Publications Review Guidelines

Dear Visitors:
Federal funding for this website ended in 2003, therefore few materials have been added since that time. Fortunately, there is continued interest in culturally and appropriate materials, curriculum, and programs. Because of this, we have allowed this site to remain as an archive. Please feel free to use this site, but recognize that it is no longer current.

The following Review Guidelines are intended to help service providers and individuals involved in personnel preparation determine the congruence between the beliefs, values, and practices of the individuals in your community and current recommended practices in early childhood/special education. The Review Guidelines will first help you consider the overall effectiveness of presentation of a material. Next, questions follow which pertain specifically to the content area of Emergent Literacy.

It is important to realize that no material is likely to match the exact needs of individuals in your community. Therefore, in many instances, you may wish to make some simple adaptations to the materials before using them.

A separate set of Review Guidelines is available to help select materials that have been translated from one language to another. In addition, other suggestions for choosing materials are available on the CLAS Web site (http://clas.illinois.edu). It is our hope that you may use these Review Guidelines to engage in meaningful dialogue with families and colleagues in your community, as you decide which materials to use in your early childhood setting.

Effectiveness of Presentation

Please respond to all that apply.

Clarity

 

1. Is the purpose of the material clear?
2. Is the presentation of the information easy to follow?
3. If there are directions on how to use the material, are they clearly stated?
4. Does the material include an effective explanation of technical terms or jargon?
5. Does the language in the material acknowledge diversity (e.g., family structures, multi-generations, disabilities, gender, ethnicity, socio-economic status, religion, etc.)?
6. Is the format (e.g., print, audio, video, etc.) appropriate for the intended users of this material?
7. Are contact agencies or persons for accessing additional information or support easily identifiable?

Comprehension Level

• Easy = mainly simple sentences with minimal or no technical jargon;
• Average = a mix of simple and complex sentences with some technical jargon (e.g., USA Today);
• Difficult = mainly complex sentences with a lot of technical jargon or discipline-specific terms (e.g., College-level text or New York Times).

 

1. For printed materials, the reading level of the material is:
   Easy | Average | Difficult | N/A
2. For video and audio materials, the comprehension level of the material is:
   Easy | Average | Difficult | N/A

Graphics, Illustrations and Photos

Do the graphics:

 

1. Represent a non-stereotypical view of cultural (e.g., contemporary dress) and linguistic groups?
2. Represent a wide variety of groups (e.g., disabilities, gender, race, generation)?
3. Enhance the materials (e.g., photo prints and designs are appropriate and of high quality)?

Establishing a Healthy Relationship Between Providers and Families

To what extent does the material …

 

1. Emphasize the importance of providers and families establishing a comfortable relationship prior to identifying, assessing, and addressing a child’s literacy needs (e.g., understanding values and beliefs)?
2. Acknowledge the importance of employing service providers who respect and are knowledgeable about the cultures and languages of the families served?
3. Encourage the provision of services in the families’ preferred language or through the assistance of a qualified translator/interpreter who can serve as a cultural mediator?
4. Encourage providers to engage in self-reflection regarding their role, assumptions and beliefs, and how they may be perceived by the family (e.g., supportive, interfering, guiding, intrusive)?
5. Encourage providers to clarify their role with families and to gather information regarding family expectations about literacy and language development?
6. Offer strategies to address conflict or misunderstanding that may arise between suggested interventions and families’ preferences?
7. Acknowledge the importance of developing a climate of mutual respect and trust by responding to family concerns as they arise (e.g., answering questions, providing resources, and changing the intervention program)?
8. Acknowledge that family members may differ in their availability or desire to participate in literacy activities, which may increase or decrease over time?

Intervention Strategies

a. General Intervention Strategies

To what extent does the material …

 

1. Explain why service providers and families should be concerned about emergent literacy?
2. Explain and give examples to families and service providers how everyday literacy activities that occur in children’s home, school and community can help facilitate children’s literacy development?
3. Explain why second-language learners of English should be given the opportunity to develop their emergent literacy in their dominant or native language?
4. Explain the use of ESL techniques and native language support for all second language learners of English?
5. Acknowledge the language and communication style of the child, family, and community (e.g., use of code-switching, regional dialect, multiple languages)?
6. Acknowledge the variety of people who can influence the literacy development in young children (e.g., parents, siblings, extended family, neighbors, and religious mentors)?
7. Acknowledge the different ways in which young children may interact with adults and other children (e.g., their responses to and asking of questions, their role as conversational partners, their view of authority, their narrative styles in story telling)?
8. Include information acknowledging a variety of caregiving practices (e.g., reading to young children, storytelling) and the impact they may have on the child’s literacy development?
9. Acknowledge the importance of using games, songs, and activities that are familiar to the family to promote literacy development?
10. Explain that a goal of emergent literacy is to facilitate children’s enjoyment of literacy activities?
11. Explain the different ways in which young children may interact or "read" (e.g., pretend read, read correctly some but not all words, etc.)?
12. Encourage emergent literacy activities that provide options to support children in sharing life experiences (e.g., birth of a sibling, incidences of social injustice, moving to a new home, etc.)?
13. Encourage strategies that address multiple domains of development as opposed to a singular focus during intervention (e.g., address motor and literacy development simultaneously through games and action songs)?
14. Encourage adapting literacy activities, materials, equipment, environments, and intervention strategies as needed to accommodate the abilities and sensory needs of individual children?
15. Encourage literacy activities and strategies that take into account the environment in which the family lives (e.g., living space, and safety considerations) and in which literacy activities can occur (e.g., home, school, and community)? Strategies and activities should be environmentally sensitive, and may vary according to the setting.
16. Encourage collaboration among providers and family members in planning, implementing, and evaluating literacy activities and strategies (e.g., reading instructor, parents or guardian, preschool teacher, speech language pathologist)?
17. Provide useful explanations for how to support activities for families with diverse literacy abilities (e.g., sharing family stories, conversations associated with daily life routines, sharing music or singing, or playing cards)?
18. Emphasize that intervention services must be consistent with what is required under IDEA?

b. Assessment and Information Gathering

To what extent does the material …

 

1. Suggest ways to obtain information and build on the caregiver's belief about his or her own role in supporting the child's literacy development?
2. Emphasize the importance of assessing second-language learners' emergent literacy development in the language they know best?
3. Provide an explanation for when and how bilingual children's emergent literacy development should be assessed in their two languages?

c. Instructional Activities in Center-Based Programs

To what extent does the material …

 

1. Encourage the use of a variety of emergent literacy instructional activities (e.g., book reading, rhyming games, opportunities to write, singing, sharing time, etc.)?
2. Encourage providers to respect and support children’s life experiences that may be reflected in emergent literacy activities or products (e.g., field trips, family composition, relocation, or death in family)?
3. Explain the purpose and implementation of the following emergent literacy instructional activities:

 

1. Adult-child book reading, with repeated reading of familiar and predictable stories
2. The recitation of poems, rhymes, riddles, and proverbs
3. Singing, chanting, and music
4. Use of the language experience approach
5. Acknowledgement and use of environmental print
6. Literacy-oriented centers
7. Wide access to writing and reading materials throughout the day
8. Time to look at or read a variety of books (mini photo albums, any student-, teacher-, or family-made book, authentic texts which reflect the culture and language of the children)
9. Support and development of multiple purposes for writing (to label, write stories, write letters, make lists, describe a drawing, etc.)
10. Support and development of multiple purposes for reading (for pleasure, information, safety, etc.)
11. Acceptance of invented spelling
12. Phonemic awareness, developmental writing, and participation in book reading.
13. Writing that approximates print according to the structure of the child’s dominant language.

d. Instructional Activities at Home and Community

To what extent does the material …

 

1. Suggest strategies, activities, and materials that can be embedded within the family's routines and environments?
2. Explain how to conduct adult-to-child storybook reading and child-to-adult reading for families?

Model Effectiveness

To what extent does the material …

 

1. Identify potential short-term outcomes for both the caregiver and/or the child?
2. Identify potential long-term outcomes for both the caregiver and/or the child?
3. Specify the cultural and linguistic groups with whom the approach has been used?

Evaluating Impact and Appropriateness of Intervention and Services

To what extent does the material …

 

1. Encourage providers to systematically evaluate the appropriateness of the interventions with families based on their changing needs and preferences?
2. Suggest ways of ensuring that outcomes are important and meaningful to the families as well as the service providers?
3. Include a variety of options for gathering information from families (e.g., interviews, observations, checklists, etc.) that respect families’ cultural and linguistic background and considers families’ level of acculturation?-

The following two questions are intended to deepen the analysis of the ways materials address issues of diversity. In some cases, these issues may have been addressed in the proceeding questions.

Does the material acknowledge and address complex and sometimes subtle aspects of diversity as they relate to emergent literacy, such as:

 

1. Power (refers to the division of members of society into levels with unequal access to resources, knowledge, and authority)
2. Racism (systems advantage based on race)
3. Prejudice (refers to an adverse judgment or opinion based on preconceived beliefs and ideas about different groups)
4. Socio-Economic Class (refers to the division of society into levels with unequal wealth and prestige)

Are there any spoken or unspoken assumptions, values, or beliefs in this material that could conflict with the delivery of culturally and linguistically appropriate services (e.g., assuming all parents view themselves as advocates or equal partners)?

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
College of Education
Early Childhood and Parenting Collaborative
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