Dr Kerry Hempenstall, Senior Industry Fellow, School of Education, RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia.
All my blogs can be viewed on-line or downloaded as a Word file or PDF at https://www.dropbox.com/sh/olxpifutwcgvg8j/AABU8YNr4ZxiXPXzvHrrirR8a?dl=0
New Addition – April 2025
The end of this segment holds the original older Reading Fluency document.
Why start another document?
I decided to take into account more recent literacy documents, and I’ve selected only research findings provided in the years 2020 to 2025.
The idea was to get some sense of whether how Reading Fluency may be taught differently in these times. The early document had numerous older documents and practitioners.
The original Reading Fluency document is still available at the end of this document.
I decided to take into account more recent documents, and I’ve selected only new research provided in the years 2020 to 2025.
My idea was to get some sense of how the acceptance of Reading Fluency may have changed since my early document was rather critical.
So, on to the new section:
Reading fluency is the ability to read with proper speed, accuracy, and expression. Children, and people in general, must be able to read fluently in order to understand what they're reading.”
How to Support Children to Develop Their Reading Fluency (2024)
“There are some important things that we can do as educators, parents and carers to support children with developing their reading fluency. Here are our top tips and ideas to help you get started:
- Choose engaging texts – It’s vital to select exciting books that will encourage children to explore further, including allowing children to choose their own next read. Fluency develops progressively as pupils encounter and re-read books with new vocabulary and language structures, so it’s especially helpful for pupils to re-read books they liked, as familiarity with a text supports the development of reading fluency.
- Read aloud regularly – As the latest findings from the Department of Education’s 2023 Reading Framework indicate, regularly reading aloud to children is a very important factor in helping them develop their reading fluency: ‘The more frequently teachers read aloud across the curriculum, the more pupils experience the impact of fluent reading – what it sounds like and how it makes them feel.’
- Practise expression – Encourage children to practise natural pace, intonation and expression by both reading aloud to them and encouraging them to read aloud, too. Then, ‘over time, they begin to understand how a reader might share meaning through choosing which words to emphasise, and how pace, intonation and volume can be controlled’ (DfE Reading Framework).
- Provide time to read – Prioritising reading time during class and at home will ensure children have ample time to practise their reading skills and naturally develop fluency over time. Even taking 15 minutes at the end of the day to read aloud to your children can make a big difference.
- Create sociable reading environments – Reading together and sharing books, talking about their favourite books and giving or receiving recommendations (from peers and adults) can all help children get excited about reading. Social reading environments are a great motivator for children to pursue reading and, therefore, develop reading fluency.
- Encourage library use – Both local public libraries and school libraries are wonderful places for children to explore books they’re interested in and discover new titles to continue their reading adventure. Perhaps you can set aside a day a week to take a trip to the library and do some reading together – perfect for quality time and boosting reading fluency at the same time!
- Support vocabulary development – Developing their vocabulary is a really important way for children to improve their reading fluency. Thankfully, we’ve made vocabulary development fun with our award-winning ChatterStars app. Children can earn stars by playing games and completing activities designed to boost their vocabulary, making learning fun, easy and accessible.
- Keep a word book – Children can keep a log of all the words they learn in their very own word book, which is a book with a section for each letter from A to Z where children can write down all the new words they come across while reading. This will help children remember new words and steadily build their vocabulary and, thus, their reading fluency over time.”
Hart, A. (2024). What is Reading Fluency? + Top Tips to Develop Reading Fluency. ChatterStars. https://chatterstars.co.uk/chatterstars-reading-fluency/
“Fluency is the ability to read a text with accuracy automaticity, and prosody (expression) sufficient to enable comprehension. Fluency is a key skill to becoming a strong reader because it provides a bridge between word recognition and comprehension.
Why fluency is important
When fluent readers read silently, they recognize words automatically. They group words quickly to help them gain meaning from what they read. Fluent readers read aloud effortlessly and with expression — their reading sounds natural, as if they are speaking, an aspect of fluency that is termed prosody. Readers who have not yet developed fluency read slowly, word by word. Their oral reading is choppy and lacks prosody.
Fluency is important for several reasons. First, fluent reading is a foundation for good reading comprehension. Because fluent readers do not have to concentrate on decoding words, they can focus their attention on what the text means. They can make connections between the ideas in the text and their background knowledge.
In other words, fluent readers recognize words and comprehend at the same time. Reading fluency also affects a child’s motivation to read. Children (and adults!) typically do not enjoy activities that feel burdensome and difficult. When children’s reading is not fluent, they often don’t enjoy reading, and they are less inclined to practice reading, which may contribute even further to a decline in their reading skills.
In addition, learning to read fluently helps children become better prepared for the demands of the upper grades.
In the middle school and high school, students are usually expected to do a lot of independent reading. Even if students can read accurately, if they are not fluent, they may take much longer to complete their schoolwork.
Fluent reading is a product of strong decoding and strong language comprehension. Less fluent readers, however, must focus their attention on figuring out the words, leaving them little attention for understanding the text.
Fluency is important because it frees students to understand what they read!
Reading 101. (2025). Why fluency is important.
https://www.readingrockets.org/reading-101/reading-101-learning-modules/course-modules/fluency#:~:text=First%2C%20fluent%20reading%20is%20a,on%20what%20the%20text%20means
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AI Overview
Reading fluency, encompassing accuracy, rate, and prosody, is crucial for comprehension and is promoted through strategies like repeated reading, choral reading, and focused practice.
Here's a more detailed look at the significance and promotion of reading fluency:
Significance of Reading Fluency:
- Bridge to Comprehension:
Fluency is essential for readers to move beyond decoding words and focus on understanding the text.
- Increased Engagement:
Fluent readers are more likely to be engaged with the text because they are not struggling with decoding, allowing them to focus on meaning.
- Improved Comprehension:
By reading smoothly and accurately, readers can better retain information and understand the text's meaning.
- Foundation for Success:
Fluent reading is a key predictor of reading success, impacting overall academic performance.
Promoting Reading Fluency:
- Repeated Reading:
Encourage students to reread passages multiple times to build automaticity and speed.
- Choral Reading:
Have students read aloud together to model fluent reading and provide a supportive environment.
- Focus on Accuracy:
Ensure students are reading words correctly to build a solid foundation for fluency.
- Target Rate:
Encourage students to read at an appropriate pace, neither too fast nor too slow, while maintaining accuracy.
- Prosody (Expression):
Teach students to read with expression and phrasing to enhance comprehension and engagement.
- Read Aloud:
Teachers should model fluent reading by reading aloud to students, demonstrating proper pacing and expression.
- Provide Opportunities for Practice:
Offer regular opportunities for students to practice reading aloud, both independently and with guidance.
- Use Technology:
Utilize reading apps and software that offer interactive fluency practice and feedback.
- Create a Positive Reading Environment:
Make reading a fun and engaging experience to motivate students to practice and improve their fluency.
- Self-Reflection:
Encourage students to reflect on their reading fluency and set goals for improvement.
AI Overview
Oral Reading Fluency of College Graduates (2022)
“Reading fluency has been identified as a critical competency for reading success. Accurate and automatic word recognition, one component of fluency, is normally assessed through reading rate (Oral Reading Fluency--ORF). While norms for ORF exist through grade 8, norms beyond grade 8 are largely unknown. The present study attempted to establish ORF norms associated with successful adult readers (college graduates), thus establishing a ceiling ORF target range for success in fluency. Results indicate that a word recognition accuracy range of 98-100% and an automaticity range of 138-158 words read correctly per minute on high school level reading material are associated with average performance by college graduates. Results are discussed in terms of implications for monitoring students' progress in fluency in the secondary grades and beyond.”
Rasinski, T., Galeza, A., Vogel, L., Viton, B., Rundo, H., Royan, E., Nemer S., Randa; Bartholomew, M., Kaewkaemket, C., Stokes, F., Young, C., Paige, D. (2022). Oral Reading Fluency of College Graduates: Toward a Deeper Understanding of College Ready Fluency. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, v66 n1 p23-30 Jul-Aug 2022
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“ABSTRACT
Two groups were formed in a randomized, controlled trial: an Experimental group (n = 346), which benefited from specific interventions by trained teachers for a period of two years, and a Control group (n = 1354) with business as usual. For Experimental group in Kindergarten, the interventions were conducted in small groups and focused on code-related and language skills (mainly in comprehension), whereas in Grade 1, only code-related skills were addressed and the children received an amount of exposure that was a function of their performance level. Globally, Experimental group significantly outperformed Control group in code-related scores (Code) as well as on two reading scores (fluency and comprehension) at the end of Grade 1. Results were subdivided into quintiles for analysis as a function of initial performance. The main results showed that in Code Experimental group in the lowest quintiles obtained better performance at the end of Grade 1.”
Kieffer, M. J., & Christodoulou, J. A. (2020). Automaticity and control: How do executive functions and reading fluency interact to predict reading comprehension? Reading Research Quarterly, 55(1), 146–166.
Literacy intervention from Kindergarten to Grade 1 (2023)
“Abstract
Two large samples were assessed twice in Grade 1: the control group (Cont; N = 2302), which received no specific interventions, and the experimental group (Exp; N = 484), which received interventions associated with code-related skills (decoding and fluency). We estimated that a mean score of around 50 correctly read words per minute corresponded to a mean reading comprehension (RC) score. We then examined the relationships between decoding, fluency, RC and their associated skills, i.e. phonemic segmentation, vocabulary and listening comprehension. The causal nature of the links between decoding, fluency and RC was examined in two ways: hypothesized and experimental. Structural modeling showed that fluency was a good mediator variable between decoding and RC and explained RC. When we compared the Cont and Exp groups, the intervention had a positive effect on RC, even though linguistic comprehension was not stimulated. We conclude that fluency should be stimulated once decoding is efficient.”
Ecalle, J., Dujardin, E., Gomes, C., Cros, L., & Magnan, A. (2023). Effects of a two-year literacy intervention from Kindergarten to Grade 1: a differential approach. Australian Journal of Learning Difficulties, 28(2), 119–138.
https://doi.org/10.1080/19404158.2023.2271914
Developing fluency and comprehension (2021)
“Abstract
This article examines the effects of a reading fluency intervention on the fluency and comprehension of struggling middle school readers. The secondary fluency routine was developed by the first author, and was based on effective practices described in other studies. Thirty-nine seventh and eighth grade students enrolled in reading intervention classes participated in the study, which lasted for a period of 18 weeks. Students in the treatment classes participated in the Secondary Fluency Routine for 10 minutes daily, while students in the comparison classrooms participated in independent reading during that time. Participants were pre- and posttested using the GORT-5. A repeated measures analysis of variance was conducted on all outcome measures which included rate, accuracy, fluency, oral reading index, prosody, and comprehension. There were no interaction effects; however, main effects were detected on all measures, and mean difference effect sizes indicated that the intervention was effective in increasing reading fluency and comprehension.”
Landreth, S., & Young, C. (2021). Developing fluency and comprehension with the secondary fluency routine. Journal of Educational Research, 114(3), 252–262.
Decoding, Fluency and Reading Comprehension (2020)
“Abstract
Two large samples were assessed twice in Grade 1: the control group (Cont; N = 2302), which received no specific interventions, and the experimental group (Exp; N = 484), which received interventions associated with code-related skills (decoding and fluency). We estimated that a mean score of around 50 correctly read words per minute corresponded to a mean reading comprehension (RC) score. We then examined the relationships between decoding, fluency, RC and their associated skills, i.e. phonemic segmentation, vocabulary and listening comprehension. The causal nature of the links between decoding, fluency and RC was examined in two ways: hypothesized and experimental. Structural modeling showed that fluency was a good mediator variable between decoding and RC and explained RC. When we compared the Cont and Exp groups, the intervention had a positive effect on RC, even though linguistic comprehension was not stimulated. We conclude that fluency should be stimulated once decoding is efficient.”
Ecalle, J., Dujardin, E., Gomes, C., Cros, L., & Magnan, A. (2020). Decoding, Fluency and Reading Comprehension: Examining the Nature of their Relationships in a Large-Scale Study with First Graders. Reading & Writing Quarterly, 37(5), 444–461. https://doi.org/10.1080/10573569.2020.1846007
“Abstract
This article examines the effects of a reading fluency intervention on the fluency and comprehension of struggling middle school readers. The secondary fluency routine was developed by the first author, and was based on effective practices described in other studies. Thirty-nine seventh and eighth grade students enrolled in reading intervention classes participated in the study, which lasted for a period of 18 weeks. Students in the treatment classes participated in the Secondary Fluency Routine for 10 minutes daily, while students in the comparison classrooms participated in independent reading during that time. Participants were pre- and posttested using the GORT-5. A repeated measures analysis of variance was conducted on all outcome measures which included rate, accuracy, fluency, oral reading index, prosody, and comprehension. There were no interaction effects; however, main effects were detected on all measures, and mean difference effect sizes indicated that the intervention was effective in increasing reading fluency and comprehension.”
Landreth, S., & Young, C. (2021). Developing fluency and comprehension with the secondary fluency routine. Journal of Educational Research,114(3), 252–262.
Teaching oral reading fluency to older students (2021)
“First, the research on fluency instruction has focused heavily on two groups: kids in grades 1-4 and remedial readers in grades 1-12 (NICHD, 2001). I can’t tell a 6th grade teacher that there is research showing that if she devotes sufficient time to fluency her students will do better with reading comprehension. My own professional practice suggests that it can be powerful but that’s a different level of support.
Second, round robin reading has given oral reading a bad name. Most teachers have memories of hating round robin when they were kids, so being enlightened they avoid oral reading at much cost. Kids should be able to develop fluency from silent reading practice. Unfortunately, you can’t tell if kids are making progress unless you listen to them read and it is hard to intervene and help without that kind of monitoring. Practice can “make perfect” as the old saying claims but it often doesn’t. (Given this, perhaps it shouldn’t be surprising that research has found the amount of oral reading practice in high school is correlated with reading achievement gains more closely than the amount of in class silent reading practice (Stallings, 1980).
Third, older kids will often resist. One of my least favorite instructional activities (Popcorn) sometimes results in kids balking: “You can call on me, but that doesn’t mean that I’m going to read aloud to the class!”
Recently, I’ve astonished some teachers and district administrators by encouraging fluency teaching with older kids. They are getting a lot of pressure these days to emphasize phonics – yeah, phonics in regular high school English classes (which I think is lunatic) and they have no idea that oral reading fluency instruction has been found to improve kids’ word reading and decoding. Many of these kids have had a ton of phonics instruction and don’t know how to apply it. Fluency instruction began with the notion that such practice would enable the application of what the kids had already learned about letters, sounds, spelling patterns.
Don’t get me wrong. There definitely are a relatively small number of high school kids who would likely get some benefit from explicit phonics. That instruction, however, should be relegated to remedial reading or special education, not the English class. Likewise, the idea of English classes devoting some of their valuable minutes to morphological study – which can impact decoding – makes great sense, too. That should be a regular part of the vocabulary teaching that should be going on.
Nevertheless, fluency training can have a remarkable impact on kids’ reading comprehension in the upper grades – most likely by consolidating what those kids have already learned about decoding along the way.
Let me define and explain a few basic ideas about fluency and then the rest of this blog is aimed at providing instructional advice on fluency teaching with older students.
Fluency refers to the ability to read text accurately, with automaticity, and with proper expression (NICHD, 2001).
Accuracy is about reading an author’s words. If you don’t do that, then miscomprehension may occur. Students must get into the habit of respecting authors. That means reading the words that the author put on the page, rather than replacing them with context-based guesses as to what may have been meant. Words matter and becoming an effective reader requires reading the author’s words; not substituting them with our own.
This word reading must be accomplished with automaticity. That means reading the words accurately without conscious attention. Automaticity is usually estimated by tracking reading speed. If a student reads text too slowly, comprehension deteriorates. Adult proficient readers read text aloud at about 166-178 words correct per minute (Baer, et al., 2009). Fourth graders who read at fewer than 100 words correct per minute tend to be “below basic” in reading comprehension. Reading so slowly makes it difficult to integrate information. By the time you get to the end of the sentence, you’ve likely lost the thread of the first part.
Proper expression is important because there are many aspects to translating text that are not on the page. Except for punctuation, authors do little to help readers to group words together, pause appropriately, or raise or lower pitch. If you don’t get those things right it can be difficult to understand.
Here are some activities that have been used successfully in upper elementary, middle, and high school.
Instructional Activities Aimed at Building Fluency
Paired reading: Pair students up. Have them take turns reading the text to each other. One student read a page or paragraph and the other gives feedback. Then the students switch roles. During this activity, the teacher circulates throughout the room, giving feedback as needed. Link some comprehension work to this. At the end of each section of reading, have the students determine the main point(s) of that section or compose a good test question about that part of the material.
Repeated Reading: Students read aloud a portion of text (perhaps a 100-word chunk, or the first couple of paragraphs). The teacher or another student gives feedback, and the student tries it again. This repetition continues three times or until the student can read it with 99% accuracy, at more than 100 words per minute, and with expression that suggests successful comprehension (White, et al., 2021). This can be combined with paired reading. Repeated reading is especially valuable with content materials. Understanding such texts often requires this kind of intensive rereading anyway, so the rereading is appropriate.
Pause, Prompt, Praise: Not all students are great fluency partners. PPP provides some support in this area. Partners and teachers are encouraged to give students some slack if a mistake is made. Let the student read to the end of the clause or sentence and see what they do. Better readers try to fix the mistake. That’s the pause. But if a student can’t remedy the error (or doesn’t notice it), then provide a Prompt. If the mistake doesn’t make sense, then give some feedback about meaning. If the word read doesn’t look or sound like the word in the book, then direct the student to look more closely. If the student can’t fix the error after one prompt, tell them what the word is. Finally, for anything done well, provide praise.
Recorded Readings: Students can make progress without much individual feedback. Consider having students record oral reading for homework. Have them read an assigned portion of text (no more than 5–10 minutes worth). To complete the assignment successfully, the students will likely need to practice prior to recording. Teacher can spot check these to check on performance. Again, it is a good idea to link to some comprehension tasks.
Chunking: Studies suggest that chunking can be helpful with older students. In this, the teacher initially provides text with phrasal boundaries marked. Students of all ability levels tend to get a boost from this material. After they have had some practice reading materials so marked, then give them unmarked texts and have them working in teams or individually to identify phrasal boundaries.
Shanahan, T. (2021). Teaching oral reading fluency to older students. Shanahan on Literacy https://www.shanahanonliteracy.com/blog/teaching-oral-reading-fluency-to-older-students#sthash.baSKOHyW.dpbs
Off to the earlier paper!
This next segment is the original, broader document and includes earlier periods.
The conventional wisdom that one should learn to crawl before learning to walk has been ignored by those who consider that beginners should be encouraged to read in the way that skilled readers do (Goodman, 1973, 1974). The evidence on literacy (analogous to many other life skills) indicates the need to ensure that students develop instantaneous word recognition. For this to occur, teachers must first emphasise the minutiae of decoding, and ensure that all students obtain their requisite levels of practice to enable the achievement of that most important quality, automaticity. It is a state of skill development in which tasks that formerly required concentration to complete competently, having been practised to the point of over-learning, are now able to be completed without conscious attention (Baker, Kame’enui, Simmons, & Stahl, 1994; Thompson & Nicholson, 1998).
All readers have a limited amount of attentional capacity to devote to the reading task. If the basic process of extracting the words from the page is laboured (slow and usually error-prone), readers will lose track of that which already has been read (Mastropieri, Leinart, & Scruggs, 1999), and be unable to follow the text’s sequence of ideas (Kamhi & Catts, 1999). They will also remain essentially passive during the reading task, not able to bring their own experiences to bear on the all-important meaningmaking process, and hence their comprehension is doubly hindered. Because of the additional effort required, they are likely to be reading less than their peers and their resultant slower vocabulary development further impedes comprehension (Mastropieri et al., 1999). Sometimes these struggling readers are exhorted to pay more attention to meaning (Newman, 1985) than to the words in front of them – a cruel, if unintentionally so, diversion away from the problem source. With automaticity, all available attention can be directed to the meaning-making task, because the lower-level decoding process is effortless. Unsurprisingly then, research has shown that fluency and comprehension are mutually interdependent (Mathes, Howard, Allen, & Fuchs, 1998).
Some students who have reached the stage of reading grade level materials with accuracy may continue to be characterised by a slow and halting style, read without expression, and despite their excellent word recognition accuracy, comprehension may be compromised. Hence as reading accuracy becomes facile, the role of reading speed assumes greater importance. For some students, fluency (speed combined with accuracy) may develop simply from practice at reading, but can be enhanced when students’ attention is drawn to the goal of increasing their reading speed. The greater the volume of appropriately constructed text read at a student’s independent reading level (95 per cent accuracy), the more rapidly fluency is likely to develop (Lyon, 1998). Students whose fluency does not develop normally may require significant additional support, a circumstance easily overlooked unless regular fluency checks are an element in the reading program. Various methods have been employed to assist fluency further, including repeated reading, speed drills, computer-guided practice, and rapid word recognition charts (Mather & Goldstein, 2001). The general intention is to assist students to realise the value of more fluent reading, and to provide regular opportunities for them to test and chart their developing rate and accuracy. There has been ample research demonstrating that the number of words students read correctly in one minute provides a reliable and valid measure of overall reading ability (Baker, Gersten, & Keating, 2000).
While suggested rates vary, Howell and Nolet (2000) recommend the following benchmarks. From early Year 1 to late Year 1, the anticipated progression is from 35– 50 words correct per minute; whilst from early Year 2 to late Year 2, the target is from 70–100 correct wpm; and from early Year 3 to late Year 3 the progression is from 120–140 correct wpm. A slightly different trajectory is suggested by Binder, Haughton, and Bateman (2002). They anticipate a more rapid progression throughout Year 1 reaching between 60-100 correct wpm. They also provide additional yearly expectations: Year 2–Year 3 100–120 correct wpm; Year 4–Year 5 120–150 correct wpm; Year 6–Year 8 150–180 correct wpm; and Year 9 and above 180–200 correct wpm.
When the author was working in a Florida school in 2004, there was consternation about a new state 3rd Year reading comprehension test, known as the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test (FCAT). The alarming new mandate was that any student failing this test could not progress to Year 4, an eventuality that tended to attract schools’ attention and efforts. It was discovered that 91 per cent of students who read at or above 110 correct words per minute on grade level text achieved adequate performance on the reading section of the FCAT. Of students reading below 80 correct words per minute, 81 per cent failed the FCAT (Buck & Torgesen, 2003). Fluency suddenly became a firm focus for identifying at risk students and as a focus for intervention. Similar findings with respect to oral reading fluency and state reading tests have been reported in Michigan (Carlisle, Schilling, Scott, & Zeng, 2004) and North Carolina (Barger, 2003).
Reading Fluency is Amenable to Intervention
Students who seriously struggle with reading may have a developmental reading trajectory as little as half that of the average student (Wheldall & Beaman, 2000). This difficulty is clearly reflected in their fluency rates, and in the stagnation of those rates over time. In a two year study of 3000 students, Fuchs, Fuchs, Hamlett, Walz, and Germann (1993) found, with an effective reading program, that students in Year 1 to Year 3 should improve their fluency by two correct words per minute per week of instruction, whilst those in Year 4 to Year 6 should improve by one correct word per minute per week of instruction. This study did not focus upon low progress readers, and an important issue is the degree to which such readers can also display progress in fluency.
There are fluency-based instructional programs that have produced strong gains in programs for students diagnosed with learning difficulties (Johnson and Layng, 1992). The one correct word per minute per week of instruction figure was exceeded in the Wheldall and Beaman (2000) evaluation of the Making Up Lost Time In Literacy (MULTILIT) program for students from Year 3 to Year 6. An increase of 38 words per minute was attained by low progress readers after two school terms of intensive, systematic, direct instruction that emphasised phonological decoding skills, word recognition and supported text reading. Wheldall and Beaman argue that a reasonable target for low progress readers, when provided with effective remedial instruction, is a rate of 135 wpm corresponding to a mid Year 5 level, an attainment they consider represents functional literacy.
Both standardised and informal assessments of oral reading accuracy, rate and comprehension are recommended and referenced in the National Reading Panel Report (National Reading Panel, 2000). The report recommends guided oral reading as a valuable fluency enhancing activity, yet both fluency assessment and instruction are notably absent from the reading curricula of many schools. Perhaps this is unsurprising given that reading fluency is not mentioned in the English curriculum standards documents from at least three Australian states: Victoria, South Australia, and Queensland (Department of Education, Employment & Training, 2001). Teaching approaches that include a fluency component, such as MULTILIT (Wheldall & Beaman, 2000) and the Corrective Reading program (Adams & Engelmann, 1996; Gunn, Biglan, Smolkowski, & Ary, 2000) have demonstrated their effectiveness in this domain but have not yet achieved the mainstream recognition they deserve.
It is in reaching the stage of automaticity that the apparent magic of skilled reading becomes evident – whole words are recognised as quickly as are individual letters. The actual process of reading, of transforming squiggles into language, appears transparent – that is, the words seem to leap off the page and into consciousness without any noticeable effort or strategy (LaBerge & Samuels, 1974). The issue of variation in the effort required to make sense of print has been addressed by employing neuro-imaging techniques when both capable and struggling students are engaged in reading. Richards et al. (1999) noted that the poor readers used four to five times as much physical energy as the capable readers to complete the same phonological tasks in the left anterior lobe of the brain. This difference was not observed when non-language tasks were presented. It is unsurprising that motivation to read is a serious obstacle to overcome with struggling readers.
For skilled readers, there is no further need to resort to the slow, unreliable process of prediction based upon context, followed by confirmation. Though it may remain of value in understanding the meaning of a new word, attendance to such contextual cues is not required by competent readers as a strategy for obtaining the pronunciation of words.
Isn’t skilled performance a wondrous thing? Wouldn’t it be marvellous if our brains were already wired for reading, so that teachers could simply evoke from students an existing but unexpressed reading talent (as was speech so evoked)? But, really, is there any area of skilled performance at a man-made task that does not require real dedication and serious practice from learners? The moral is that there is no fast and dirty way of avoiding the sounding-out sequence. Any such avoidance will divert students into a reading cul-de-sac, leaving them doomed to rely upon their memory for overall shape rather than for letter position, to look for pictures, or to second-guess the authors, and to be forever battling with novel and technical words throughout their life.
Morphemic sources of information are also useful in coping with the challenges caused by the different (and sometimes contradictory) spelling conventions of English’ parent languages. Given that more than half the words in written English are derived from Greek or Latin (Henry, 1997), then much benefit in reading fluency, comprehension, and spelling can be gained from a systematic study of prefixes, suffixes and root words. This benefit is even more evident in the decoding and comprehension of technical words.
Older Struggling Readers
Intervention for older students requires far more intensity and duration than that for younger students (Swanson, 2001; Torgesen, 1998). Intervention programs for older students have thus far provided little cause for optimism, particularly those that involve “eclectic approaches to teaching reading that were provided in an inconsistent fashion and for relatively brief periods” (Shaywitz et al. 1999, p.1336). In fact, Alexander, Entwisle, and Olsen (1997) claim that reading improvement typically occurs twice as fast in first grade as it does in third grade, whilst Hall and Moats (1999) report the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development finding that it takes four times as much assistance to improve a child’s reading skills if help is delayed until Year 4 than if it is begun in the Prep year. Apart from the efficiency gains for a system enabled by early identification and intervention, there are also pressing issues of social justice to be considered. Nevertheless, progress is achievable for older students when systematic research-validated approaches are well implemented (Wheldall & Beaman, 2000).
For older struggling readers, the focus of intervention remains the same, as the majority of reading difficulties displayed by older students are fundamentally phonological (Al-Otaiba & Fuchs, in press, cited in Scruggs & Mastropieri, 2002; Ehri, 1995; Lovett & Steinbach, 1997; Shaywitz et al., 1999). Thus, instruction should continue to emphasise letter-sound correspondences, blending, segmenting, and adequate practice (Bruck, 1998; Shankweiler, Lundquist, Dreyer, & Dickinson, 1996). As it is for younger students, it is only through such laborious letter-by-letter decoding can precise letter-order become entrenched in the orthographic representation that forms the basis for accurate spelling and fluent reading (Adams, 1990; Jorm & Share, 1983; Williams, 1991). Of course, older students may also require attention to vocabulary enhancement, metacognitive strategies, and, possibly, motivational supports – the Matthew effects having added to the student’s burden. For example, it can be difficult persuading students to discard their existing focus on context-and-initial-letters in favour of careful attention to all the letters and their positions in words. It usually involves a temporary slowing of the students’ reading rate – a price that some students are loath to pay (Apel & Swank, 1999). Subtle persuasion may be initially necessary, and the intensive daily practice over a period of a year or more (Swanson, 2001; Wong, 2001) is eventually considered worthwhile by the students, when they begin to appreciate that reading actually can be enjoyable and meaningful. At this point, decoding skills and comprehension exert influences that assist each other (Berninger, 2001).
Read the rest of this article at https://www.dropbox.com/sh/olxpifutwcgvg8j/AABU8YNr4ZxiXPXzvHrrirR8a?dl=0
