Readers and Texts in the Primary Years (Rethinking Reading)

In the primary classroom approaches to the teaching of reading continue to be a focus for much professional debate. Readers and Texts in the Primary Years examines the ways in which readers respond to different texts. The word 'response' occurs throughout the National Curriculum for English but is not defined in any precise sense and the aim of the book is to develop an awareness of the issues involved for primary teachers. What happens when readers make their way through texts is fascinating, especially so when the same process appears to be at work in both young children and adults. The book explores the responses of a variety of readers from three-year-old Dominic sharing a picture book with his father to adults reading a poem by Ted Hughes. It draws out the implications for primary teachers both in terms of giving status to what child readers take to their reading and helping them develop the awareness necessary to deal with texts of increasing complexity.