INTRODUCTION TO 3 STUDIES ON READING ACQUISITION - CONVERGENT FINDINGS ON THEORETICAL FOUNDATIONS OF CODE-ORIENTED VERSUS WHOLE-LANGUAGE APPROACHES TO READING-INSTRUCTION

This article reviews research bearing on the theoretical foundations of code-oriented versus whole-language approaches to reading instruction, with a focus on the following issues: (a) the role played by word identification in reading; (b) the weight accorded context in word identification; and (c) the respective roles played by alphabetic coding and phoneme awareness in learning to read. These issues are directly or indirectly addressed in studies reported in this issue (December 1991) of the Journal of Educational Psychology, and their results extend or qualify previous findings. The evidence, on balance, favors the major theoretical premises on which code-emphasis approaches to reading instruction are based and is at variance with the major theoretical premises on which whole-language approaches are based. However, the findings do not preclude the compatibility of certain features of both approaches.