Teaching reading through Direct Instruction: A role for educational psychologists?

Educational psychologists can play a number of roles within education settings. They are often called upon to assist with the assessment and treatment of disability issues, student behaviour and mental health problems, parent and teacher liaison, and counselling, to name a few. Less frequently pursued is an active role in establishing and evaluating both general classroom and remedial literacy instruction. A lack of success in the literacy domain can have far-reaching effects on students’ educational and social and emotional development. Further, it has been noted in national and international reports that the accumulated evidence for effective literacy instruction has not had the impact on policy that it deserves. Educational psychologists are well placed to assist schools to develop an evidence-based perspective that can provide a marked improvement in the literacy development of students. One such model with a long research history is Direct Instruction. This article will describe the model, and consider how it might be profitably employed in schools.