CLTT Special Issue October 2021 Editorial

Abstract

This special Issue of Child Language Teaching and Therapy (CLTT) is dedicated to the theme of language and literacy which intersects the work of educators including teachers and speech and language therapist/pathologists (henceforth SLT/P). It is going to press at a time when the world is still in the shadow of a global pandemic, the effects of which have been felt in every domain of our personal, social and professional lives. The editorial board is indebted to the tireless support of our peer reviewers and to the patience and tenacity of our international authors whose scholarship we are delighted to share in this Special Issue. This issue comprises eight papers from both speech and language therapy and education from a range of countries: Australia; Canada; South Africa and the USA Literacy, and especially literacy instruction, is a topic that unites teachers and speech and language therapists/pathologists in a unique way. However, the past few decades have seen divergent approaches in literacy instruction which have impacted opportunities for collaborative practice in the classroom. Whole language / Balanced Literacy advocates have suggested literacy instruction should prioritize meaning as a starting point to learning to read. Conversely, educators who support a more explicit, systematic phonics instruction approach suggest that learners first need to “crack the code” (Snow, current issue) to embark on a successful, literate career. In this special issue there is a strong consensus amongst all eight papers that the conceptual framework laid out in the Simple View of Reading (Gough and Tunmer, 1986) offers the most compelling explanatory roadmap for literacy development and instruction. In her review SOLAR: The Science of Language and Reading, Pamela Snow offers a detailed and unambiguous account of the bidirectional links between oral language and written language development. She clearly outlines the influence that the foundational skills of semantics, syntax and pragmatics bring to bear not only on emergent literacy skill in the preschool and early school years but throughout the entire scholastic trajectory into post education and employment years. Many educators will be familiar with Hollis Scarborough’s Reading Rope (Scarborough, 2001) describing the strands of language development and word recognition woven into the ‘rope’ of skilled reading. Snow’s visual metaphor of “The Language House” is another helpful image that reminds us of the foundational language skills that underpin literacy development. In addition, this diagram invites us to think beyond essentialist, individual factors of the learner and instead consider broader psychological, emotional and systemic, contextual factors that influence the development of oral language and written language. Snow reminds us that access to high quality literacy instruction is a determinant of health and wellbeing and, thus inadequate literacy instruction a major contributor to social inequity. This panoramic view sets the scene for important themes that emerge in this Special Issue namely, the expanding SLT/P’s contribution to explicit literacy Editorial