This handbook contains brief essays concerning aspects of reading and reading skills, activities designed to promote those skills, and biographies of reading specialists. The first section of the handbook discusses reading readiness, word recognition, word analysis, word meaning, comprehension, and content area reading. After discussion of each aspect of reading, the handbook provides activities designed for that aspect. The second section of the handbook includes one-page biographies of Roach Van Allen, Emmett Betts, Jeanne Chall, Theodore Clymer, Roger Farr, Arthur Heilman, Bill Martin, Mary Constance McCullough, John Money, Francis Robinson, Nila Banton Smith, James Trelease, and Evelyn Wood. Appendixes offer a reading teacher evaluation form, a list of reading materials for multicultural children, a list of professional journals and books, a list of reading supplementary materials, general and diagnostic reading tests, suggestions for content area teachers, and the Fry readability graph. (RS)