How can educators accelerate literacy when students' strongest language is the language they already speak?

Accelerating Literacy with Talk to Read provides a practical, research-backed answer. Elizabeth Baker, professor at the University of Missouri, presents a field-tested framework that transforms students' oral language, cultural backgrounds, and lived experiences into powerful reading and writing opportunities. Successfully backed by a major, federally funded professional learning initiative at the eMINTS National Center currently serving forty-six schools, ninety-six teachers, and more than nineteen hundred students, this approach bridges the Science of Reading with the Language Experience Approach (LEA). By integrating digital dictation technologies, explicit think-alouds, and literary structures, Baker shows elementary teachers and literacy coaches how student-generated texts make phonics, vocabulary, and comprehension instruction deeply meaningful and transferable across content areas.

Designed for today's linguistically diverse classrooms, this book moves beyond passive skill drills to elevate learner self-efficacy and reading proficiency. Baker equips educators with concrete implementation guides, classroom management routines, and reflection tools to personalize literacy acceleration across general education, English Language Learner (ELL), and special education contexts.

Key insights include:

• The five-component Talk to Read framework: A systematic model uniting LEA, digital dictation, literary structures, explicit think-alouds, and classroom management.
• Science of Reading alignment through authentic application: Explicitly teaching foundational literacy skills—phonics, vocabulary, and comprehension—within student-generated texts.
• Leveraging digital dictation technologies: Practical techniques using speech-to-text tools to capture student speech and retain native learner language efficiently.
• Cross-curricular transfer: Strategies for applying student-created texts across literacy, science, mathematics, and social studies instruction.
• Field-tested implementation guides: Adaptable routines, classroom vignettes, and coaching prompts supported by extensive classroom data.

Written by the former president of the Literacy Research Association and host of the Voice of Literacy podcast, Accelerating Literacy with Talk to Read proves that when educators harness the power of student voice and modern dictation technology, literacy instruction becomes an empowering engine for equitable academic success.