Literacy Research by WestEd's Greenleaf Helps Inform Common Core State Standards

Education Week — November 13, 2012

Literacy used to mean simply decoding words on a page. Thanks in part to research from WestEd's Cynthia Greenleaf, the definition of literacy is expanding and deepening.

Greenleaf is the Co-Director of the Strategic Literacy Initiative at WestEd. She is also co-author of Literacy Instruction in the Content Areas: Getting to the Core of Middle and High School Improvement, an influential study on literacy.

Greenleaf's research examines academic literacy—the ability to read, think, write, and speak effectively in and across multiple subject areas.

As this Education Week article notes, this richer definition of academic literacy underpins the philosophy of literacy embodied in the Common Core State Standards.