James Christie is a Professor Emeritus in the T. Denny Sanford School of Social and Family Dynamics at Arizona State University, where he taught courses in play and early language and literacy development. Dr. Christie has coauthored Play, Development, and Early Education (Allyn & Bacon, 2005) and Teaching Language and Literacy: Preschool through the Elementary Grades, 5th ed. (Pearson, 2014) and 14 other books and over 100 journal articles and chapters in edited books. He has been codirector of three Early Reading First projects: the Arizona Centers of Excellence in Early Education in San Luis, AZ; the Mohave Desert Coalition in Bullhead City, AZ; and Pump Up the Volume in Preschool in Gallup, NM. He served as the early literacy consultant for Sesame Street Magazine and Fisher-Price Toys.