ABSTRACT
The high premium that many people place on literacy skills, including those necessary for performing well in school and in the workplace, emerges largely from the degree to which educated adults depend on text-based and digital resources for learning and communication. When educated people think about
how and why literacy is important, few question the fundamental notion that reading is a crucial building block, if not the chief cornerstone, of success at school, at work, and in society (Feiler, 2007; Gee, 2008; McCarty, 2005). In primary education around the globe, one of the first things children do at school is participate in literacy lessons and “learn to read.” Of course, “the developmental transformations that mark the way to reading expertise begin in infancy, not in school” (Wolf, 2007, p. 223).
