What ideas does a teacher have about literacy and how children learn language? Sorting these out is, in the authors' view, the teacher's first priority. Accordingly they begin with a clear and concise exposition of the beliefs which have shaped their own work in the classroom. Yet though this theoretical core is vital and informs everything they do, it is the account of what they do and how they do it that occupies the major portion of this rewarding and helpful book. Covering whole language teaching from initial planning to evaluation, this book is a notable example of convictions explored, tested, and realized in day-to-day practice. The numerous workshops and inservice courses which Hazel Brown and Vonne Mathie have conducted over the past few years have given them a lively awareness of other teachers' needs, enabling them now to write equally for those already committed to a whole language approach and for those pausing and wondering whether to try it.