Nancy Newman is a remedial English teacher, published novelist, mother of children who overcame reading difficulties, and parent educator who has lectured at public venues and schools
for more than twenty years on her approach to raising readers. When Newman taught remedial English in junior and senior high schools in the Bronx, and then at a community college on Staten Island, she witnessed firsthand the corrosive effects
of early reading problems on people’s lives. Determined to aid her struggling college students, she helped establish an alternate school on campus and subsequently developed a highly effective classroom approach that bolstered her students’ weak reading and writing skills and repaired their mangled self-esteem. When she became a mother, Newman used this same approach with her three sons. Though two of her sons struggled with reading, all three of her children became skilled, avid readers and dazzling students. School administrators invited Newman to share her “secrets” with other parents and teachers, and since 1995, she has lectured to thousands of parents, grandparents, and educators in a variety of settings, including the New York Public Library, Barnes & Noble, YMHA, Citibank, and Colgate Palmolive Corporation. She has also given talks at a wide range of schools such as the Collegiate School, Chapin School, Trinity School, St. David’s School, and Marymount School, as well as nursery schools and public schools in the New York tristate area. Born and raised on Long Island, NY, Newman received a BA and MA in English Literature from the City University of New York. Her well-reviewed first novel, Disturbing the Peace, was published by HarperCollins in 2002. Raising Passionate Readers is her second book. Nancy Newman lives with her family in New York City.
