Start Your Engines!
Growing
Rationale:
To
read fluently, a student must read quickly, smoothly, and expressively. In addition, word recognition must be
automatic. If word recognition is automatic, reading becomes an
enjoyable activity for a student. For students to gain automatic
word recognition, the reading and re-reading of connected, decodable
text is needed. The more a student comes in to contact with a
specific text, the more fluent he or she becomes. In this lesson,
students will learn how to read quickly, smoothly, and expressively in
order to gain fluency. Students will gain fluency through
repeated readings and one-minute reads.
Materials:
Marker board with sentence "We loaded on to the bus after
school."
written on it, individual pieces of paper with sentence "My friends and
I played baseball on Sunday afternoon." written on each sheet, chart
with a race track on it for each student (charts should go up to
one-hundred words per minute), small cut-outs of cars for each student,
Velcro to attach each race car, one stopwatch for every two children,
multiple copies of In The Big Top(Educational
Insights) and of Charlie by
Richard Vaughan (enough of each book for every two children) (both
books should be marked with pencil after every ten words so that the
children can count the words), pencils
Procedure:
1. Direct the students to look at
the marker board. I want to start out by talking about how
important it is for readers to read quickly and smoothly. If we
read quickly and smoothly, two things happen as we read: our reading
sounds nice and we can understand what we read better. Also, our
reading becomes more fun and enjoyable! Watch me. I am
going to show you how my reading becomes more and more fun as I read
more fluently and smoothly. I am going to read a sentence one
time just like a beginning reader would, and then I am going to read it
again like a really good reader would read it. Listen to how
different the two sentences sound. "W-e loa-d-e-d o-n th-e b-u-s
a-f-t-e-r s-ch-oo-l." That didn't sound natural, did it?
That's because I wasn't reading quickly and smoothly. Listen
again. "We loaded on to the bus after school." The sentence
sounded better that time, didn't it? What did I do the second
time that helped the sentence sound right and make more sense?
(Answer: I read more quickly and smoothly.)
2. Now I am going to pair you in groups of two. Pair the students off homogenously so
that they can share a graph and be able to use the same book. I
am going to give the members of each group a sentence to work
with. Pass out paper with "My
friends and I played baseball on Sunday afternoon." I
want each of you to read the sentence out loud to your partner.
Be sure to pay attention to the way it sounds the first time that each
of you reads it. After you have read it out loud, I want you to
read the sentence silently to yourself five times. Reading the
sentence over and over will help it make more sense and sound
better. It will also help you read faster. Then, read the
sentence out loud to your partner again. Do you notice a
difference from the first time that you read it aloud? What makes
it sound better? (Answer: It is quicker and smoother.) Did
it sound better when you read it the first time or the second
time? (Answer: The second time.) Way to go!
3. Now we are going to do it with a real book. I am going to give
each group a book to read. Pass
out the stop watches and various books to each group. While
one member of the group reads the book, the other will be the
timer. The reader will be timed for one minute. If you are
the reader, I want you to read as many words as you can. If you
come to a word that you do not know, use the cover-up method to try to
figure it out. Just place a finger after each letter and sound
out the word! If that does not work, ask your partner for
help. I will walk around the room to help anyone who needs
it. Each group will do this several times so that the reader may
become faster and faster with each reading!
4. Pass out the cardboard race
tracks and cars. When the timer has timed for one minute, he or
she will record the number of words that the reader has read and place
the car at that specific number on the race track. (Each reader will read the book four
times.) Then you will switch and the reader will become
the timer. He or she will do the same thing! Before you
start each new reading, draw a star with your pencil on your track on
the number of words that you read so that we can see how much faster
you are getting. I bet that your car will get farther and farther
up the track with each reading that you do!
Assessment:
Once everyone has finished reading four times I will ask the students
to be sure that their names, the date, and the title of the book they
read are on their race track charts. Then, the students will turn
them in. I will assess the children by looking at their progress
charts. The chart will show each student's beginning and ending
point and will be turned in for me to evaluate. I will let the
children take the books home to show their families how well they
read. Also, the class could discuss the two books to make sure
that each student comprehends the material.
Sources:
http://www.auburn.edu/rdggenie/discov/adamsgt.html
(Whitney Adams-
Speedy reader; Discoveries)