European-American Connections in Adolescent Literacy: An Interview With Christine Garbe

Christine Garbe, a professor at the Institute for German Language and Literature Education at Leuphana University in Lueneburg, Germany, initially focused her research on youth's socialization as readers. Her professional textbooks in this area are innovative. International comparisons of youth's reading achievement drew her attention to adolescent struggling readers, and she recently shared the lead in a project that described the best adolescent literacy instructional practices observed in 11 European countries. During a spring 2009 visit to the United States, she noticed relatively extensive preparation and professional development of secondary-school teachers in literacy instruction. She currently is planning to collaborate with European and American educators to develop teacher preparation and professional development modules on secondary-school literacy instruction. She is confident that educators from different countries will unite the best of their traditions and develop well-founded curricula for the preparation and development of teachers involved with adolescent struggling readers.