Soaring Towards Fluency
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Growing Independence and Fluency Lesson Plan
Rationale: To become fluent readers children must have a large store of sight words that they develop by the process of decoding, crosschecking, and rereading. Fluency is when a child is able to read with automatic word recognition. In order to comprehend texts, students must be able to read fluently. Students must be able to crosscheck and mentally mark irregular words in order to read quicker and to become fluent readers. In this lesson, children will read, decode, crosscheck, and reread to improve fluency. It is important for the teacher to provide models and scaffolds to assist in the students moving on to fluency when reading. In order to measure progress, the teacher will use the formula (words read x 60/seconds) to determine the student’s words per minute and to help track the student’s fluency gains.
Materials:
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Partner Reading Feedback sheet for each student
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Stopwatches for each pair of students
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Reading time sheet
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Class set of Tuck Dam by Matt Sims
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Whiteboard and dry erase markers
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Comprehension Questions Worksheets
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Sample sentences for the teacher to model
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Peer fluency sheets for students
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Peer fluency sheets for teacher
Procedures:
1) Explain: Say: Today were going to become master readers by learning to read fluently. Does anyone know what fluent reading means? Fluent reading happens when a student can read words automatically, quickly and with expression. After you learn to read fluently you will be able to understand what is happening in the story. Today we are going to practice fluency by repeated reading so you all can read with comprehension and expression. Let’s become master readers!
2) Model: Say: First, I’m going to show you all how a reader who is not fluent will read the sentence on the board [I see the bird soaring.] Since I am not a fluent reader, I may struggle on some words in this sentence. The first time I see this word [point to the word soaring] I may have to sound it out, /s/ /o/ /a/ /r/ /i/ n/ /g/… soooo-arrrrrr-inggggg. I see the bird sooo-arrr-innggg, hmmmm that’s not quite right. Oh! The word is soaring, I used the strategy of decoding and cross checking to figure out the word. Now that I figured out the word I’m going to try to read the sentence again. [Read the sentence slowly and without expression.] That was better but I am going to try again and this time read the sentence even faster and with expression. [Read the sentence one more time even at a fast pace and with expression.] See how easy that was? I got better because I learned new tough words. You will be able to read like that too by becoming fluent readers.
3) Self-help: Say: When I read the sentence on the board, it wasn’t easy and I didn’t get all of the words right the first time. I used the self-help strategy of decoding and cross checking to figure out the word. I sounded out the word soaring as sooo-arrr-innggg the first time I read the sentence but then I realized that the word didn’t make sense in the sentence so I was able to use cross checking to figure out the word. Once I figured out the word I was then able to read with expression. I used the strategies I have learned to reads the words I didn’t know and then remember them the next time I saw them.
4) Read whole text: Say: Now we are going to all practice becoming fluent readers by reading the book, Tuck Dam. For now I want you to just read the book silently to yourselves. There should be no words coming out of your mouth. This is the story Ben and Pam. They are bored so they decide they want to go to Tuck Dam because there is a lot fun things to do there. Ben and Pam must convince their dad to take them to the dam. Let’s read on and see if they get to the dam.
5) Partner reading practice: Say: Now you all are going to have the chance to work with a partner to become even better, more fluent readers. [Pass out a stopwatch and reading time sheet for each pair of students.] Each pair of partners is going to take turns reading and being the time recorder. The first partner to go will read Tuck Dam three times. The first reading of the text doesn’t have to be timed but on the second and third readings the partner will keep track of the time. I want the partner that is timing to also notice the changes that they saw in the readers reading. You should make not of whether your partner began to read with fluency and expression and any other improvements you saw in their reading. I want everyone to be a good and encouraging partner. I will walk around during the partner reading to observes and offer my help. Don’t forget to keep track of the time and improvements you notice during your partners reading because I will be collecting it in the end. Everyone start NOW!
Peer Fluency Sheet for Students to record with:
Total number of words:
Reader:
Timekeeper:
1. _____ words in _____ seconds
2. _____ words in _____ seconds
3. _____ words in _____ seconds
What changes did you notice?
6) Individual reading practice: Say: Now I am going to have each of you show off your new fluency skills to me by individually coming up to my desk and reading, When you are not called on you may sit at your desk and practice reading silently. I will start calling you up now. [This will allow you to collect information on how each student is doing. Use the words per minute formula to help monitor fluency. Also, mark miscues and improvements you notice while working with your student.]
Peer Fluency Sheet for Teachers to use:
Student Name:
Words x 60/seconds:
Improvements:
Miscues:
7) Reader response: Say: Now you’ve read the story a few times I want to see how much you know. [Pass out reading comprehension questions.] This should be done on your own and I will come around and collect each of them as you finish.
Reading Comprehension Questions:
1. What are the names of the two main characters in the book?
2. Why do the siblings want to go to Tuck Dam?
3. What must they do in order to convince their father to go to Tuck Dam?
8) Assessment: Calculate the wpm of each student from the teacher reading time and the student reading time. Evaluate how well each student comprehended the text by assessing each student’s comprehension worksheets.
Reading Genie Website: http://www.auburn.edu/academic/education/reading_genie/Entries.html
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References:
Snow, Kate http://kss0017.wixsite.com/katesnow/growing-independence-and-fluency-lesson
Sims, Matt. Tuck Dam. High Noon Books, c 2002. 27 pp.
