3, 2, 1… Blast-Off into Reading!
Growing Independence and Fluency
Rationale:
Once children have learned decoding and letter recognition, they can focus on
becoming a more fluent reader. Fluency helps students in comprehending the text
better, which is the ultimate goal for readers. Fluency, gained greatly from
repeated readings, also allows students to read words automatically and to read
with expression. When readers gain fluency and comprehension, their confidence
gets a great boost and causes their love for reading to blast-off even more!
This lesson will improve fluency through one minute reads, repeated readings,
and timed readings.
Materials:
-Individual copies of the book Polly’s
Shop
-Pencils
-1 stopwatch for every 2 students
-Dry erase board and dry erase markers (for teacher)
-Speed Reading record (one for each student)
-Partner Check Sheet (one for each student)
Speed Reading Record:
Your Name: ___________ Partner’s Name: ___________ Date:
___________
Time:
- After 1st read
__________
- After 2nd read
__________
- After 3rd read
__________
Partner Check Sheet:
Your Name: ___________
Partner’s Name: _____________
Date: ________
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 _______
_______
Procedure:
1. Begin lesson by explaining to students the importance of becoming a fluent
reader. “Today, students, we are going to be working on fluency, a very
important part of reading. When you read fluently, you recognize words without
any trouble and do not have to stop and sound out each word! To gain fluency, we
must reread our books! Today, we are going to read and reread the same book over
and see if we read it more quickly each time we read it! ”
2. “Before we read, let’s remember what to do if you come to a word that you are
not familiar with.” (Write the word
trucks on the dry erase board). “You will come across this word while
reading Polly’s Shop, and you may
have trouble with it. Let’s pretend I am reading the book and I am not sure how
to pronounce this word. I will start by finding the vowel in the word and cover
up the other letters. See, I will use my hands to cover the other letters up. I
see that the vowel in this word is the ‘u’
which says /u/. Everyone point your finger to your head and say ‘uhhhh’,
pretending you do not understand. Great job, this is the vowel in the word. Now
I will look at the first letter which says /t/. Next, I will uncover the second
letter which says /r/. Let’s put the first 3 letters together, we see that they
say /tru/. Now, all we have to do is uncover the last two letters. We know that
‘ck’ says /ck/. When we blend /tru/
and /ck/ together, we know that the word is truck.”
3. Write the following sentence on the board:
Bugs were mixed with rugs. “I will
read the sentence written on the board aloud and you all pay very close
attention to how I read it. Ready?” (Read the sentence slowly, lacking fluency).
“Bbbugs were miiixed wiiith ruuugs. Did you notice how I read the sentence so
slowly that it was hard for me to understand what it was about? Now, I am going
to try reading the sentence again and remember how the words are said.” (Read
the sentence with fluency). “Bugs were mixed with rugs. Awesome, that was so
much easier to understand than the last time, wasn’t it! Do we understand how
rereading a sentence a second or even third time can make it sound better and
help us understand better? Rereading also helped me read the sentence much
faster than the first time.”
4. “Now, everyone is going to get a copy of the book
Polly’s Shop. In this book, Polly has
a shop. She seems to be a tad bit disorganized. A few customers come into
Polly’s Shop looking for certain things. Will the customers be able to find
anything? Let’s read the book to find out! First, I want you all to read the
book by yourselves.”
5. Next, students will break into groups of two. Each group will get a stopwatch
and each student will be given a Speed Reading Record and a Partner Check Sheet.
Each child will be instructed to read the book three times. The person that is
not reading (the listener) will record the times of each reading on the Speed
Reading Record. Explain to the students that each time they reread the book,
they should try to read faster, smoother, and with expression because they will
remember more words. The listener will fill out the Partner Check Sheet after
the second and third readings. “Okay students; listen up while I explain exactly
how to use the two forms. Let’s say that Annie is my partner. Annie will read
the book the first time and I will start the timer when she begins reading. When
she finishes the book, I will stop the timer. I will record on the line what the
time is. Let’s say Annie finishes the book in 2 minutes and 25 seconds. I will
write it like this on the line—2:35” (Model how to write the time on the sheet).
“You will do the same after the second and third read. Also after the second and
third time your partner reads the book to you, put checks on the check sheet.
Pay attention to how many words your partner remembered, how much faster they
read, if they read smoother, and which read they read with more expression. If
Annie is my partner and she read with more expression the third time she read, I
would put a check under ‘After 3rd’. If I thought that she read
smoother on the second read, I would put a check under ‘After 2nd’.
Does everyone understand? Great, get busy!”
6. Assessment: I will conduct one minute reads with each student individually to
check for accuracy and fluency. I will also look over the Speed Reading Record
and Partner Check Sheet that the students filled out.
References:
-Grout, Beth and Chang, Heidi. Polly’s
Shop. Parsippany, NJ. Modern Curriculum Press, 1996.
-Mathews, Pearson. Ready, Set, Read!
http://www.auburn.edu/academic/education/reading_genie/adventures/mathewsgf.htm
- Murray, Bruce. Developing Reading Fluency. Auburn University Reading
Genie Website
http://www.auburn.edu/academic/education/reading_genie/fluency.html