“Building a very strong foundation early is critical to be able to help kids be successful as they move throughout the school years,” said Christina Budde, who is an assistant professor in the SOE and specializes in language and literacy education. “As your school years build on, you're just learning more and more. If you think of it as a foundation, if there's all these little cracks or holes missing in the foundation, and you're adding on to that foundation, it gets much more difficult to fill in those cracks and holes as we move up through the grade levels. But if we can build a really strong foundation in the beginning, then we set kids up for far more success throughout their academic career.”

Teaching children to read is complex, and there are different approaches to teaching literacy, with some methods focusing on phonics and others focusing more heavily on language comprehension. Research has shown, however, that the most effective instruction includes explicit instruction in both.

“Reading is a really broad concept. The evidence supports thinking about reading as a component-based concept, so there are different components that go into it,” said SOE Professor Steve Amendum, whose research areas include early reading intervention, literacy development and evidence-based classroom instruction. “Students need  vocabulary knowledge, they have to have phonics knowledge, they have to have strategies for comprehending and so on. The evidence in the field supports these different components that are important to making sure that students can read proficiently, and so we address all of those components in our courses.”

Critical to building a foundation of literacy is having an understanding of phonics. Recently, one of the nation’s leading literacy experts rewrote her curriculum to place a stronger emphasis on phonics and the science of reading — something that UD’s CEHD professors have always embraced.

“We've known for a long time that systematic instruction in phonics is required for teaching kids how to read, and so we have always made sure that our teachers are trained in evidence-based practices,” Coker said. “We teach students the fundamental procedures, strategies and content knowledge that teachers really need to have to be effective reading and writing teachers.”

Unlike language, which is acquired naturally through exposure to opportunities to communicate, reading is something that has to be taught.

“All kids and all individuals — all humans — need to learn to read and write from somebody. It's not natural,” said SOE Professor Sharon Walpole, who recently served as the director of CEHD’s Professional Development Center for Educators (PDCE), which partners with teachers and administrators to craft services that meet the particular needs of schools and school districts. “Language development for humans is natural, but it's not the same thing for learning to read and spell — those things are human inventions, and they have to be taught. Almost all children can learn to read if they get strong access to instruction, and I think it's a civil right that they get that at school.”

As part of UD’s ETE program, students are required to take three literacy courses, as well as an additional course focused on literacy for English learners. At many universities, students are required to take only one literacy course.

“Delaware districts are so eager to hire our grads,” Walpole said “Our students get jobs because the HR directors and school districts know that we've trained them in these things. And that's the most important thing: Is there respect for our program in the field? And there definitely is.”