improving writing, including
Trade Review
'The style of writing is accessible yet appropriately academic. The book provides an excellent foundation for initial teacher education.'
Fiona Maine, Professor of Language and Literacy in Education, University of Exeter.
‘This book is useful not just because of its detail and depth of coverage of the topics throughout, but also because of its consideration of inclusion of children learning English as an Additional Language (EAL).’
Tamara Mortimer, Primary Education Lead (BEd and PGCE), Plymouth Institute of Education, University of Plymouth
‘The figures and tables throughout the book clearly convey key information and examples. Examples of children’s work, in particular, are very useful… The Practice Points at the end of each chapter are an excellent summary of how the approaches should be applied… This book also provides clear links between theory and practice. Main educational theorists have been summarised effectively, and examples of teaching demonstrate how the theory can be practically applied.’
Jess Bellamy, Lecturer in Primary Education, Leeds Beckett University
‘What makes this resource accessible is that it is not overly academic in how it is written. The provision of cross-chapter references and additional readings makes it very useful.’
Amanda Denston, Senior Lecturer in Literacy, Massey University in New Zealand.
‘This proves to be a very comprehensive text to understand the basics of teaching English, including dialogic teaching and developing talk as key aspects of literacy instruction as well as different drama methods.’
Susan Sandretto, Associate Professor, College of Education, University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand
‘The coverage of standard English and accent, bullet-pointed practice points at the end of each chapter as well as useful references to multilingualism make this book a helpful resource for all English teachers.’
Rebecca Simpson-Hargreaves, Lecturer in Education, University of Manchester
‘This book is great for beginning teachers as well as first time tertiary learners trying to understand Western theoretical perspectives… The extra reading material and coverage of the basics for students in one book make it a handy resource since educators often have to use more than one resource to cover all of the topics across the levels of literacy.’
Rachel Martin, Senior Lecturer, Otago University, Aotearoa New Zealand
Table of Contents
Part I: Introduction 1. The history of English, language and literacy 2. Thinking about learning and language 3. Equity, diversity and inclusion Part II: Language 4. The development of language 5. Accent, dialect and Standard English 6. Classroom practices for talk 7. Drama Part III: Reading 8. The development of reading 9. Reading for pleasure 10. Classroom practices for reading 11. Reading comprehension 12. Phonics Part IV: Writing 13. The development of writing 14. Classroom practices for writing 15. Grammar and Punctuation 16. Spelling 17. Handwriting Part V: General Issues 18. Assessing Oral Language, Reading and Writing 19. Language and literacy difficulties 20. Planning 21. Home–school literacy links
