This brief, thought-provoking collection evaluates historical perspectives in reading to show how current reading practices have developed over time and provides an understanding of the development of significant issues in the field of literacy education. Richard Robinson carefully chose 46 selections with several aims in mind: to include the historical perspective so often neglected in other texts; to explain the evolution of reading practices and ideas across time as well as in terms of pedagogical development; and to illustrate the developing nature of literacy education.

Reading fluency has been identified as a key component of proficient reading. Research has consistently demonstrated significant and substantial correlations between reading fluency and overall reading achievement. Despite the great potential for fluency to have a significant outcome on students’ reading achievement, it continues to be not well understood by teachers, school administrators and policy makers. The chapters in this volume examine reading fluency from a variety of perspectives. The initial chapter sketches the history of fluency as a literacy instruction component. Following chapters examine recent studies and approaches to reading fluency, followed by chapters that explore actual fluency instruction models and the impact of fluency instruction. Assessment of reading fluency is critical for monitoring progress and identifying students in need of intervention. Two articles on assessment, one focused on word recognition and the other on prosody, expand our understanding of fluency measurement. Finally, a study from Turkey explores the relationship of various reading competencies, including fluency, in an integrated model of reading. Our hope for this volume is that it may spark a renewed interest in research into reading fluency and fluency instruction and move toward making fluency instruction an even more integral part of all literacy instruction.

Contemporary Readings in Literacy Education is designed to provide students with high-quality journal and research articles in literacy education. The readings are contextualized with introductions and discussion questions by the editors of the text. The text will help instructors to easily integrate the latest research into their course in a meaningful way. This reader, with edited content and contextualizing material, makes the latest research more interesting and accessible to the students of literacy education.

A small set of important practices should be considered non-negotiable elements of daily reading instruction. The research base of these non-negotiables is described along with practical examples of their application. The non-negotiables do not require additional materials, time or funding, but can be integrated into any program in order to ensure every student has access to effective literacy instruction. This book can be used as a guide for program design and evaluation, as well as a source of ideas and (re)assurances for those currently engaged in the ongoing pursuit of effective literacy instruction for every reader, every day.

This collection of articles on the teaching of reading pulls together some of the best—and most clicked-on—articles on reading that Educational Leadership has published in the past few years from more than a dozen of the most respected experts in the field, including Richard L. Allington, Nell K. Duke, and Sally E. Shaywitz. The articles cover what research says about the teaching of both reading and reading comprehension—from teaching phonics to improving fluency to tackling complex texts. On Developing Readers offers strategies for teaching informational texts as well as fiction. Most important, it also addresses how to inspire the love of reading.