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Literacy
106
ACQ
Volume 11, Number 2 2009
ACQ
uiring knowledge in speech, language and hearing
factors that, when present, predict future literacy success
in preliterate children. Now referred to as emergent literacy,
these factors have been brought together into a formalised
framework (see Clay, 1972; Sulzby & Teale, 1991; Whitehurst
& Lonigan, 1998), which includes:
•
language abilities
: including receptive and expressive
vocabulary size, understanding written text and being
capable of talking about the text;
•
letter identification/knowledge
: knowing the names and
corresponding sounds of letters;
•
phonological awareness/sensitivity
: the ability to identify
and manipulate sounds in words;
•
conventions of print
: understanding the basic concepts
of writing and reading text, including the left-to-right and
top-to-bottom direction of print on each page with print
progressing from front to back across pages;
•
literacy environments
: having favourite books, going
to the library, having a number of books in the home,
and engaging in other home literacy activities, including
shared book reading.
While most children develop spoken language skills
to communicate in their first or native language naturally,
children require more active instruction and modelling to
acquire literacy skills, particularly skills to understand the
written word. Therefore, literacy is thought to be experience
dependent (Whitehurst & Lonigan, 1998).
Current research shows that parental and family influences
and interactions can profoundly enhance the quality and
quantity of children’s exposure to and experiences with
literacy and can lead to improved literacy outcomes (Evan,
Shaw, & Bell, 2000). When parents or significant others are
actively involved in literacy activities, children have larger
vocabularies (Hart & Risley, 1995), faster vocabulary growth
over time (Huttenlocher, Haight, Bryk, Seltzer, & Lyons,
1991) and enhanced emergent literacy skills (Bracken &
The last decade has seen an increasing
number of early literacy promotion programs
across the globe. This paper takes a brief look
at the current research around emergent
literacy and identifies some of the factors
found to influence children’s literacy success.
The paper then reports on the Let’s Read
initiative, an early literacy promotion program
that emphasises shared reading with young
children, aged 0 to 5, taking place across
Australia. The effectiveness of this program is
currently being investigated, utilising a cluster
randomised controlled trial.
F
ew would dispute that literacy attainment is one of the
most important foundations for academic success. It
is similarly now well established that attaining literacy
skills depends on multidimensional influences, including:
parental beliefs and goals about education and literacy;
the way that families engage with or stimulate children;
the environment in which children are raised; the school
they attend and the way they are taught. Unfortunately,
many children struggle to reach the minimum benchmarks
set for literacy acquisition, and these deficits can be
tracked with increasing prevalence from childhood through
to adolescence and adulthood (Ministerial Council on
Education, 2007; Persampieri, Gortmaker, Daly, Sheridan, &
McCurdy, 2006; Thomson & De Bortoli, 2008).
Although the term “literacy” refers to the ability to read and
write printed text representing spoken language (Australian
Bureau of Statistics, 2008; Baker, Piotrkowski, & Brooks-
Gunn, 1999), more recent research has demonstrated
the importance of key developmental and environmental
Let’s Read
A universal intervention to promote literacy in
very young children
Sharon Goldfeld, Natasha Napiza, Jon Quach, Carly Veness, Sheena Reilly, Obioha C Ukoumunne, and
Melissa Wake
Keywords
early
intervention
emergent
literacy
literacy
parent–child
interaction
preschool