Promising Interventions for Promoting Emergent Literacy Skills

The decade of the 1990s saw a tremendous increase in research studying the value of emergent literacy intervention, particularly for meeting the needs of children at risk. Such studies have documented the positive effects of adult—child shared storybook reading, literacy-enriched play settings, and structured phonological awareness curricula for enhancing the emergent literacy skills of young children. This article defines emergent literacy, discusses the meaning of evidence-based practice, and describes three promising evidence-based approaches for emergent literacy intervention.