"Flying into Fluency"
Growing Independence and
Fluency
Rational: In order
for children to be able to read an adequate amount of text in a certain amount
of time they need to be able to read fluently and skillfully.
Reading fluency is the ability to recognize words accurately, rapidly,
and automatically. Decoding skills make fluency easier, so the students must
practice and master phoneme correspondences. When children practice strategies
and correspondences in repeated readings, they will become more fluent readers
which will lead to more comprehension, greater vocabulary, and faster speed.
Students gain comprehension skills because they do not have to focus on sounding
out the words. The design of this particular lesson is to offer repetitive
readings of texts for students so that they become more fluent readers, and to
help students understand how significant fluent reading is.
Materials:
·
Speed Reading Record for each
student
·
Partner check sheet
·
Pencil
·
Cover-up buddy
·
Cut out Kites
·
Pencils
·
Stop watch for each group
·
"James and the Good Day" by
Sheila Suchman and Rona Kornblum. c1990.
Procedure:
1. Begin
by telling the students that to become fluent readers, they must practice so
that they will read with more accuracy. It is important that we learn to read
with speed so that we can read things quickly and easily. Reading a story over
and over again will help us all to become more fluent readers.
"Ask them what they think fluency is, and we will discuss its definition
and its importance as a class. Today our class is going to read a story many
times so that each of us will become more fluent readers. Everyone should set a
goal to read faster each time we read a book."
2. Talk
about the coverup strategy so that the students can use this while reading.
"Whenever you come across difficult words while reading, you can use a
coverup buddy to help you figure out what the word is."
Write the word ''neck'' on the board, and model how to use the coverup
buddy in decoding this word. "As
you come across a difficult word, use your coverup buddy to help you sound the
word out. Okay, so I have come word neck, I am going to cover up the whole word
except for the first letter, n. So I know the n says /n/. then I move my cover
up buddy to the letter, /e/. I now that says /e/. S I will then combine ne. Then
I am going to look at the last letters ck. I know that says /ck/. So I am going
to say,/n/,/e/,/ck/, NECK!"
3. Next,
model fluent reading, write the following sentence on the board: ''I love to fly
kites at the beach.'' Everyone listen to me as I read this sentence to you.
At first I am going to read it slowly without fluency. I. . .love. . .
to. . . fly. . . kites. . . at. . . the. . . beach. In order to get better at
reading this sentence I will need to read it over and over again. Let's try
again, I love. . . to. . . fly. . . kites. . . at the. . . beach. I love to. . .
fly kites. . . at the beach. Can you hear how I became more fluent after I
continued reading that sentence?"
4. Now,
each student will receive a copy of the book, "James
and the Good Day." They will each have a chance to read it by themselves before
reading it aloud with a partner for timed readings.
This book is about some children who enjoy flying their kites at the
lake. A young boy named Bob wants to fly kites with the other kids at the lake,
but he is sad because he does not have his own kite. Will Bob end up getting a
kite of his own? Well, let's all read the story to find out.
After the students finish reading Kite Day at Pine Lake, we will discuss
the events of the story.
5. Next,
the students will be assigned a partner and will be given one stop watch per
partner as well as a Partner Check Sheet and Speed Reading Record for each
child. Each child will read the
book three times. The listener will
time each reading and give a report after the second and third readings.
They will record the times of each reading on the Speed Reading Record.
The reports are to only be positive, no criticism, and just nice positive
comments. The student records the
answers on the evaluation sheet.
With your partner you will read the book three times.
Time each reading and record the time on your Speed Reading Record. After
the second and third readings, you will mark the evaluation sheet.
You may look at the times to determine if your partner is reading faster
each time.
5. Last,
after the students are done, they will come to me, and I will have cut out kites
with each child's name on it and they can write their fastest reading time on
them. I will have a bulletin board in my room decorated with a blue background
and white puffy clouds. This will be great for the students next time they are
being timed to see how they are progressing in fluency!
Assessment: I will
take up the partner checklist and speed reading records. I will ask a few
comprehension questions to make sure that each student didn't speed read through
the text.
References:
Murray,
Bruce. Developing Reading Fluency
http://www.auburn.edu/academic/education/reading_genie/fluency.html
Tate,
Natalie. "Kites are Slow, Reading is Fast"
http://www.auburn.edu/academic/education/reading_genie/persp/tategf.html
"James
and the Good Day" by Sheila Suchman and Rona Kornblum. c1990.
Ward,
Marthbeth. "Flying away with Fluency"
http://www.auburn.edu/academic/education/reading_genie/encounters/wardgf.html
Speed
Reading Record:
Name:_________________________
Date:___________
Time:
- After 1st read
_______
- After 2nd read _______
- After 3rd read
_______
Partner Check Sheet for students to
assess their partner's fluency:
As I
listened to my partner read, he/she:
After 2nd
After 3rd
1. Remembered more words
_______
_______
2. Read faster
_______
_______
3. Read smoother
_______
_______
4. Read with expression
_______
_______