A detailed characterisation of teacher practices is a first and crucial step to determine the best conditions for successful literacy learning. In this paper, we show the concurrence of the use of two instruments - semi-structured interview and classroom observation-to obtain a more detailed, in depth and exploratory view of practice profiles to teach reading and writing, which had been identified in a previous phase of this longitudinal study. Two instruments were designed in order to better identify teachers' different ways of going about teaching to read and write. These instruments were administered to a sample of 71 teachers and their respective classes (39 five year olds in preschool, and 32 in first year of primary school). The analysis of results confirms that both instruments efficiently detect teachers' declared preferences for teaching to read and write. They allow us to confirm the existence of three teaching practice profiles for literacy instruction - instructional, situational, and multidimensional-as well as specify and clarify teachers' characteristic ways of going about instruction in each profile, contributing details that may be crucial to explain students' reading and writing achievements.
