Emily James
Rationale: Fluency in reading is the ability to recognize words quickly, accurately, and automatically. Automatic word recognition allows children to read with expression and add emphasis. More importantly, it allows for reading comprehension. To achieve fluency, students will learn to read fluently through reading, decoding, crosschecking, mental marking, and rereading. Students will improve their reading rate and grow into confident, fluent readers by reading a chapter from the book Dogs at Work
Materials:
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Pencils
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Sample sentences for teacher to model (written on board)
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Class set of Dogs at work by Matt Sims
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Stopwatches for each pair of students
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Cover-up critters for each student (popsicle stick with ‘googly eyes’)
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Peer evaluation worksheet for each student
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Comprehension worksheet for each student
Procedure:
1. Say: Today we are going to become masters at fluent reading! Every reader must learn how to ready fluently. What does fluency mean? It means you are able to read words easily and correctly. Being a fluent reader is important because it allows you to understand what you are reading. It also gives you the chance to make the story sound more exciting when we are reading aloud! When we make the story sound more exciting, we call that “reading with expression”. We can practice this by repeated reading. Repeated reading is where we same book more than once. You’ll see that each time we read it, we will be more familiar with the words.
2. The teacher will then model crosschecking and decoding by reading a sample sentence from the board. Say: “I want everyone to look at this sentence” (sample: See the cute dog panting and waging his tail). Let’s read it together. “Sseee the cuuuttee dog ppppaa….” When I get stuck on a word, I finish reading the sentence….and waging his tail.” If I still can’t figure out the correct word, I can use my cover-up critter. First, I uncover the letter p. This tells us to say /p/” [Continue uncovering each letter at a time]. /p/a/n/t/i/ng/
Oh! It must be panting! See the cute dog panting and waging his tail! I used crosschecking to reread the sentence to try to figure out the word. Now that I know the correct word, I can mental mark the spelling to help me remember it next time.
3. Say: Now, let’s see the difference between a fluent and non-fluent reader” (sample: Mary pet a fluffy puppy). A non-fluent reader may read it like this: Maaaarrry peeet the fluuufffffyyy puuuppy. When I read it like that, it is hard to understand what I read. What happens if I read it again? Mar-r-ry pet the f-flu-ffy P-u-u-ppy. That was a little faster and smoother, but I think I can read it even better! [Read smoothly and with expression] I see a flufffy puppy! Did you notice how that sounded? Not only did it read smoothly, but I was able to add expression. That is how a fluent reader would read the sentence. Now you try reading the sentence like a fluent reader would read it. [Have students read sentence aloud and practice using expression].
4. Say: We all have to practice to become a great reader. When I first read the sentence, it was difficult because it was my first time reading it. I had to spend time decoding, or figuring out, the words. When I re-read, it was easier because I had already decoded it. When I read it the last time, I was able to say it smoothly and add expression. I became fluent in reading by re-reading. That is how you can become fluent readers too!
5. Say: To practice reading fluently, we are going to read chapter two of the book Dogs at Work. This chapter is about Buzz and his owner Paul. However, Paul is more than Buzz’s owner, he is his work partner! A dog can do people-work? Of course they can! So pair up and read chapter two to see what kind of work dogs can do!
6. Give students a copy of the book, a cover-up critter, evaluation worksheet, comprehension worksheet, and one stopwatch per pair of students. Say: Now we are going to get into pairs and practice reading fluently. You will take turns reading the story, and each of you will each read it three times. Don’t forget to crosscheck and use your cover-up critter to help you figure out words! While you read, your partner will time you by using the stopwatch. After the partner has read it, record the time on the worksheet. Since we’re all reading it three times, you need to record the time it takes each time. So you should have 3 scores on our papers. Your partner will be listening closely to see if you are reading smoothly and with expression. When we tell our partner our score, we want to use kind words! We do not want to hurt each other’s feelings! After you finish reading and recording, talk about the book with your partner and fill out the reading comprehension worksheets together.
Assessment: For the assessment, I will walk around the room to observe and monitor students’ reading and recording. After the students have finished their worksheets, we will review them to see if fluency improvements were made. Also, review the answers to the reading comprehension questions to see how well the students understood the story.
Later, I will look over each evaluation worksheet and calculate how many words per minute each student will read. The formula is complicated, and not every student will be able to use a calculator, so it is best for the teacher to do this part on their own. [Words per minute formula: (Words read x 60) divided by total seconds it took to read the text].
Worksheets:
Resources:
Haley, Christine “Fluency is SPOOKtacular”: http://cmh0049.wixsite.com/christinelessons/growing-independence-and-fluency
Sims, Matt. (2005). Dogs at Work. Novato, California: High Noon Books. Print.
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