LITERACY AND LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT
How can schools achieve high levels of literacy and language development among all of their students?
During the early elementary years, learning to read is the top priority; school success depends, in large part, on how successful children are in learning to read. Literacy remains the key to school success throughout a student's school years and is critical for full social and economic participation in our increasingly knowledge-dependent, technological society. Although middle and high school teachers may view their primary responsibility as conveying the content of their subject area, it is increasingly understood by educators that reading in middle and high school is a critical issue to be addressed.
While almost all students can decode and understand words at a "basic" level, many students cannot read and comprehend the types of higher level texts essential to success in an information-based economy. These difficulties often persist throughout a student's school years.
Educators need access to research-based practices in language development and the ability to make wise choices from the wealth of resource materials and programs that exist to address the learning needs of their students and meet challenging literacy standards.
Teachers must not only be knowledgeable about best practices in early literacy instruction, but also must be skilled in teaching and motivating children from economically disadvantaged families and from linguistically and culturally diverse families.
Differences in both the quality and quantity of children's spoken and written language environments in the preschool years often translate into substantial differences in the ease with which children learn to match print to sound and to make sense of what they read. These difficulties often are compounded by poverty, low levels of parental education, and lack of access to preschool programs.
Effective teachers acknowledge and build on cultural differences, while at the same time preparing children to live successfully in both their home culture and the larger society.
