Tips & Tricks for Building Fluency
Congrats! You’ve got students who can decode words effectively. This is half of the battle! Now for the other half: Are they efficient yet? This second part can take an ample amount of time, and students need plenty of practice building fluency. Fluency is so important because it bridges the gap from decoding to comprehension, especially in the foundational years. For our kindergarten through 2nd graders, developing fluency in reading, writing, and communication is crucial for future academic success. Today, I’m sharing some tips and tricks to help build fluency during these foundational years that you can walk away with and start tomorrow!
What is fluency?
Fluency is the ability to read a text smoothly, accurately, and with appropriate expression, all the while demonstrating comprehension. It is the bridge between decoding and comprehension.
Sarah Paul says, “Fluency is the accurate reading at a conversational rate with appropriate prosody and deep understanding.”
Fluent students have an easier time understanding the text at hand and better understand it as well, which is why it’s so important to focus on it.
Students who struggle with fluency often work too hard at decoding a word. This decoding takes up too much brain power and leaves less room for understanding the text.
One would think that the more we decode, the better we become, but this isn’t always so easy. It can take students a long time to become fluent, and also can become difficult to know when they need more support.
Interested in learning more about the journey readers take to become successful readers? Head to my homepage and simply scroll down to my Your Reader’s Journey Roadmap and sign up for my free webinar! I walk you through step-by-step what foundational skills should be in place to ensure students are moving right along on their reading journey.
Checking for Fluency
In order to find out if fluency is indeed what a student is struggling with, we must work our way back.
First, we need to determine if the student can comprehend a text. If yes → it’s likely that fluency isn’t an issue. If no → it’s time to check their fluency. We do this by:
Giving students a simple ORF assessment. If a student appears to be struggling, we then check their decoding. If they’re struggling in decoding, then we must work on decoding and phonemic awareness yet integrate fluency strategies within daily practice.
If a student does not struggle with this test, the struggle likely isn’t fluency, but more so comprehension and vocabulary skills.
You can download my intervention roadmap for free and get even more information on this process by watching my free training HERE!
Strategies for Improving Fluency
Tip #1: Model Fluent Reading
This is a fun tip that can be demonstrated almost anytime, anywhere in the classroom and is especially perfect for circle time. By reading out loud to students, we are showing them proper pacing, intonation, and expression. And by doing all this “heavy lifting” for them, we’re also giving them an opportunity to focus on the context of the text.
Tip #2: Partner Reading
This is a safe, non-threatening way for students to practice fluency. By partner reading, you’re providing students with lots of reading practice as well as support and feedback from their peers in an environment that’s small (and not in front of the whole class - goodbye, round-robin reading!) This time does not replace the time students spend with you as their teacher. This is an addition to that time and should take less than 10-15 minutes.
Things to consider:
Pair your high and low readers with the middle-of-the-road readers. Pairing a high reader with a low reader just causes frustration.
Use decodable passages that focus on the phonics skill you’ve been working on throughout the week. This gives everyone a chance to be comfortable with the text.
Have partners read the passage three times in three different ways: first, students should choral read. Then, the higher of the two readers reads it while the partner follows along, and then finally the lower of the two readers reads it while their partner follows along. This allows the lower reader to have seen the text twice before reading it independently.
If students are not quite ready for passages, sentences or even phrases will suffice (and kindergarten students can even practice letter sound flashcards!)
Always model these expectations to students beforehand:
Sit criss-cross across from their partner with passage in front of them.
If a partner misses the word, the other is to place their finger on the word and give immediate feedback. It’s important for the student to receive constructive criticism, but it’s equally important to ensure you’ve built a strong and positive classroom community where everyone feels welcome, comfortable, and not judged.
Tip #3: Repeated Reading
Encourage students to practice reading the same passage multiple times. This helps improve accuracy and speed, two key components of fluency.
Consider helping students set goals for their reading and remind students that the goal is not to read as fast as they can. A great goal is to read at a conversational rate with appropriate prosody and deep understanding.
Tip #4: Phrased Reading:
Teach students to read in meaningful phrases rather than word-by-word.
Phrasing or “scooping” aids in natural pausing and expression while reading. When we do this, we are reading in a natural and conversational way.
Provide scoops for students at first and then have them practice making their own scoops.
For example: “My mom likes to go swimming each day.” Phrases could be “My mom likes to go swimming each day.”
Tip #5: Practice Reading Together
Choral, echo, or cloze reading are fun ways to do this.
This models good reading while allowing scaffolding that some students need.
Keep in Mind
Fluency is the ability to read a text smoothly, accurately, and with appropriate expression while demonstrating comprehension. It is not fast reading, but rather conversational.
The foundational reading skills must be in place if we want fluency to improve.
Silent reading does not help improve fluency.
The methods within this podcast and these show notes are backed by research and have been found to improve fluency.
Resources from Episode
My Favorite Resources Regarding Fluency:
My Favorite Books and Articles Regarding Fluency:
Rasinski, T. V. (2020). The importance of fluency instruction in the early grades.
Chard, D. J., & Pikulski, J. J. (2005). Developing fluency: Theory, research, and practice.
Gambrell, L. B., & Morrow, L. M. (2017). Best practices in fluency instruction for early readers.
Allington, R. L., & McGill-Franzen, A. (2016). Fluency: Still waiting after all these years.
