The primary post-pandemic Nationwide Evaluation of Instructional Progress outcomes for studying achievement got here out final yr, and the outcomes have been dismal. The typical studying achievement rating for 13-year-olds is on the lowest stage prior to now 40 years! How can that be?
With the sturdy focus lately on educating the code (i.e., phonics), it appears that evidently studying achievement amongst college students needs to be bettering. Nevertheless, that isn’t the case. Sure, the pandemic introduced huge disruption to training, and that’s in all probability a part of it. However studying and educating studying are advanced, and once we focus totally on one a part of the reading-instruction puzzle, different vital studying competencies (similar to vocabulary, comprehension, motivation) are largely relegated to second-tier standing.
One cliche I usually hear is “readers can’t comprehend if they will’t decode the phrases.” Whereas not denying the important function of phonics, additionally it is essential that we not neglect these different vital competencies. Studying fluency is considered one of them, one which I’ve been exploring, researching, and writing about for near 50 years.
My very own initiation with fluency started as an intervention instructor in Elkhorn, Neb., in 1979 (I do know, I’m previous), the place I labored with elementary college students battling studying. I used to be capable of assist most college students by specializing in phrases—phonics, spelling, and vocabulary. Nevertheless, there was a major variety of college students who didn’t appear to profit a lot from such instruction. They may already decode phrases, although they did so at a remarkably sluggish tempo with little expression or enthusiasm. It was clear of their studying that they merely didn’t get pleasure from or worth studying as a result of it was so painful for them. I clearly was not serving to these youngsters. What to do?
Thankfully for me, I used to be additionally engaged on my grasp’s diploma in studying training, and considered one of my professors had me learn some current articles on fluency, particularly “The Technique of Repeated Readings” by Jay Samuels. Samuels reported that when college students have been requested to learn a textual content greater than as soon as, not solely did they enhance their studying on the piece practiced, however there was additionally enchancment that generalized to new texts by no means earlier than learn.
Since what I had been doing with these college students was not working, I gave repeated readings a attempt. Lo and behold, these college students who beforehand have been making next-to-zero progress started to take off. In some instances, the advance was near spectacular. Better of all, these younger college students who beforehand didn’t see themselves as readers, now found that they might learn in addition to their more adept classmates. They solely wanted to develop fluency via intentional apply.
Lo and behold, these college students who beforehand have been making next-to-zero progress started to take off.
Why does fluency matter? For the reason that report of the Nationwide Studying Panel in 2000, studying fluency—the power to learn the phrases in textual content precisely, effortlessly, and with applicable expression and phrasing—has been recognized as important for studying success. As readers turn out to be computerized of their phrase recognition, they will dedicate their cognitive sources from phrase decoding to comprehension. Moreover, the significant expression readers embed of their studying (oral or silent) is proof of studying for which means. Scientific analysis has demonstrated that fluency is very correlated with studying comprehension and general studying achievement and that fluency-focused instruction results in enhancements in comprehension, the final word objective of studying. Furthermore, analysis has additionally proven that vital numbers of scholars who battle in studying usually are not sufficiently fluent.
Of their 2021 and 2023 energetic view of studying, Nell Duke, Kelly Cartwright, and Matt Burns determine fluency as a bridging course of to comprehension. Researchers have estimated that the impact dimension of the bridging processes, together with vocabulary and morphology (understanding of significant phrase components) in addition to fluency, are considerably bigger than the impact dimension for phrase decoding.
But, fluency continues to be uncared for. Why?
First, and maybe foremost, the obsessive concentrate on phonics leaves little room for fluency to be given consideration. However there are different causes for the neglect as effectively. Fluency, largely related to oral studying, is commonly wrongly seen as a studying competency vital solely within the major grades. Sadly, we see fluency difficulties in center and highschool, too, but, by then, there are sometimes few academics adequately versed in fluency instruction to supply efficient intervention. Lastly, studying fluency is commonly considered as a competency that’s taught after decoding is mastered. Analysis has proven that fluency instruction could be applied concurrently with phonics as early as 1st grade and that fluency and phonics instruction can help one another. For struggling readers in specific, we can’t anticipate them to grasp phrase decoding earlier than transferring on to fluency.
Given the present state of studying achievement in the US, it appears to me that now’s the time to make fluency an educational precedence in our studying curriculum. The nice factor is that fluency could be nurtured in a variety of genuine and comparatively easy-to-implement methods.
Repeated studying is one strategy. Rehearsing and performing texts, similar to readers-theater scripts, poetry, tune lyrics, speeches, and the like have been discovered to enhance fluency, phrase recognition, and even comprehension. These texts can simply draw on content material college students are already exploring of their disciplinary research.
One other strategy, assisted studying, additionally works. College students learn a textual content whereas concurrently listening to a fluent rendering of the identical textual content, which is usually a prerecorded model of the identical textual content on a digital pill, the studying of an grownup classroom volunteer, or a gaggle rendition in speech or tune of a poem or different quick textual content at first of each college day.
With colleagues, I’ve developed two educational protocols for growing fluency (Fluency Growth Lesson and Learn Two Impress) which were proven to enhance studying outcomes. When college students interact in repeated and assisted studying, they succeed.
In 1983, Richard Allington wrote that studying fluency, though essential for studying success, was a “uncared for objective of the studying curriculum.” Forty-plus years later, I worry that fluency continues to be uncared for. If we actually need to see vital enhancements in studying outcomes for our college students, we should embrace a extra full, advanced, and scientific view of studying and studying instruction—together with the competency of fluency.
