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“The third edition of this text is a valuable resource for preservice and inservice teacher preparation courses. It is grounded in the authors’ own evidence-based strategies for early reading success plus years of experience partnering with teachers to implement the strategies in diverse classrooms. The book integrates up-to-date reading theory with concrete examples of how to differentiate instruction. Each chapter begins with an instructional goal and ends with bulleted key points, with 'Keep in Mind' tips along the way, 'Snapshot' checklists that serve as assessment and planning tools, and other useful features. The authors’ emphases on reflective teaching and responsive instruction set this text apart.”

— Barbara R. Foorman, PhD, Professor Emerita, College of Education, Florida State University


“This book is full of important information on the science of reading, with practical tools for planning and implementing impactful instruction for elementary students learning to read. The third edition provides even more detail on factors related to student misunderstandings and ways to help all children learn to read more effectively and efficiently. This is a valuable resource for educators learning about reading instruction, as well as experienced teachers who want to further improve their literacy instruction.”

—Jeanne Wanzek, PhD, Professor and Currey-Ingram Endowed Chair, Department of Special Education, Vanderbilt University


“A powerful resource for classroom and intervention teachers looking for ways to adjust or refine their practice to better meet the needs of each of their learners. The authors provide clear descriptions of key instructional practices along with explanations about why those practices are used, allowing teachers to better understand where this work fits in the context of current conversations about reading instruction. The book is filled with guidance on implementing ISA, including sample dialogues as well as suggestions for choosing resources and selecting words for lessons. The authors also share additional considerations for multilingual learners and students who receive support across instructional settings.”

—Laura Hallgren-Flynn, MSEd, Language Arts Coordinator and Reading Specialist, Guilderland Central School District, New York


“In the third edition, Scanlon and her colleagues offer updated, research-based advice about teaching strategies to help students develop the 'set for variability' that readers of English need to navigate the inconsistent mapping of letters onto sounds. Classroom teachers, intervention teachers, and tutors gain a full toolbox of nimble word-reading and word-solving routines. ISA combines phonics instruction with contextual analysis to help students develop a repertoire of words that are immediately recognized at sight. The best news? This book embodies a more comprehensive science of reading than one finds in the media these days.”

—P. David Pearson, PhD, Evelyn Lois Corey Professor Emeritus of Instructional Science, University of California, Berkeley

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Table of Contents

Preface to the Third Edition

Introduction

I. Theoretical and Practical Understandings of Early Literacy Learning and Instruction

1. Early Literacy Learning and the Interactive Strategies Approach

2. Responsive Instruction

3. Motivation to Read and Write

II. Understanding Print and the English (Alphabetic) Writing System

4. Purposes, Concepts, and Conventions of Print

5. Phonemic Awareness

6. Letter Naming and Letter Formation

7. Letter–Sound (Grapheme–Phoneme) Relationships

8. The Alphabetic Principle and the Alphabetic Code: Early Development

9. Rimes and Word Families

10. The Alphabetic Principle and the Alphabetic Code: Later Development

11. Morphological Units and Multisyllabic Words

III. Word Learning

12. Strategic Word Solving, Word Identification, and Word Learning

13. High-Frequency Word Learning and Word Identification

IV. Meaning Construction

14. Text-Reading Fluency

15. Vocabulary and Oral Language Development

16. Comprehension and General Knowledge

V. Integration of the Goals: Putting It All Together

17. Small-Group Instruction

18. Revisiting and Concluding

Glossary

References

Index

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About the Authors

Donna M. Scanlon, PhD, is Professor Emeritus in the Department of Literacy Teaching and Learning at the University at Albany, State University of New York, where she served as director of the Child Research and Study Center. Dr. Scanlon has spent most of her career studying children’s reading difficulties and helping families and schools address the needs of students who struggle with literacy development. Her research contributed to the emergence of response to intervention as a process for preventing reading difficulties and avoiding inappropriate and inaccurate learning disability classifications. In recent years, her work has focused on the development of teacher knowledge and teaching skill to help prevent reading difficulties in young children and remediate reading difficulties among older children. Dr. Scanlon has served on the Literacy Research Panel, Response to Intervention Task Force, and Response to Intervention Commission of the International Literacy Association.

• All titles by Donna M. Scanlon

Kimberly L. Anderson, PhD, is Associate Professor in the Department of Literacy Studies, English Education, and History Education at East Carolina University. Her research focuses on improving teacher preparation for early literacy instruction and on the development of literacy tutoring protocols that can be used by tutors with limited expertise. Dr. Anderson contributed to research on the Interactive Strategies Approach (ISA) in her past role as a research associate and director of professional development at the Child Research and Study Center, University at Albany, State University of New York. Dr. Anderson has a particular interest in the role of strategy instruction in word solving and has studied the differential impact of professional development that emphasizes the combination of alphabetic decoding and meaning-based strategies, one of the main tenets of the ISA.

Erica M. Barnes, PhD, is Associate Professor in the Department of Literacy Teaching and Learning at the University at Albany, State University of New York. Her research investigates teacher–child interactions in preschool and early elementary classrooms that promote language and literacy growth, with an emphasis on the developmental trajectories of children with varying levels of language abilities from underserved populations. Dr. Barnes is interested in how language facilitates literacy development, and how teachers may differentiate instruction for students to prevent literacy-learning difficulties. She has worked as a special education teacher, a teacher consultant, and a progress-monitoring consultant in K–12 settings.

Joan M. Sweeney, MSEd, is a reading specialist in a Capital District public school in New York State. Previously, she was a research associate in the Child Research and Study Center, University at Albany, State University of New York, where she provided intervention for struggling readers, supervised intervention teachers, and coached classroom teachers utilizing the Interactive Strategies Approach to support children’s literacy development.

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Audience

Teachers of children ages 5–8 (grades K–3); literacy coaches; school administrators; teacher educators and graduate students.

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Course Use

Serves as a text in graduate-level courses such as Early Literacy and Early Reading Intervention.

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Previous editions published by Guilford:

Second Edition, © 2017
ISBN: 9781462528097

First Edition, © 2010
ISBN: 9781606238530

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New to this edition:

• Increased attention to whole-class instruction, teaching linguistically diverse students, writing development, and language–literacy connections.
• More examples of explicit instructional language, including sample scripts.
• Incorporates the latest research about early literacy development and difficulties.
• End-of-chapter "key points" and an end-of-book glossary.
• Additional online-only reproducible tools, including ISA lesson sheets.