1 Front Matter 2 Executive Summary 3 Part I: Introduction to Reading 4 1. Introduction 5 2. The Process of Learning to Read 6 Part II: Who Are We Talking About? 7 3. Who Has Reading Difficulties? 8 4. Predictors of Success and Failure in Reading 9 Part III: Prevention and Intervention 10 5. Preventing Reading Difficulties Before Kindergarten 11 6. Instructional Strategies for Kindergarten and the Primary Grades 12 7. Organizational Strategies for Kindergarten and the Primary Grades 13 8. Helping Children with Reading Difficulties in Grades 1 to 3 14 Part IV: Knowledge into Action 15 9. The Agents of Change 16 10. Recommendations for Practice and Research 17 References 18 Biographical Sketches 19 Index

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Preventing reading difficulties in young children

Emergent literacy consists of the skills, knowledge, and attitudes that are developmental precursors to reading and writing. This article offers a preliminary typology of children's emergent literacy skills, a review of the evidence that relates emergent literacy to reading, and a review of the evidence for linkage between children's emergent literacy environments and the development of emergent literacy skills. We propose that emergent literacy consists of at least two distinct domains: inside-out skills (e.g., phonological awareness, letter knowledge) and outside-in skills (e.g., language, conceptual knowledge). These different domains are not the product of the same experiences and appear to be influential at different points in time during reading acquisition. Whereas outside-in skills are associated with those aspects of children's literacy environments typically measured, little is known about the origins of inside-out skills. Evidence from interventions to enhance emergent literacy suggests that relatively intensive and multifaceted interventions are needed to improve reading achievement maximally. A number of successful preschool interventions for outside-in skills exist, and computer-based tasks designed to teach children inside-out skills seem promising. Future research directions include more sophisticated multidimensional examination of emergent literacy skills and environments, better integration with reading research, and longer-term evaluation of preschool interventions. Policy implications for emergent literacy intervention and reading education are discussed.

Child development and emergent literacy

The current review is a quantitative meta-analysis of the available empirical evidence related to parent-preschooler reading and several outcome measures. In selecting the studies to be included in this meta-analysis, we focused on studies examining the frequency of book reading to preschoolers. The results support the hypothesis that parent-preschooler reading is related to outcome measures such as language growth, emergent literacy, and reading achievement. The overall effect size of d = .59 indicates that book reading explains about 8% of the variance in the outcome measures. The results support the hypothesis that book reading, in particular, affects acquisition of the written language register. The effect of parent-preschooler reading is not dependent on the socioeconomic status of the families or on several methodological differences between the studies. However, the effect seems to become smaller as soon as children become conventional readers and are able to read on their own.

Joint Book Reading Makes for Success in Learning to Read: A Meta-Analysis on Intergenerational Transmission of Literacy

This study examined code-related and oral language precursors to reading in a longitudinal study of 626 children from preschool through 4th grade. Code-related precursors, including print concepts and phonological awareness, and oral language were assessed in preschool and kindergarten. Reading accuracy and reading comprehension skills were examined in 1st through 4th grades. Results demonstrated that (a) the relationship between code-related precursors and oral language is strong during preschool; (b) there is a high degree of continuity over time of both code-related and oral language abilities; (c) during early elementary school, reading ability is predominantly determined by the level of print knowledge and phonological awareness a child brings from kindergarten; and (d) in later elementary school, reading accuracy and reading comprehension appear to be 2 separate abilities that are influenced by different sets of skills.

Oral language and code-related precursors to reading: Evidence from a longitudinal structural model.

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Joint book reading makes for success in learning to read

Accelerating Language Development through Picture Book Reading.

Previous research demonstrates linguistic advances in middle-class 2-year-olds in the United States resulting from training parents to read with their children following a particular style. This style, called dialogic reading, encourages children to talk about picture books and gives them models and feedback for progressively more sophisticated language use. This research extends these procedures to a day-care setting using 20 Mexican 2-year-olds from low-income backgrounds. Children in the intervention group were read to individually by a teacher using dialogic reading techniques. The control group children were given individual arts and crafts instruction by the same teacher

Accelerating language development through picture book reading: A systematic extension to Mexican day care.

Monolingual American and Mexican 2- and 3-year-old children were exposed to a foreign language in a naturalistic but controlled environment Children were randomly assigned to 2 groups 1 group was differentially reinforced throughout the study for the use of foreign vocabulary The control group was first reinforced nondifferentially for use of the native language or the foreign language and later was switched to differential reinforcement for the foreign language Frequencies of spontaneous foreign word production and other verbal responses were computed, and formal assessments of comprehension and production of the foreign words were conducted Differential reinforcement resulted in accelerating frequencies of spontaneous foreign language use and better performance on both comprehension and production tests Under nondifferential reinforcement, rates of spontaneous foreign language use were low and static Results are interpreted as evidence that the acquisition of expressive vocabulary is a function of socially mediated reinforcement

What is the role of reinforcement in early language acquisition

Developmental expressive language disorder (ELD) is a condition characterized by a delay in the development of expressive language compared with receptive language and IQ. Conditions that might contribute to the origins or maintenance of ELD are poorly understood. Unusual verbal interactions between parents and ELD children might be implicated in the origins of ELD or might represent parental reactivity to the child's limited expressive skills. We compared verbal interactions in the homes of 28-month-old ELD children, 28-month-old normal children matched on receptive ability with the ELD children, and 17-month-old normal children matched on expressive ability with the ELD children. We analyzed frequencies of major pragmatic categories of parent and child verbal behavior as well as sequential relations involving those categories. Pragmatic interactions in the ELD families were substantially similar to those in the families of the normal younger children and different from those in the older normal children. A measure of the structural complexity of maternal speech (MLU) did not differ across the groups. These results indicate that pragmatic language interactions in the families of ELD children are determined largely by the children's level of expressive ability rather than by their age or receptive abilities. In this regard, the child directed speech of parents of ELD children cannot be considered deviant and cannot be implicated in the etiology of ELD. The sensitivity of parents to their child's level of expressive ability suggests the need for refinement in current hypotheses concerning child directed speech.

Verbal Interaction in Families of Normal and Expressive-Language-Delayed Children.

Treatment of early expressive language delay: If, when, and how Grover Whitehurst;Janet Fischel;Christopher Lonigan;Marta Valdez-Menchaca;David Arnold;Meagan Smith; Topics in Language Disorders

Marta C. Valdez-Menchaca

Papers

Accelerating Language Development through Picture Book Reading.

Accelerating language development through picture book reading: A systematic extension to Mexican day care.

What is the role of reinforcement in early language acquisition

Verbal Interaction in Families of Normal and Expressive-Language-Delayed Children.

Treatment of Early Expressive Language Delay: If, When, and How.