Learning to be Literate

Margaret M Clark OBE is Emeritus Professor of Education at the University of Birmingham, and Visiting Professor at Newman University, Birmingham, UK.

This exceptional book documents and critically analyses literacy education over a period of fifty years. Margaret Clark continues in her relentless quest to raise awareness of the changing nature and quality of literacy research evidence, theory and practice. Her goal has ever been to ensure that the best evidence underpins literacy education policy. She [is] among the most influential figures in literacy research of her generation. Carol Aubrey, Professor Emeritus, Warwick University.Provides vital illumination for classroom teachers and those who steer the processes of education. Henrietta Dombey, Professor Emeritus, University of Brighton, Past Chair of NATE and a Past President of UKLA.Professor Clark’s latest book takes a cool, primary trained, look at the insights gained from over fifty years of research into children learning the skill of reading. The result is a book which summarizes the evidence upon which our teaching should be based. This book supports our professionalism and it merits a place in the libraries of all schools and universities, particularly those engaged in initial training. John Coe, NAPE Primary First.

• Introduction PART I Insights from literacy research: 1960s to 1980s 2. Reading and related skills: lessons from the early 1970s 3. Language and reading: insights from early research 4. Strengths and weaknesses of children with reading difficulties and young fluent readers 5. Insights from young fluent readers PART II Young literacy learners: how we can help them 6. Literacy learning in creative contexts 7. Sensitive observation and the development of literacy: a tribute to Marie Clay 8. Meeting individual needs in learning to read 9. High frequency words: a neglected resource in learning to read 10. Reading and writing: a reciprocal relationship PART III Curriculum developments and literacy policies, 1988 to 1997: a comparison between England, Wales and Scotland 11. The first National Curriculum in England and Wales: lessons for the future 12. Government policy on literacy in Scotland from the 1980s to the 1990s PART IV Synthetic phonics and literacy learning: government policy in England, 2006 to 2015 13. The Rose Report and the teaching of reading: a critique 14. One best method of teaching reading: what is the research evidence? 15. The phonics check: its background, initial results and possible effects 16. Research evidence on the phonics check for all Year 1 children in England 17. Unresolved issues on the value and validity of the phonics check: four years on 18. Whose knowledge counts in government literacy policies: at what cost? PART V Interpretations of literacies in the twenty-first century 19. International studies of reading, such as PIRLS: a cautionary tale 20. Literacies in and for a changing world: what is the evidence? 21. Insights on literacy from research