Effective Reading Instruction in the Early Years of School

NSW Centre for Education Statistics and Evaluation. (2017). Effective reading instruction in the early years of school: A Literature Review. Retrieved from https://www.cese.nsw.gov.au/publications-filter/literature-review-effective-reading-instruction-in-the-early-years-of-school

Background

Major reviews of the teaching and learning of reading have been conducted in many countries over the past decade. The paper is a literature review of meta-analyses and syntheses of the research on what constitutes effective reading instruction. These reviews together with a sizable body of research have consistently identified five key components of effective reading programmes:

phonemic awareness;
phonics;
fluency;
vocabulary; and
comprehension.

These five components should also be taught explicitly, systematically and sequentially.

Aims

This paper summarises the research regarding why these five elements are important, as well as how they should be taught in the classroom.

Sample

The literature sampled is taken from a range of articles and documents from international journals.

Method

The paper examines each of the five elements by analysing what it is, why it is important and how it should be taught and assessed.

Findings

The authors note that studies have generally shown that the whole language approach does not work as well as the explicit instruction approach. They point out there is also strong research support for the five key components listed above and their sequential and systematic use. However, the authors recognise that there are gaps between the research evidence as to ‘what works’ and the teaching practices that are actually carried out in classrooms.

Implications

The authors recommend that teachers be equipped with both an understanding of evidence-based reading instruction as well as the ability to implement this in the classroom. This training needs to cover the five components of effective reading instruction, as well as the use of assessments to identify and implement appropriate reading strategies for individual students.

Original article retrieved from https://www.cese.nsw.gov.au/publications-filter/literature-review-effective-reading-instruction-in-the-early-years-of-school.