Literacy instruction in first grade classrooms : teachers trained in Reading Recovery in comparison with teachers who have not been trained

This investigation attempts to demonstrate the importance of having trained Reading Recovery teachers in first grade classrooms. Reading education has always been a vital part of curricula in school districts across America. Successful reading requires numerous basic processes, such as the identification of letters, the mapping of letters onto sounds, word decoding, the recognition of words, and the use of syntax and semantic cues. Several areas of learning such as emergent literacy also facilitate the process of reading. Reading involves recognition of visual patterns-groups of words, word parts, clusters of letters and single letters. Reading also involves knowledge of the conventions of printed language, such as directional rules, space formats, and punctuation signals for new sentences, new speakers, and questions. Beginning readers have to learn the directional road rules for print (Clay, 2002)