The crucial importance of the early years of schooling in laying the foundations for children's literacy development is undisputed. However, debate about approaches to literacy pedagogy has persisted, associated with a large and sometimes contradictory body of empirical research. The UK-based Education Endowment Foundation has synthesised the best current evidence, to provide guidance about good practice in the teaching of literacy in the early years of primary school. Their guidance has been updated for the Australian context by the Evidence for Learning (E4L) Group3 and aligns well with the Australian Curriculum. This fact sheet provides an overview of the eight recommendations in these Guidance Reports, illustrated with examples from our research in Tasmania