Databases
Reading Rockets – Book Finder Database
This is a tool to search thousands of children’s book titles, and the option to create your own reading lists. This database has some really good filters to search for specific diversity content, a large range of topics, and geographical locations.
This is a database of articles about education from more than 200 journals, managed by the Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER). Searching in this database will help you to browse and find full-text articles on early literacy, teaching and curriculum, with a particular focus on Australian education.
Journal articles
Alexander, P. A. (2020). What Research Has Revealed About Readers’ Struggles With Comprehension in the Digital Age: Moving Beyond the Phonics Versus Whole Language Debate. Reading research quarterly, 55(1), S89-S97.
This article is about reading development in the digital age. Moving on from debate around phonics versus whole language approaches, and recognising that learning to read is more than literacy instruction. Instead, the article encourages thinking about reading as all interaction between the child and written language, and the importance of supporting a young reader’s journey with reading in the information age. Top pick.
Ho, E. S. C., & Lau, K. l. (2018). Reading engagement and reading literacy performance: effective policy and practices at home and in school. Journal of research in reading, 41(4), 657-679.
This is a Hong Kong study of early reading engagement. It’s useful because it sets out the impacts on early literacy and refers to other key studies. It finds that early parental involvement and parent’s own engagement in reading has an important impact on the child’s engagement with reading. Some interesting cultural observations as well.
Ledger, S., & Merga, M. K. (2018). Reading Aloud: Children’s Attitudes toward being Read to at Home and at School. Australian Journal of Teacher Education, 43(3).
This journal article has a slightly different take on reading aloud – it looks at it from the child’s perspective. The study finds that over 75% of children enjoy being read to – and for those that don’t, the main reason given is that they can already read themselves!. It’s probably no surprise that the majority of children would like to be read to more often.