The Language Experience Approach and the Science of Literacy Instruction

This book considers Russell Stauffer's Language Experience Approach (LEA), an approach that must be judged by its impact on student learning and not on the age of conception. The nature of wholistic teaching in early childhood and beyond is explored, and developmental maturation for the different language tasks are explained.

The information contained in this text covers literacy instruction in kindergarten, primary grades, middle school, and secondary school. It gives the background on the developmental aspects of all attributes needed for successful reading. It presents a balanced body of information for instruction between wholistic approaches and traditional approaches for the total literacy curriculum. This book includes the complete developmental aspects of skills necessary for competence in all literacy tasks from birth to adolescent literacy, the need for availability for teachers to assess the progress of all these skills as they are presented in a wholistic fashion on a regular basis, the criteria of how decisions are made for remedial reading instruction, the interface of special education considerations for students experiencing literacy deficits, approaches for adolescent literacy programs, and extensive information on teaching English language learners.