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Fearless Fluency

 

 

 

 

 

 

Growing Fluency Lesson Design

Maggie Murchison

 

Rationale: This lesson will help children gain fluency as a reader. In order for students to read effortlessly and with automaticity, they must practice expression, pace, and comprehension. Effortless word recognition allows students to reflect on what they are reading. Through reading, decoding, crosschecking, mental marking, and rereading, students will be able to confidently improve their reading rate and grow into fluent readers. Fluency is essential in students gaining comprehension. In this lesson, students will use the strategy of crosschecking after reading a decodable text and then complete repeated readings in order to gain fluency and independence in reading.

 

Materials:

  1. Pencils

  2. Stopwatch for each student

  3. Sentences for teacher to model on the board

  4. Peer fluency sheet for each student

  5. Teacher fluency checklist

  6. Cover up critters for each student

  7. Fearless with Finley by: Ashley Holt  

  8. Fluency chart

 

Procedures:

  1. Say: Today we are going to learn how to improve our fluency when reading. Can anyone tell me what the word fluency means? Fluency is when you read words quickly and automatically with expression. When we read with fluency, we comprehend more of the story and the story becomes more exciting! To become expert readers, we must have a large sight word vocabulary, or words that we know automatically and don’t have to decode. Our sight word vocabulary will grow when we practice reading through a method of repeated reading where we can decode, crosscheck, mental mark, and reread. So, we might read a book more than once, but it will make you more confident in reading. Let’s get started!

  2. Say: Have you ever read a book and come across a word you don’t recognize? Does anyone remember what strategy we can use when we come across this situation? [Allow students to respond.] That’s right, we can use crosschecking! Listen as I model how we crosscheck when we come across a word we don’t know. [Write sentence “The dog catches the ball” on the board.] I might read this sentence as “The dog /c/a/t/k/E/s hmm, let me finish the sentence, the ball. Ohh it’s not /c/a/t/ch/E/s, it’s /c/A/t/ch/e/s! Now I am going to reread the sentence with the correct word to get back into the story. “The dog catches the ball.”

  3. Say: I’m going to show you how a fluent reader reads. [Write sentence “The dog is scared of the storm” on the board.] “The dddd-ooo-ggg is /s/c/aw/r/e/d/ of the sss-ttt-oo-rr-mmm.” That can’t be right. Oh! Its /s/c/A/r/e/d. I noticed I read the sentence slow and stretched out a few of the words. Let me try again. “The dog is scared of the storm.” That was much better, I remembered “scared” after decoding it. Now, I am going to read the sentence again, but this time I am going to read it with expression. “The dog is scared of the storm!” I read the sentence over and over again which allowed me to read faster, smoother, and with expression. I gained fluency because I remembered the words I had trouble with, the words that slowed me down the first time. Now you are going to practice repeated reading, so you can become a fluent reader!

  4. Say: We are going to read a book called Fearless with Finley silently at our desks. In this book, Finley, a black puppy, lives with her parents in a dirt patch. Even though they don’t have many things, they like to pretend that they live in a nice green pasture. When it is time for bed, Finley is always scared of the dark. Let’s read to see how Finley overcomes her fear of the dark. 

  5. Say: Now turn to the person beside you, they will be your partner for the next activity. You are going to take turns reading aloud and practicing repeated reading. Each pair will need one stopwatch and one fluency checklist. The first partner will read aloud, while the other partner times the reader. The first partner reading will read the book three times while the second partner follows along. If you are recording a reader, remember to use the checklist I will give you to see if your partner remembers more words, reads faster, smoother, and with more expression each time. After the first partner reads three times, you will switch so that the other partner reads, while the first partner uses the checklist to assess your classmates.

  6. Assessment: Walk around the room to monitor the student’s reading and recording. After both partners have read three times, students will turn in their fluency checklist to ensure fluency has improved.

  7. I will bring students up to assess their reading fluency and comprehension individually. Once the student read the book to me, I will ask comprehension questions like:

  • Who did Finley live with?

  • What was Finley most afraid of?

  • Why did Finley’s parents tell her that she was brave?

  • How does the story end?

When I look over the fluency checklist, I will help students graph their words per minute from the three readings on the fluency chart with dog stickers. I will explain that the student’s goal is to get the dog in the dog house at 85 WPM.

 

Teacher Fluency Checklist:

Student Name:

Words x 60/seconds

Reading #1

WPM:

Reading #2

WPM:

Reading #3

WPM:      

 

Partner Fluency Checklist:

 

Reading #1

Did the student read with more expression? Yes or No

Did the student read smoother? Yes or No

Did the student read faster? Yes or No

 

Reading #2

Did the student read with more expression? Yes or No

Did the student read smoother? Yes or No

Did the student read faster? Yes or No

 

Reading #3

Did the student read with more expression? Yes or No

Did the student read smoother? Yes or No

Did the student read faster? Yes or No

 

Fluency Chart:

 

 

 

 

0-----10-----20-----30----40-----50-----60-----70-----80-----90-----100-----110-----120

 

Resources:

Katie, Brown: Pancake Flipping Fluency

https://kyb0004.wixsite.com/mysite/growing-fluency

Joy, Boldt: Fancy Fluency

https://jdb0102.wixsite.com/mysite/growing-fluency

Jayme, Moorer: FALL-ing into Fluency

https://jlm0104.wixsite.com/readingdesigns/growing-independence-and-fluency-de

 

Book: Holt, Ashley, and Lovyaa Garg. Fearless with Finley. Publisher Not Identified, 2017.

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