Fluency Design
Kelly Roberts
Rationale:
Materials:
-1 copy of Jane and Babe (Educational
Insights) per student
-check sheet for fluency and expression for
each
student (for their reading partner activity)
-a one-minute read chart to graph the
students
progress (A dog that is moved so that it gets closer to it’s bone)
-timer or watch
Procedures:
1. Tell students: Good readers read very smoothly. We can also
say
that they read fluently. In order to become a good reader, not only do
we have
to practice a lot, but we also have to read with expression (Ask
for a
volunteer to tell what reading with expression means). We
want our words to flow together so that they sound like a sentence
as if we are talking to our friend or the person sitting next to us. We have been using good methods to help us
with our reading, such as cover-ups (Model cover-ups by showing
how to
isolate parts of a word to break it into chunks) and cross
checks (rereading the sentence to make sure it makes
sense…Model crosschecking with a sentence from Jane and Babe), but the kind of readers we are learning to
be do not need use these methods. Instead,
they can read very smoothly,
making the words flow together.
2. I want to give you an
example of what I am talking about. (use my copy
of Jane and Babe). I
am going to read this sentence in two
different ways. I want you to tell me which sentence sounds better to
you and
why. Wait until I have read both
sentences, then raise your hand if you want to share your opinion. Okay, let me open up my book… (read the
first sentence slowly and blend aloud)-B-a-b-e
s-t-a-y-s i-n
h-i-s c-a-g-e. (Say the next
one fluently)- “The cage has Babe’s name.”
Now call on a student who is raising
their hand to answer which was better. Good.
The second sentence did sound better. That
sentence was much more improved because
I blended the sounds together smoothly and automatically. It sounded
like I was
talking and not reading, didn’t it!?
That is what I want for each of you to accomplish, and we are
going to
start today! Are we on our way to
becoming fluent readers? Yes we are!
3. First
practice reading a
sentence on the board: “The
cage has a gate.” (Read together aloud 3 times. ) Now say, Did
everyone notice how much more smoothly
we all sounded by the third time? Tell students that today we will
be
reading a book called Jane and Babe.
Give book talk: I bet each one of
you has been to the zoo at least one time in your life…Well, if you
have, I am
sure you have seen the lions in their cage. Well, this book is about a
lion
named Babe and a zookeeper named Jane who spend the whole day together.
What
kind of fun things can you do with a lion? Let’s read and find out!
4.
Distribute
a copy of the text to each student. Say: Everyone
will read silently on their own until I say stop. If
you happen to finish the book, please
start back at the beginning again. 1-2-3-Begin! After students have
had
sufficient time, have them stop reading and conduct a discussion on
what they
have just read. Who were the
main characters in this story? What kinds of things did
the characters participate in?Next, have students work in pairs to
complete
a fluency chart for their partner while listening to each other read. Have them raise their hands when they are
finished to let you know they have completed their reading.
5. I will assess my
students by doing a one-minute read with each of them.
They will each read a passage for one minute, while I record each
student’s
time and chart it on a graph for the student to see (a dog moving
closer to his
bone). We will reread two more times, and each time I will encourage
them to
get the dog closer to his bone. While I
am individually assessing the students, the other student will be
reading a
familiar book (the one they read in class the day before).
References:
Adams, Marilyn Jager. Beginning to
Read: Thinking and Learning
about Print.
Back to Constructions.