Programme 354, Tara Concannon-Gibney on Early Years Literacy 2 (20-2-19)

Presented and produced by Seán Delaney

Theme tune by David Vesey

On this week's programme I continue my conversation on teaching literacy in the early years with Dr. Tara Concannon-Gibney from Dublin City University. The occasion was to mark the publication by Routledge of Tara's book Teaching Essential Literacy Skills in the Early Years Classroom: A Guide for Students and Teachers. Among the topics we discuss on this week's programme are:

• Her definition of literacy


• Digital texts and literacy


• Why some children struggle with reading


• How parents can help their child to read


• How a parent should react to a child reading when the child comes to a word that is not known


• Advice for choosing a book for a child


• The benefits of repetitive reading of texts


• Poetry and literacy skills


• How she became interested in the area of literacy


• How she went about writing the book

In the course of our interview Tara mentioned texts by the following writers: Mem Fox, Georgia Heard, Lucy Calkins, Oliver Jeffers, Hervé Tullet, and Julia Donaldson.