Chapter 2: Making Space for Critical Literacy and not Just Cultural Literacy

Literacy education has long been at the forefront of education reform, education policy, and discussion of school curricula. With the introduction of the Reading First Initiative in No Child Left Behind (2001) and the high- stakes testing movement, literacy education was further catapulted into the spotlight. As a result of the Reading First Initiative, schools were required to implement reading programs considered to be based on scientific research. In order to receive federal funding, reading programs had to teach toward the five components of reading instruction—phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension—as identified by the National Reading Panel (NRP) Report (2002). That the NRP Report was fraught with problems that led to inconclusive results never came into question. Rather, the incomplete findings of the NRP Report came to frame federal policy on reading instruction.