Fluency: Importance, Instruction and Assessment

1. Fluency: Importance, Instruction and Assessment Aaron, Amy, Destiny, Jamie, and Keshia

2. Why is Fluency Important? • The ultimate goal of reading is the construction of meaning. • Fluent reader • Shift from intentional decoding to automatic word recognition • Focus changes from decoding to comprehending

3. What is Fluency? • Fluent reading is more than just reading words accurately and automatically. • Fluency is reading in phrases with appropriate intonation and prosody. • Reading with expression • Poor readers often struggle with prosody. • comprehension

4. Carver’s Causal Model for Reading Achievement Teach/Learn Verbal Knowledge Level Verbal Aptitude Accuracy Level Teach/Learn Pronunciation Knowledge Level Reading Efficiency Pronunciation Aptitude Rate Level Cognitive Speed Level Age Cognitive Speed Aptitude

5. Instruction: Repeated Readings • Timed repeated reading- student reads material at his/her instructional level for 1-2 minute timed period results are graphed, reading is repeated and results are graphed, following session repeat the process with the same passage (4 reads total in 2 sessions)

6. Instruction: Repeated Readings • Rasinski disagrees- all repeated reading should be passages read as practice with the end purpose of performance • Reader’s Theater • Song of the Day • Poetry • Speeches • Read to “Buddy” (provide feedback during practice)

7. Instruction: Fluent Model • Teacher read aloud • Books on Tape • Listening Center • Echo Reading

8. Instruction: Silent Reading • Strategies to select appropriate material • Accountability • Reading response • Conference with teacher • “Rap”

9. Assessment: Fluency • Traditional reading inventories focused on the ability to read isolated words at a given grade level. Although accuracy is important to reading, it has not been proven to be sufficient evidence to predict reading comprehension. • “Fluency combines accuracy, automaticity, and oral reading prosody, which, taken together facilitate the reader’s construction of meaning. It is demonstrated during oral reading through ease of word recognition, appropriate pacing, phrasing, and intonation. It is a factor in both oral and silent reading that can limit or support comprehension” -Kuhn, Schwanenflugel, & Meisinger, (2010)

10. Assessment: Accuracy • Accuracy is important to reading, it has not been proven to be sufficient evidence to predict reading comprehension. • Accuracy combined with comprehension will help determine a student’s reading level. • Oral Reading Accuracy measures: • Leveled passages • Missed words • Self corrections • Meaning change errors

11. Assessment: Automaticity • As automaticity develops, performance is not only accurate but increases speed. • Effortlessness: • Fluent readers do not struggle and are able to recognize most words. • Most fluent readers are able to decode text while comprehending. • Flash • Timed • Untimed • Spelling • Students word knowledge • Word recognition-timed is a superior method in predicting oral reading rate across grade levels.

12. Assessment: Prosody • Prosody is the act of reading with appropriate expression connected to text • English learning students will not stress words in the same way that English speaking students do, because stress patterns vary throughout different languages. • Research is currently vague that prosody could be a reliable reading assessment.

13. Assessment Overview • We can gather significant data through a wider range of assessments. • Above all readers need to be truly fluent instead of fast. • Disfluent readers are always aware of steps needed to decode words within text, which slows the reader down; whereas fluent readers are automatic and can identify most of the words without effort. • Accuracy alone is not strongly correlated to reading comprehension, so reading should be measured by three components, automaticity, prosody, and accuracy.

14. Final Thought • “…fluency is but a stage name. Rate and Accuracy may be at the microphone, but the true voice is Comprehension. That’s read reading.” --Barclay Marcell

15. Bibliography • Allington, R.L., (1983). Fluency: The Neglected Reading Goal, The Reading Teacher, 36 (6), pp.556-561. • Allington, R.L., (2006). What Research Has To Say About Fluency Instruction. Fluency: Still Waiting After All These Years, Ch. 5 p. 94-105. • Bashir, A. S., Hook, P. E., (2009) Fluency: A Key Link Between Word Identification and Comprehension. Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools, 40, pg. 196-200. • Biggs, M., Homan, S., & Rasinki, T. (2009). Teaching reading fluency to struggling readers: method, materials, and evidence. Reading and Writing Quarterly. 25, 192-204. • Carver, P. R., (1992). Reading rate: Theory, research, and practical implications. Journal of Reading, 36(2),84-95. • Carver, P. R., (2000). The Causal Model, Accuracy Level, Rate Level. The Causes of High and Low Reading Acheivement, ch. 1, 4, & 5, p. 3-23, p. 61-74, p. 75-89. • Fawson, F., Jones, C., Reutzel, D., & Smith, J. (2008). Scaffolded silent reading: A complement to guided repeated oral reading that works!. The Reading Teacher. 62, 194-207. • Gaffney, M., & Morris, D. (2011). Building reading fluency in a learning-disabled middle school reader. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy. 54, 331-341. • Kelley, Michelle, Clausen-Grace, Nicki (2006). R5: The Sustained Silent Reading makeover that transformed readers, The Reading Teacher Vol. 60, No. 2 October 2006, pp. 148-156. • Kuhn, M., (2005). A Comparative Study of Small Group Fluency Instruction. Reading Psychology. 26, 127-146.

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