Cunningham defines fluency as "the ability to read most words in context quickly and accurately and with appropriate expression." (49). When thinking about the definition of fluency, one can infer than it means reading words quickly, yet making sense of the words. Fluency isn't necessarily dependent on the reading level of the reader, but more on the complexity of the text. One of the important things to remember when teaching fluency, is to introduce the child to material that they are interested in. Generally, most things we read are at a lower reading level and easy for us to read. By giving a child easy material that they like to read, ensures that they will by able to recognize most of the words, which in turn helps build fluency through comprehension.
According to the reading, "one of the major ways we become fluent readers is to read something over several times." (Cunningham 57). Fun ways that can incorporate rereading text are:
1.Easy Reading
2. Echo Reading
3. Choral Reading
After reading Chapter 4, I realized that my teachers practiced many of these fluency activities with me. One activity that stick out to me most is reading Dr. Seuss books using Echo Reading. Each day for about 2 weeks, we would all read "Green Eggs and Ham" along with the teacher. She would read the book first by herself, then we would all read the book a second time together. I felt that this was a very fun way to read the book, yet I didn't realize that this activity was helping improve my fluency!
Here is an example of Echo reading:
- Do you remember doing any fluency activities when you were in grade school? Which ones? Do you think you could incorporate these into your future classroom?
- What are some way you practice fluency? (Reading magazines, reading the same books with children, etc)
I think you are spot on in your statement that we should allow students to read things that they are interested in. Now, we should balance this obviously but in order for students to become good 'readers' they should be interested in what they are reading! I remember as a child reading football books and I would read every single book about football that I could get my hands on! If this behavior had not been encouraged I do not know if I would enjoy reading as much as I do now!
ReplyDeleteI wrote my blog about the article, "Creating Fluent Readers" this week, but it is amazing how much these two readings connected with one another. I actually thought your picture was directed towards the reading I did because it spoke about the same topics. Risinski did not talk about echo reading however. I think it is so neat that we are able to take what we are learning now and connect it with our learning experiences, as you did when speaking about echo reading. I think this is an important strategy that can be used in the classroom, and I have seen in at the Early Learning Center here at UT, as well as thinking about it being used as I learned how to become fluent in reading.
ReplyDeleteThe only fluency activities I remember from grade school are the reading assessments we had each semester. I remember that we had to read as much of a story as we could in one minute so the teacher could see how we were progressing. After reading these articles I realize that those assessments did not promote fluency but rather speed reading. I wish my teachers had spent more time working with us on our fluency by providing an array of books to practice with!
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