The purpose of the Teacher Prep Review is to guarantee teachers have expertise in reading instruction (as well as other essential areas NCTQ assesses) before being trusted to teach children to read. By regularly reviewing the reading coursework provided by nearly 700 elementary teacher preparation programs, the National Council on Teacher Quality…

There have been few areas in England over the last 50 years where government has drawn more heavily on research to inform policy and practice than in the area of teaching reading. The focus of this article is an analysis of the research and evidence on early reading, in particular the role of phonics, on which government policy in England and the…

Working through four key tenets of Deleuze-Guattarian theory, the authors describe how contemporary affect theory offers a radically different perspective on reading. Asking how we can conceptualize reading differently if we conceptualize affect differently, we argue that possible meanings of reading or experiences of reading must be considered…

A recent survey aimed at identifying the most popular current programs used to teach reading found that one common feature of all the top sellers was that they organize their teaching around leveled books. Other recent surveys show that teaching reading with leveled books is on the increase and that teachers believe it is endorsed or supported by…

Adapted alternating treatment designs were used to evaluate and compare the effectiveness of two computer-based sight-word-reading interventions among three elementary school students with an intellectual disability. Each intervention provided 30 stimulus--response--stimulus--response learning trials. One intervention included fixed 3-s response…

Learning and developing as a reader are more complicated in a language the reader is simultaneously learning to speak and understand. This challenge is faced by millions of English learners (ELs) who are in all-English programs and must therefore learn to read, write, and develop as readers and writers while learning and becoming proficient in…

Over the past two decades, reading fluency has been increasingly recognized as an important instructional variable for success in reading. Yet, this has not always been the case. This article presents a historical review of the nature and role of fluency instruction in the United States. The roots of oral reading fluency began in an age when texts…

This article presents a project that explored the effectiveness of intensive reading to enhance reading comprehension with a group of university students in Pasto, Colombia. At the initial stage, a diagnostic test, field notes, and three questionnaires allowed the identification of the students' needs. During the intervention stage, a set of…

This article develops an account of an extracurricular reading group convened in a small theatre/performance department, consisting of postgraduate and honours students. The origins of the group in a formal seminar/class are discussed, including a shift in syllabus design based upon breadth of reading/content to one based upon depth, taking up the…

Children who are learning English as an additional language (EAL) need opportunities to learn English in playful, engaging ways. Nursery rhymes offer an effective forum to explore a wide range of vocabulary and grammar knowledge in a manner that is comprehensible to EAL pupils by using gestures, visuals, and props to support oral language…

Some children experience more difficulty than others becoming literate, often at great emotional, intellectual, social, and economic cost to themselves, but also to those who love and care for them, and for society at large. The causes of those difficulties and what to do about them have been the source of much research and sometimes heated…

Our pupils' success will be defined by their ability to read fluently and skilfully. But despite universal acceptance of reading's vital importance, the reading gap in our classroom remains, and it is linked to an array of factors, such as parental wealth, education and book ownership, as well as classroom practice. To close this gap, we need to…

A decade after the publication of Visible Learning: A Synthesis of Over 800 Meta-Analyses Relating to Achievement, the influence of John Hattie's statistical work continues to grow. This paper critically examines one aspect of Hattie's 'synthesis' of education meta-analyses, his summation of research data for whole language literacy teaching. Of…

Ten years after publication of two reviews of the evidence on phonics, a number of British policy initiatives have firmly embedded phonics in the curriculum for early reading development. However, uncertainty about the most effective approaches to teaching reading remains. A definitive trial comparing different approaches was recommended in 2006,…

While composition research recognizes the importance of the body and bodily knowledge, literacy instruction, especially as relayed in writing textbooks, often disembodies the material practice of reading. This move, in turn, contributes to normative assumptions about students' corporeal reading experiences. Drawing together scholarship on…