Rationale:

The objective of this lesson design is to help readers develop better fluency in longer and more advance texts. Fluency is ability to recognize sight words automatically while also reading understanding and expression. Educators need to make sure to constantly encourage reading and re-reading of decodable texts. With this lesson, fluency, decoding, crosschecking, re-reading and comprehension will be taught. You should have a better understanding of your students’ abilities to read fluently and independently.

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Materials:

stopwatches, pencils, fluency chart/checklist, 1 sample sentence (on the white board), student reading rate tracker, teacher reading rate record, reading comprehension questions, copies of So Many Cats.

 

Procedures:

1.“Today we are going to learn what it means to be a fluent reader. Does anyone know what being a fluent reader means (call on student)? A fluent reader is able to read quickly and efficiently while able to recognize all words in order to understand a text as a whole. When we can recognize the meaning of every word and comprehend what we read we are able to better understand text as a whole. Reading ends up being so much more fun when we can understand it as we go!”

2.“To introduce the idea of fluency to you let us look at this sentence on the board. As I read this sentence two different ways, I want you to tell me if I sound like a fluent reader. Remember only I am going to read this time; I just want you all to listen really hard.”Read: “Sarah had a cat that loved to jump on the couch and scratch the carpet.”Then read: “S-awwww-ahh (Sarah) hhhhh-aah-d a ssssaaat, oh someone has a cat, thhh-aah-tt lll-ahhh-vved t-oooo jj-uuu-mmm-ppp o-onnnn thh-heee ccc-owww-chhh aa-nnn-ddd scr-aaahh-tt-cchhhh the cc-aaarrr-pettt.”Then say: “Can anyone tell me which way they think sounded more fluent to them?” (letThe students answer) “Did anyone notice how I got stuck on a couple of words that the second time read the sentence? To figure out what words I struggled with I had to reread that part of the sentence more than once to figure out what made the most sense. This way of reading is called crosschecking and it is super important to use when we are striving to read fluently and eventually you will not have to use this strategy because when you become fluent readers, your reading will sound like the first time I read the sentence.”

3.Next introduce the book and provide the book talk: “I have this interesting book about a frenzy of cats. There is a home with a dozen or more cats. Would you ever want that many cats? How could someone have that many cats in one house? Let’s find out how these people came to have so many cats!”

4. Then say “now that we are familiar with this book, I am going to hand each of you your own copy! Please read this book silently on your own first!” (pass out books).

5.*Once students finish their book silently on their own, pair them with a partner and pass out the stopwatches and fluency checklist sheet and reading rate tracker sheet. Then instruct them to reread the book by themselves one more time but this time they will time their reading from start to finish with the stopwatch. Make sure to say: “With your stopwatches I want you to start your timer when you begin reading, then stop it when you finish! Do not let the time at the end bother you we are simply doing this for fun to see how we progress as fluent readers throughout this lesson! Do not rush or be hard on yourself if you struggle on a word because this is not a competition. After you record your time write it down on your reading rate tracker page.”

6.“Next I want you to take turns reading the book to your partner aloud and while one reads the other will time them from start to finish. When using the stopwatch, make sure to press start when your partner starts to read out loud and stop as soon as they finish reading. The partner with the stopwatch will write down the time on your tracker for you after the reading. As your partner reads out loud, I want you to really listen for any changes in their reading! Some questions to think about: Does your partner remember more words this time? does your partner read with more expression on their face? Does your partners voice change when they read this time?I want you to mark what you notice each time they read. You will do this 2 more times together (each student should be have read out loud 3 times in all). Remember to use our crosschecking strategy to figure it out the words you get stuck on the best you can.”

7.“Once you are finished reading with your partner, I will call you up one at a time to re-read the first two pages to me (bring your reading rate tracker sheet up with you).”*As they read, time them on the two pages they read a loud and calculate the formulas for how many words per-minute they read. After each student finishes reading, ask them the 3 comprehension questions, record what they say/ if they got it correct based off the reading.

8.Lastly, allow students to discuss how they noticed their reading changing after re-reading the book multiple times and if they noticed they did not really know what was going on in the book after reading it the first time versus how much they understood after reading it aloud several more times. Explain: “To become a fluent reader, it takes practice and that is exactly what we did today. When you read the text the first time, you probably had trouble with a few words, but after reading it multiple times you began remembering more words and able to read them faster as well as understand what your reading more than you did the first time.” and ask: “do you think you feel more confident in reading on your own after this?”

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References:

Book: Beatrice Schenk de Regniers and Ellen Weiss. So Many Cats!

Read aloud video (if needed): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S1_X5mfa12Q Fluency

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Checklist: https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/FreeDownload/Reading-Fluency Checklist-4309247 Students Reading Rate

 

Tracker:

Silent Reading Time: ___________seconds

1st Partner-Reading Time: ____________

seconds2nd Partner-Reading Time: ___________seconds

3rd Partner-Reading Time: __________seconds

 

Teacher’s Individual Reading Rate Record:

Correct words x 60= Words per minute

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Reading Comprehension Questions:

Why did one of the cats turn into a mother cat?

How did there end up being 12 cats in the end?

Does the narrator want more cats?

 

Jackie Zencuch, Dancing for Fluency: https://jmz0009.wixsite.com/mysite/growing-independence-and-fluency