Aiming
For Fluency
Fluency
Lesson Design
Rationale: To become
fluent readers, students must
recognize words automatically. The goal
of this lesson is to improve the student’s automatic word recognition. Beginning
readers usually do not read fluently and reading is often a word-by
word
struggle. With Automatic word
recognition, reading becomes faster, smoother, and more expressive, and
students can begin to read silently, which is roughly twice as fast as
oral
reading. Prior to this lesson, I will
have already determined the student’s stage of instructional
development. Because repeated reading
works best with
readers who are full alphabetic, this lesson will be taught only to
students
who are in the full alphabetic stage. It
is important for full alphabetic students to begin developing
automaticity because
students in this stage read slowly and word by word.
By using a direct approach, this lesson will
involve modeling and practice with repeated reading under time pressure. Because graphing is motivating for students,
I will use a basketball graph that records the student’s progress. Because their success is evident, the
students will enjoy the one-minute reads during this lesson.
Materials:
“one-minute
reading”
laminated basketball
graph
(see example graph below), stop
watch, and Pig In A Bag by Geri Murray which can be found at
http://www.auburn.edu/academic/education/reading_genie/pig/pigcover.html
Procedure:
1.
I
will begin by introducing the graph.
I will discuss how the graph works by explaining that it
demonstrates
how fast he/she can complete a “one-minute read”.
2.
I will
model fluent and nonfluent reading. For
example, I will show the difference between smooth and choppy reading. I will show how expressive readers make their
voices go higher and lower, faster and slower, louder and softer.
3.
I
will discuss with the student that the goal of this reading is speed,
not accuracy. Overtime, speed with WPM
will increase and errors will decrease. I will also talk with the
student about how I am aware that reading is hard right now, but it’s how you learn
new words.
4.
I
will introduce Pig In A Bag with a book talk.
I will say, "Ben gives Tim a pet pig for
his tenth birthday! Tim names the pig
Slim. Slim gets in a mess with Lad and
Scat! What will happen to Slim? You'll have to read to find out."
Pig In A Bag involves text with
words that the student can decode
using known correspondences. This whole
and engaging texts will be used to sustain the student’s interest.
5.
I
will time the student reading with a stopwatch. By
alerting the reader with a quiet beeping
signal, the stop watch will let the reader know when it is time to stop
and
also help the instructor keep up with the time of each reading.
6.
I will
have the student read for one minute, count the number of words read,
and graph
the result with the basketball graph by moving the basketball closer to
the
basketball goal. A scale with an
erasable marker will be incorporated on the basketball graph. Each time the student’s goal is met, the bar
will be raised 5 WPM for the next book, which will require a new scale
on the
basketball graph.
7.
I will ask
student to reread each sentence that requires an unusual decoding
effort.
8.
After
the first “one-minute read,” I will get a baseline reading for
the student.
9.
To speed
up the word count, I will mark off every 10 words in light pencil so
that I can
count by tens. I will then subtract a
word for each miscue so accuracy is not totally abandoned.
10.
I will continue to
support the student’s
reading by asking questions about the story and making comments about
story
events after each reading to keep meaning focus. (example
questions: What did you think about the
pig's name? Have you ever seen a pig? Would you want a pig for your birthday? Do you have any pets?)
11.
I will collect miscue
notes to analyze for
missing correspondences.
12.
For
assessment, I will record
my baseline reading for the student and study the progress that the
student
makes during each reading and reread.
Reference:
International
Reading Association. (March 27,
2006). Multipurpose Poetry: Introducing Science
Concepts and Increasing Fluency.
October
26, 2006. http://readwritethink.org/lessons/lesson_view.asp?id=69
