Rationale for this book: the linguistically aware teacher

Primary school teachers across the world are responsible for developing children's talking and listening, reading and writing skills. They are responsible for assessing development in these areas and for creating learning environments in which language and literacy learning can thrive.

Knowledge from research in linguistics and applied linguistics now underpins much of the primary school language and literacy curriculum. Obvious examples include the teaching of phonics and phonological awareness, genre-based approaches to writing and to reading comprehension, and of course the teaching of modern foreign languages. Primary teachers draw on frameworks derived from applied linguistics when they seek to understand these aspects of the curriculum, and to analyse children's phoneme awareness, spelling, reading strategies or writing attainment. Evidence from applied linguistics research prompts teachers to bridge the language and literacy gaps between home and school or to use the relationship between oral language, reading and writing to make learning in the classroom more efficient. It helps primary teachers consider how to adapt the curriculum to meet the needs of individuals with defined language and literacy difficulties, or the needs of bilingual and multilingual children who are learning English as an additional language at school.

Finally, applied linguistics research contributes to our understanding of classroom pedagogy and curriculum organisation. For example, it offers insights into group interaction and classroom discourse and, as such, has the capacity to inform how teachers teach and how they manage their classes to ensure more efficient learning.