There is considerable interest across the United States in increasing the number of children who are reading at grade level by the end of third grade (e.g., Rose, 2012). Some responses to this interest, such as mandatory retention policies, are not supported by the weight of research evidence (e.g., Reschly & Christenson, 2013). In contrast, research offers substantial support for the impact of professional development, coaching, and specific instructional practices on literacy growth (e.g., Carlisle & Berebitsky, 2011; Purcell-Gates, Duke, & Stouffer, in press; Yoon, Duncan, Lee, Scarloss, & Shapley, 2007).

In Michigan, an Early Literacy Task Force has been formed to support professional development, coaching, and the use of research-supported instructional practices statewide. This is no small task. Michigan has 540 Local Education Agencies (LEAs) and 56 Intermediate School Districts charged with providing various kinds of support to those LEAs, as well as a variety of nonprofit and other organizations that interact with literacy education.

To provide leadership in this context, Michigan’s Association of Intermediate School Administrators (MAISA), through its General Educational Leadership Network (GELN), formed the Early Literacy Task Force. The Task Force comprises representatives from a number of relevant organizations in Michigan, including not only Intermediate School Districts, but also the Michigan Reading Association, the Michigan Department of Education, the Michigan Association for Computer Users in Learning, the Michigan Elementary and Middle School Principals Association, the University of Michigan, Michigan State University, and many others.

In our first meeting, we agreed there is an enormous need in Michigan to get on the same page about effective early literacy instruction—on the same page about the content of early literacy professional development for Michigan teachers, the focus of literacy coaching, and the literacy instructional practices we want children to experience. Toward that end, we developed two documents, which you can access at the following links:

Essential Instructional Practices in Early Literacy: Prekindergarten

Essential Instructional Practices in Early Literacy: Grades K to 3

In developing the documents, we relied heavily on research and focused on high-utility instructional practices (for further information about the purposes and use of the documents, please see their introductory sections). Given the effectiveness and range of these practices, we believe that focusing professional development and coaching on them could make a measurable difference in reading-by-third-grade outcomes. We are pleased that the documents have already received considerable attention—not only in Michigan but elsewhere in the United States and beyond. Plans are underway to create professional development offerings and materials, including an extensive library of video clips, to support learning about the practices.

Additional documents, such as Essential Practices in Literacy Coaching and Literacy Essentials School-Level Companion Document are also in the works. Task Force leaders Joanne Hopper (MAISA GELN Director), Naomi Norman (Interim Assistant Superintendent, Achievement & Student Services at the Washtenaw Intermediate School District and the Livingston Education Agency), and Susan Townsend (Director of Instruction & Learning Services at the Jackson Intermediate School District), report a degree of collaboration and unity among education stakeholders that is unprecedented in Michigan. We are now in the same book and, with continued effort, we will be on the same page as well.

Nell K. Duke is a professor of Literacy, Language, and Culture at the University of Michigan, a member of the ILA Literacy Research Panel, and author of Inside Information: Developing Powerful Readers and Writers of Informational Text Through Project-Based Instruction.

The ILA Literacy Research Panel uses this blog to connect ILA members around the world with research relevant to policy and practice. Reader response is welcomed via e-mail.