On behalf of the Australian Journal of Learning Difficulties, its Editorial Board, Referees and Authors, and of the membership and Council of Learning Difficulties Australia, the Association of which this Journal belongs, we would like to thank the outgoing Editor, Emeritus Professor Kevin Wheldall, for graciously editing the Journal since 2006. Kevin has not only invested an enormous amount of time, effort and expertise into the Journal, but has cultivated a culture of dialogue, debate, and rigour around evidence in the field of learning difficulties. For this he deserves the utmost recognition.
It is an honour and a privilege to be appointed as the incoming Co-Editors of the Australian Journal of Learning Difficulties, a journal with a long and respected history in the field. We are committed to building on solid foundations: to continue the publication of high quality research, while at the same time explore new ways to increase the readership and impact of the Journal even further. Let us therefore take the opportunity to warmly encourage you to bring to the Australian Journal of Learning Difficulties the latest and best theoretical and empirical research in learning difficulties.
In this first issue under our Co-Editorship, three articles and one discussion paper are published. Tanya Serry, Pranee Liamputtong, Miranda Rose, and Lesley Bretherton examine the impact of parents’ experiences of their children’s supplementary reading interventions, most notably Reading Recovery. The difficulties experienced by these parents are brought to light, accompanied by the need for systematic and integrated approaches to the management of reading difficulties.
Robyn Wheldall, Katharine Glenn, Sarah Arakelian, Alison Madelaine, Meree Reynolds, and Kevin Wheldall provide empirical evidence for the efficacy of a whole class literacy preparation program. This article explores whether PreLit, originally designed for preschool children in the year before formal schooling, is an effective program for improving emergent literacy skills early in the school experience for students commencing school with low levels of oral language and phonological awareness.
Gary Woolley provides a balanced instructional framework for reading comprehension strategies for high functioning children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). In this article he explores levels of cognition and learning, and concludes that high functioning children with ASD would benefit from effective teaching of reading comprehension at surface and deeper levels of cognition.
Finally, James Chapman and William Tunmer’s discussion paper outlines their response to Schwartz’s criticisms of their original paper on the literacy performance of students following participation in Reading Recovery. The paper addresses the points raised by Schwartz and argues the need for research-based approaches to intervention.
To conclude, let us invite you to share the results of your research with the Australian Journal of Learning Difficulties, and help make the Journal even more successful into the future.
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Sarah McDonagh
[email protected]Co-Editors