, Mark. A Place to Stand: Essays for Educators in Troubled Times. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2003.

Edge, Julian. Continuing Cooperative Development: A Discourse Framework for Individuals as Colleagues. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2002.

Ferdman, B.M., R M. Weber, A. G. Ramirez, Eds. Literacy across Cultures. New York: Cornell University Press, 1994.

Folse, Keith S. Vocabulary Myths: Applying Second Language Research to Classroom Teaching. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2004.

Gardner, Howard. The Disciplined Mind: Beyond Facts and Standardized Tests, the K-12 Education that Every Child Deserves. New York: Penguin Books, 2000.
   The Unschooled Mind: How Children Think and How Schools Should Teach. New York: Basic Books, 1991.

Gee, James Paul. What Video Games Have to Teach Us about Learning and Literacy. New York: Macmillan, 2003.

Gladwell, Malcolm. The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Difference. Boston: Little, Brown, 2000.

Kingsolver, Barbara. High Tide in Tucson: Essays from Now or Never. New York: Harper 1995.
    Small Wonder: Essays. New York: Perennial, 2002.

Igoa, Cristina. The Inner World of the Immigrant Child. Mahweh, NJ: Erlbaum, 1995.

Kozol, Jonathan. Savage Inequalities: Children in America's Schools. New York: Perennial, 1992.

Orenstein, Paula. Schoolgirls: Young Women, Self-Esteem, and the Confidence Gap. New York: Doubleday Anchor, 1994.

Palmer, Parker J. The Courage to Teach: Exploring the Inner Landscape of a Teacher's Life. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers, 1998.

Postman, Neil, and Charles Weingartner. The Soft Revolution: A Student Handbook for Turning Schools Around. New York: Doubleday, 1971.

Rose, Mike. Possible Lives: The Promise of Public Education in America. New York: Penguin, 1995.

Suskind, Ron. A Hope in the Unseen: An American Odyssey from the Inner City to the Ivy League. New York: Broadway Books, 1998.

Tatum, Beverly Daniel. Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria? And Other Conversations about Race: A Psychologist Explains the Development of Racial Identity. New York: Basic Books, 2003.

Trounstine, Jean. Shakespeare Behind Bars: One Teacher's Story of the Power of Drama in a Women's Prison. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2004.

Watkins-Goffman, Linda. Lives in Two Languages: An Exploration of Identity and Culture. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2001.