This book provides a valuable discussion of whole languagewithin the context of the lives of the people most directly influenced:the children and their teachers. - Harvard Educational ReviewIn the fall of 1988, JoBeth Allen, Barbara Michalove, and Betty Shockley began a three-year longitudinal research project to examine the effects of whole language instruction on six children they were worried about. They collected information by observing each of the children regularly, interviewing them about how they were developing as readers and writers, collecting their writing, and recording their reading. Engaging Children is the result: portraits of children who are engaged by teachers in literacy learning, who engage with texts and each other, and who are themselves engaging.