This research synthesis is organized around identification of instructional priorities for emergent literacy and existing evidence regarding curriculum design for those instructional priorities. First, areas of emerging evidence are identified and two major ideas are extracted: (1) children need to develop knowledge of and facility with multiple dimensions of early literacy knowledge, and (2) social contexts and conditions influence early literacy knowledge. These ideas are then made more explicit and employable by relating them to the following principles of curriculum design: conspicuous strategies, mediated scaffolding, strategic integration, primed background knowledge, and judicious review. (DB)