Literacy Development in Early Childhood: Reflective Teaching for Birth to Age Eight

For Literacy in Early Childhood or Early Childhood Reading Methods courses. This text was designed to provide early childhood teachers with foundational knowledge of how children develop literacy beginning in infancy and continuing through third grade. With an emphasis on the role of oral language in the development of literacy, this text provides clear connections between theoretical perspectives, emergent literacy research, and reflective, developmentally appropriate practice. Information on homeschool connections, working with English language learners, and ways of observing and assessing children’s developing literacy knowledge is embedded throughout the text. Throughout the text, classroombased examples, scenarios, and teacherchild dialogue are provided as a way of examining, discussing and evaluating the ways in which teachers can mediate children’s transactions with literacy.