Cambourne, B. (1999) The Reading Teacher, 53(2), 126
You may wonder why an article written in 2019 would be relevant today but it could have been written yesterday. The article is short (2 pages) but with some important messages. Cambourne suggests that ‘Explicit and Systematic teaching of reading’ is yet another new Teaching reading slogan. He provides a potted history of approaches to reading instruction starting in the 1040s and moving through to the end of the 1990s. This is followed by an explanation of how Explicit and Systematic instruction is pervading curriculum, policy and legislative documents and literacy texts. Sound familiar? Cambourne follows with a discussion of Explicit vs Implicit. Systematic vs Unsystematic, Mindful vs mindless and contextualised vs decontextualised. The article finishes with a powerful word of caution.
Distributed with permission from the International Literacy Association
Links to Touchstones: 6, 10, 11