Beginning Reading: A balanced approach to literacy instruction in the first three years of school

Most children learn to read, irrespective of the method of instruction. Yet up to a fifth of children struggle with reading in their first few years at school. Unfortunately, those who struggle in the early years will continue to struggle throughout their school career. Yola Center offers a systematic, research-based guide to teaching reading in the first three years of school. Her aim is to ensure that teachers can work with at-risk or reluctant readers in the regular classroom as effectively as with children for whom reading seems to come naturally. Taking an analytic approach to reading, Beginning Reading shows how children can be moved through the key stages of early reading acquisition. Each chapter includes an overview of relevant research, practical classroom strategies and guidelines for lesson planning. Center adopts a balanced view of reading instruction, stressing the importance of phonological processes at the beginning of literacy instruction, as well as semantic and syntactic ones. This supports at risk children in regular classrooms, who are provided with the maximum opportunity to develop the accurate and fluent word recognition skills that are needed in order to extract meaning from print.