Growing a Reader from Birth: Your Child's Path from Language to Literacy

Diane McGuinness does not hold back in this book. If you are wanting some very interesting information on how a parent can affect their child's language abilities as well as their reading and writing abilities, then this is the book for you. The author cites many references and studies that support her conclusions and recommendations. I am currently in a Masters of Elem Education Program and taking a class in Reading Assessment. In my opinion, this book should be required reading. There are many ways in which those in the education system in the USA have steered all of us in the wrong direction as to the best system for teaching reading. This book has made me want to conduct further research into the reasons for this. As a future classroom teacher (I've homeschooled my now nine-year triplets), I want to be an instrument of progress and this book has opened my eyes to some startling information. I would not only recommend the book to all teachers, but to newly pregnant moms who are intersted in ways they can influence their child's literacy progress from the very start! I would LOVE to have a long, face-to-face discussion with Diane about her theories, her research, and her recommendations.

I gained some good suggestions from this book (namely the recommendation for the Jolly Phonics system) but was a bit disappointed with the lack of practical suggestions I could use with my already-quite-verbal 2 year old. Perhaps readers who work with language-challenged children would find this book more beneficial. The author seeks to help parents model and teach language skills to their children. However, many of the recommendations seemed to almost make fun of parents who struggle with communicating with their children. I thought a more supportive tone would help achieve the author's goals, especially since (as she goes to great lengths to explain) parents do not always do a good job of listening and speaking appropriately to their children. I also found the author relied overly on anecdotal situations. Often the text referred to past anecdotes without a reminder of the context; this left me feeling lost on more than one occasion. But as I mentioned previously, this book did steer me toward Jolly Phonics, which has provided exactly the tools I sought to help me guide my toddler into the world of phonics, reading, and writing.