Growing Independence and Fluency
Buzzing to Fluency
Rationale:
Fluency is a skill that is needed to be able to read for understanding. To read fluently means to recognize words quickly. In order to read words automatically then decoding should be a skill and this allows them to have a larger sight word bank. This can be important, so the student can read with expression instead of spending the majority time reading. As the student gets older they will read for comprehension. In order to have good comprehension skills they do not need to spend extra time decoding each word.
Materials:
Class set of “Kite Day at Pine Lake”
Dry erase board and marker
Paper with decoding words
Stopwatches
Pencils
Reading comprehension questions
Procedure:
1. Say: “The goal of reading is to understand and learn from what we read. To do that, we have to be able to read fluently. This means that we cannot decode every word that we read. We have to have the words in our memory so that we can read them quickly. [write sentence, “The cat is very hungry.” on the board.] It is easy for us to read this sentence as (read slowly in a monotone voice) The cat is very hungry. When you become more fluent, you can read the sentence with expression. Let’s practice reading it like this: (Read in worried voice) “The cat is very hungry!”
2. Say: “Sometimes we get to a word we may not know. This is when we need to use our self-help strategies like cross-checking. If that doesn’t help us next, we need to get out our coverup critter. Get your coverup critter and we will all decode together. I’ll show you on the board. [write the word “spring” on the board and demonstrate using the cover up to decode.] Let’s look at this word. We see the vowel i in the word. We know that the i by itself will say /i/. Let’s start at the beginning. [cover up all but the s and have the class say the /s/ sound.] Now add the pr, spr. And our vowel /i/, spri. And the ng, spring. Spring. I have a piece of paper for you. Use the cover up critter to decode these words. [clip, crop, plank]. “
3. Say: “So when we get to a word we do not know we can use our coverup critter to help us decode. Sometimes we can also crosscheck which means we can read to the end of the sentence to make sure the word makes sense in the sentence. Let’s write this sentence, [write, “We love to read books.] What if I read it like this, “We love to red books.” Does that make sense? Do you red books? No! I would go back and read it as “We love to read books!.” That is called cross checking. “
4. Say: “Now are going to pair up with the person next to you. You are going to read the book Kite Day at Pine Lake to each other. A group of friends went to the lake to fly their kites. Everyone had a different kind of kite, but Bob doesn’t have a kite to fly with his friends. What will Bob do? Let’s read to find out! Each one of you have a timer so when your partner begins to read start the timer and when they are done reading then stop the timer. Record the time on the sheet I am going to give you.
5. Say: “Okay, good job everyone! You read the books and recorded the time. Now we are going to do the same thing again but with a twist. This time while timing your partner I need you to also write down any words they do not get write. If they mess up on a word, write what he or she said.
6. Collect all time and fluency rubrics.
7. Walk through while students are reading and make notes on a clipboard. Use the formula -(words read times 60) divided by total seconds it took to read the text- to calculate words per minute. Give students a worksheet with reading comprehension questions to assess their understanding of what they read.
References: Kicking it with Fluency by Cassie Jones https://casspjones2016.wixsite.com/mysite/growing-independence-and-fluency