Reading & Other Learning Disabilities

Reading Fluency: Part I

A Guest Post by

Timothy Rasinski, Ph.D.

Professor, Kent State University

A recent survey of “What’s Hot and What’s Not” in Reading found that reading fluency is no longer a hot topic and that it should not be hot.  As a person who has written widely about reading fluency and have done a fair amount of research into fluency, I found this a bit disturbing.  From my work in the Kent State University Reading Clinic, I know that many children who experience significant difficulty in reading have problems in fluency.  When appropriate fluency instruction is provided, overall reading achievement improves, sometimes dramatically.

The problem with fluency comes from its association with reading fast. One way to assess reading fluency is by measuring speed of reading.  And since reading speed is associated with fluency and overall reading proficiency, the logic seems to be that one way to improve reading fluency and overall reading proficiency is to teach children to read fast.   This, I believe is a serious corruption of the notion of fluency. And if fluency is nothing more than reading fast, then I would agree that it should not be a hot topic in reading.

Fluency is important to the extent that it is association with reading comprehension.  Most everyone reading this post is a fluent reader. How did you become fluent? I would think that it wasn’t by instruction in speed reading, but through lots of meaningful practice. We become fluent at anything through lots of practice – wide and deep practice.

By wide practice, I refer to the kind of reading most of us do, reading one thing after another. This is clearly an important kind of practice.

Deep reading involves reading a passage more than once. Many of our struggling readers read a text once and they don’t read it well. Rather than move on to the next piece, I believe that sometimes we need to ask them to read it several times until they can read it well, or fluently. Otherwise, if we never give students a chance to read texts well, we are allowing them to practice mediocre reading.  And if that is the case, we shouldn’t be surprised if we end up with mediocre results.

Deep or repeated reading works. Research shows that when students read a text more than once and then move on to a new passage, improvement shows up on the new passage. But the question becomes how to get students to read a text more than once. In many fluency programs on the market now, the reason for repeated reading is to read fast.  I think this is fake fluency.

When I think of the need for practicing a text, I think of the idea of performance. If I knew I were to perform a poem, script, or song for an audience, I would want to engage in practice. And the practice is not aimed at reading fast, but at conveying meaning through a meaningful and expressive interpretation of the passage.

In our reading clinic, and working with teachers around the country, we have used repeated reading of readers theater scripts, poetry, song lyrics, dialogues, monologues, letters, jokes, and other texts to improve reading fluency and make meaning.  Our results with our struggling readers have been very impressive. We have seen struggling readers turn themselves into confident readers who read for meaning and enjoyment. This, to me, is the true approach to reading fluency – authentic practice guided and supported by caring and informed teachers.

Author: Timothy Rasinski, Ph.D.

Timothy Rasinski is a professor of literacy education at Kent State University. He has written over 150 articles and has authored, co-authored or edited over 15 books or curriculum programs on reading education. He is co-author of the award winning fluency program called Fluency First, published by the Wright Group. His scholarly interests include reading fluency and word study, reading in the elementary and middle grades, and readers who struggle. His research on reading has been cited by the National Reading Panel and has been published in journals such as Reading Research Quarterly, The Reading Teacher, Reading Psychology, and the Journal of Educational Research. As well as publishing numerous best selling books with Teacher Created Materials and Shell Education.

Editor: Howard Margolis, Ed.D.

© Timothy Rasinski