Despite a vast amount of reading research and legislation at the national and state level aimed at improving reading achievement, reading scores in the United States have remained stagnant. The purpose of this qualitative study was to examine novice teachers' perception of their preparedness to address the needs of students in their classroom reading significantly below grade level. A phenomenological approach was used to conduct semi-structured interviews of six teachers from a large urban school district. To identify teachers' beliefs, the researcher collected interview data by posing the following research questions: (1) How do novice elementary teachers describe their reading instruction training?; (2) How confident do novice elementary teachers feel meeting the needs of students reading significantly below grade level?; (3) What professional development activities do novice elementary teachers engage in to enhance their practice of teaching reading?; and (4) What do novice elementary teachers need to help them grow in their reading instructional practice? Results of the study show that teachers have concerns regarding the quality of instruction they receive from teacher preparation programs; felt somewhat confident meeting the needs of students reading significantly below grade level; engage in limited amounts of district level professional development; and need coaching, modeling, and feedback to improve their instructional practice. Implications include partnerships between instructors of teacher preparation programs and elementary schools to help instructors have a better understanding of the realities of today's classroom. In addition, required district level professional development training for teachers was also recommended. [The dissertation citations contained here are published with the permission of ProQuest LLC. Further reproduction is prohibited without permission. Copies of dissertations may be obtained by Telephone (800) 1-800-521-0600. Web page: http://bibliotheek.ehb.be:2222/en-US/products/dissertations/individuals.shtml.]