By Nigel Hall and Anne Robinson
(David Fulton, 16.50, ISBN 1 84312 010 0, 020 8996 3610)
Reviewed by Marian Whitehead, language and early years consultant It is good to be able to welcome a new edition of a book that was highly successful and influential when it first appeared in 1995. There have been many changes in early years education since then, and the authors now aim to offer far more practical advice for those who are trying to develop or extend play and literacy provision in their settings. This is particularly significant for the many early years workers who are not qualified teachers or nursery nurses and have limited experience of creating opportunities for socio-dramatic play.
Socio-dramatic play is at the heart of this study, and although newcomers to the book may find the arguments in Chapter 2 challenging, they cannot fail to be inspired by the Hall and Robinson 'revolution' of the mid-1980s that set up nursery class home corners and filled them with examples of everyday print materials. This new edition emphasises the importance of planning for literacy enrichment, as well as adult involvement and modelling, and there are interesting ideas for creating 'events' and 'problems' to be solved by the children using literacy in a socio-dramatic play area.
There is also a lengthy case study of a classroom 'garage' and, in Chapter 4, a powerful analysis of what the authors see as the irrelevance and strangeness of many current school literacy practices!
