1. Birmingham School District
Fluency
Birmingham School District
December 6, 2011
Michele Farah PhD
Early Literacy Consultant
Oakland Schools

2. Fluency session goals:
Understand the importance of oral reading fluency
Define and describe oral reading fluency
Differentiate between its components
Become familiar with guidelines for measuring and scoring reading fluency
Understand strategies for developing oral reading fluency for classroom use
Explore ways to assist students who struggle with fluency
This is the agenda for the day
Briefly state each point 2

3. What is Oral Reading Fluency
Think about fluent readers-list characteristics of fluent readers
Think about dysfluent readers-list characteristics of dysfluent readers
Define Oral Reading Fluency

4. Oral Reading Fluency Defined
Oral reading fluency (ORF) is the ability to read aloud accurately, automatically, quickly and with expression while comprehending the text.

5. Silent Reading & Oral Reading Fluency
Oral reading is a valuable skill but fluency is even more essential in silent reading because silent reading is what most readers do most of the time (Cramer, 2003)
Oral reading fluency is stressed in order to assess and teach
Oral reading fluency is stressed in order to monitor reading progress
The final goal is that readers will transfer oral reading fluency to silent reading.

6. Theories behind Fluency
Automaticity
Attention Capacity
Verbal Efficiency Theory
Prosody

7. Theory of Automaticity
Looked at skills necessary for reading to be automatic
Decoding is a prerequisite to reading
Decoding involves
accuracy
speed of word recognition
Once words are read accurately and automatically the reader’s attention can shift to comprehending the text

8. Attention Capacity
Readers have a limited capacity for attention and can attend to one thing at a time but may be able to process many things just as long as no more than one thing requires attention
Beginning readers have high demand for attention, which causes attention to switch between decoding and comprehension
Once decoding is automatic the reader can allocate attention to comprehending the text

9. Verbal Efficiency Theory
Builds on automaticity theory
Decoding needs to be automatic
Attention is free from word recognition readers allocate attention to not only understanding words but also use text structures such as headings to determine which words to focus on
Attention allocated to comprehend higher level processes like metacognition
Inefficient decoding produces less efficient comprehension

10. Prosody Prosody is intonation, stress and duration
Learning to read requires the reader to supply rapidly and automatically the portions of the oral signals that are not represented in the graphic signs
Easier to hear prosody in speech than to generate it from written language
Since prosody plays important role in spoken language for young children, the absence of these signals in written text explains why this is difficult

11. Read this phrase John threw the ball over the fence.
Answer these questions:
Who threw the ball?
How did the ball get over the fence?
Did your stress change?

12. When should direct fluency intervention be emphasized?
Chall (1983) and Samuels (2002) suggest specific points in reading development when the opportunity for fluency instruction should occur
Ungluing from print/Accuracy stage
Readers have a corpus of high frequency words which they can read accurately
Decoding is becoming automatic
Reading is becoming less choppy

13. Fluency Background
Two year pilot study and data collection during summer reading program for students reading below grade level
Looked at transitional readers text level, accuracy, rate, comprehension, automaticity and expression (prosody) after a six week intervention
Looked at student and teacher perceptions and understandings of oral reading fluency
Students ‘ how do you see yourself as a reader? Neutral to negative shift to positive to neutral What do good readers do when they read? Read chapter books, know all the words shift to comprehend read with expression, how does one become a good reader? Practice

14. Appropriate reading levels
Students should be reading texts at their appropriate difficulty levels. Appropriate difficulty levels refers to independent and instructional level reading materials depending on the levels of support. 14

15. What reading level for fluency assessment and instruction
Fluency building is most effective when conducted with reading materials at the student’s independent reading level
Instructional level reading materials can be used to build fluency when teacher support and scaffolding are provided
Frustrational reading level is any reading material where the student reads with less than 90% accuracy. This will significantly affect fluency, mental energy needed to decode the text and subsequently, overall comprehension.
For struggling readers, much of the grade level reading material, particularly in the content areas, is at a frustrational level.

16. Things that inhibit developing fluent readers
A steady diet of too-difficult texts that a student cannot read accurately
Daily lessons that provide little high-success reading opportunities so that very little actual reading is completed
Lessons where teachers, or others, frequently and consistently and immediately interrupt readers when they misread a word
Lack necessary basic skills instruction
Limited reading practice in high-success texts
Lessons for Struggling Readers:
Struggling readers often encounter reading lessons where they are:
asked to read aloud
reading too hard texts (frustrational)
interrupted when they misread a word
asked to sound out the word
Struggling readers need to read the same volume or more of high-accuracy reading a day as a fluent reader.
Decoding skill intervention is not sufficient to foster fluent reading, without substantial increases in the volume of high-accuracy (independent level) reading

17. Thinking about the fluency scale
First consider…
3 – the reader will need no demonstration, teaching or prompting
2 – the reader will need no explicit teaching, but may need prompting
1 – the reader will need explicit teaching and prompting
0 – the reader will need intervention and intensive teaching
It’s best to do this right away while the student’s reading is still fresh “in your ear”. This is a brief description of the 4 point fluency rubric.
After the student reads the text, you will want to assess their fluency using this rubric. We’re going to spend more time later on learning more about the fluency rubric and having time for practice.

18. The reader will need no explicit teaching, but may need prompting #2
Possible prompts…
“listen to how you sounded on this page, you can make this page sound the same”
“show me the part where you think you sounded smooth…”
Find a book that they sound particularly fluent on and use this as a benchmark for other books

19. The reader will need explicit teaching and prompting #1
Small group
Demonstrate/Model fluent reading
Actively engage
Set a goal
Possible prompts…
“listen to me read this page, now you read it with me, now try the next page on your own”
“let me show you the part where you sounded smooth… let’s read that together”
Frame parts of the sentence for child to read

20. The reader will need intervention and intensive teaching 0
Use the dimension of fluency scale to determine what the reader is neglecting
Small group or 1-1 direct instruction (1-3 students in group) for at least 6 weeks
Consider an intervention which models fluent reading
Set goals
Monitor progress

21. Monitoring oral reading fluency growth
Measure oral reading fluency regularly and systematically
Use both formal or informal measures
Establish baseline data and compare to grade level expectations (wpm) See Handout
Set fluency goals for individual students who do not meet grade level expectations
Provide additional strategic and explicit instruction and practice to increase the student’s oral reading fluency
Monitor progress by regularly assessing and graphing each at-risk student's progress toward his fluency goal
For struggling readers, need targeted instruction in addition to their instruction in the core curriculum/instruction in order to accelerate their development of reading skills (fluency and comprehension). It does NOT supplant the core! 21

22. Calculating fluency rates
If you use the F & P Calculator/Stopwatch to time the reading , you need only enter the number of running words (RW) from the front cover of the book. The calculator will give you the words per minute (WPM) to record on the Recording Form
Oral reading fluency rate is calculated by taking the total reading time in seconds and divide this into the number of words provided on Recording Form
Black square indicates where timing ends

23. Dimensions of fluency
Pausing—the reader pauses appropriately at punctuation
Phrasing—the reader puts words together in groups so that it reflects the meaning of the text
Stress—the reader places appropriate stress on words in sentences to reflect the meaning of the text
Handout
When we think about evaluating a student’s oral reading fluency, we want to consider these elements that contribute to fluent reading.
Go over information on slide.
Now, look in your assessment guide on page 27 where you will find the rubric used to evaluate oral reading fluency on the assessment. You will want to be very familiar with this rubric because you will want to have an internal sense of what fluent reading sounds like as you rate each individual reader.
Typically a reader should be expected to read fluently on easy and instructional level text. On a difficult text, you would expect the reader to slow down more often, and possible have less phrasing, and possible improper intonation. Some readers however, habituate slow reading, even though they read with accuracy. That is something that you can make note of, and teach for in small groups.
Now, we’re going to watch and listen to two students reading with commentary on their reading.
Watch DVD demonstration.

24. Dimensions of Fluency
Intonation—the reader’s voice varies in pitch, tone, and volume to reflect the punctuation and the meaning
Rate—the reading is not too slow and not too fast
Integration—good oral reading fluency means integrating all of the above factors so that the reading is smooth and expressive
When we think about evaluating a student’s oral reading fluency, we want to consider these elements that contribute to fluent reading.
Go over information on slide.
Now, look in your assessment guide on page 27 where you will find the rubric used to evaluate oral reading fluency on the assessment. You will want to be very familiar with this rubric because you will want to have an internal sense of what fluent reading sounds like as you rate each individual reader.
Typically a reader should be expected to read fluently on easy and instructional level text. On a difficult text, you would expect the reader to slow down more often, and possible have less phrasing, and possible improper intonation. Some readers however, habituate slow reading, even though they read with accuracy. That is something that you can make note of, and teach for in small groups.
Now, we’re going to watch and listen to two students reading with commentary on their reading.
Watch DVD demonstration.

25. Fostering Fluency in the Classroom
Model fluent reading in daily read aloud
Develop units of study that include fluency mini-lessons
Make fluency rubrics traits teaching points when you are conferring during reading workshop
Make sure your students have appropriate easy and just right books in their book baskets
Allow time for independent reading with targeted books during your reading workshop block expecting students to reread texts
Make use of small guided groups to teach and reinforce fluency
We don’t wait until we have disfluent readers in our classroom before we start fluency instruction

26. Fostering Fluency in the Classroom
Shared Reading (prosody, automaticity, rate, comprehension)
Guided Reading (prosody, automaticity, rate, comprehension)
Independent Reading (automaticity, rate, comprehension)
Letter Identification (automaticity)
Word Work (automaticity)
Language Experience Approach (prosody, automaticity, rate, comprehension)

27. How is this done? Assisted Repeated Reading with Comprehension Focus
Paired Partner Reading

28. Interventions Assisted Repeated Reading with Comprehension Focus
Goal is to give the students the opportunity to read contextual materials a number of times so they could experience fluent reading ( Samuels, 1987)
Differs from repeated reading

29. Interventions Paired Partner Reading
Goal is to give the students the opportunity to read contextual materials a number of times so they could experience fluent reading ( Samuels, 1987)
Done as a follow-up to guided reading instruction
Students take turns reading about words from their guided/strategy group text. Each student takes a turn being the listener or reader, reflecting each time as to how he or his partner read.

30. Break

31. Supporting Struggling Readers
Things to consider:
Comprehensive literacy framework
Clear understanding of strengths and weaknesses
Too many teaching points
Need to change passive poor readers into readers who search actively for information in print that can help them (Clay, 2005)

32. What is prompting?
Precise language to use when teaching, prompting for, and reinforcing effective strategic actions in reading and writing
Based on your observations and analysis of students' reading and writing behaviors, you can select the specific language that will work best for children as they build their literacy processing systems
Precise language to improve the reader's or writer's ability to solve problems and use strategic actions independently.

33. Linking/Making Analogies
What it means?
A reader can connect new learning with what she already knows
Ways to prompt
“What word does that look like?”
“Look at this word like, if I change the “l” to a “b” what word is it now?”
“Do you see a part you know that might help you?”
“What do you already know about…?”

34. Self-Monitoring What it means?
A reader can check himself by asking if what he is reading sounds right, looks right and makes sense. A reader can self monitor for comprehension, 1:1 match, fluency and so on
Ways to prompt
“Did you check that?”
“Point to the words”
“Why did you stop?”
“Were your right?”
“Try that again”
“Something wasn’t right, can you find it?”

35. Searching/Gathering
What it means? A reader can search letters, words, pictures, punctuation and other text features to gather information that helps her read and understand the text. She can use something she already know to help her problems solve.

36. Searching/Gathering Ways to prompt
Is there something about that word that can help you?
What do you see that you know?
Check the first letter/part of that word
What would make sense there?
Try that again and think about what would makes sense and sound right

37. Predicting at the Word Level
What it means? A reader can predict a word he does not automatically recognize. (Though his substitution may not be accurate, he is still predicting a word for the unknown word by using one or more sources of information)

38. Predicting at the Word Level
Ways to prompt
“Can you think of a word that makes sense there?”
“What word might look right there?”
“Can you say the sound the first part of the word says?”
“Go back and reread. Can you think of a word that would look right, sound right and make sense there?”

39. Predicting at the Text Level
What it means?
A reader can make prediction on what will come next in the text based on prior knowledge and based on what has happened in the text so far.

40. Predicting at the Text Level
Ways to Prompt
“What do you think will happen next?”
“What do you think this book is going to be about?”
“Lets get our minds read to read. Look at the cover title and picture and think about what you might read in this book before we start?”
“ What do you think that character is going to do?”

41. Checking/Confirming What it means?
A reader can check or compare one kind of information against another by looking at multiple sources of information (meaning, structure,visual)

42. Checking/Confirming Ways to prompt “Check that again”
“What else could it be?”
The teacher can ask the child, “it might be crocodile or alligator. How can you check that?”

43. Looking at Data Using the sheet provided examine your own data
Think about the student’s strengths and weaknesses
Determine what you will need to work on in order to see change

44. Monitoring Progress Meet in small group 5x a week
Collect and analyze data weekly (running records)
Make short term goals focusing on 1-3 teaching points that will be most effective to move the child forward