I am working on my MA in Educational Literacy. Fluency is important, as reading is a form of communication. If the children can't read, they aren't able to "communicate" of be communicated to by the author. Just as we make sure our students are using sentence fluency in writing, oral reading for fluency is just as important.
The way that I incorporate fluency in my 4th grade class is by making a copy of the Passage Summaries (We also use Houghton Mifflin). For the students that are below grade level, I use the ELL Handbook Summaries-as they are not as "wordy". For those that need a lot of work, I even send it home and have them practice with their parents. I have seen so much improvement. By using the summaries, the students are exposed to the story. I hope that this helps! Julie ----- Original Message ----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [email protected] Sent: Thursday, February 8, 2007 6:17:09 PM (GMT-0800) US/Pacific Subject: [MOSAIC] Fluency I am sorry if this sounds negative but I am trying to get some clarification on something. My school is a low-performing school that is required to teach exclusively from the Houghton Mifflin basal. We MUST do a fluency record on each child who is not reading at grade level every week. We are the lowest level third grade leveled reader passage for the fluency record. Most of my students being checked weekly are reading at least a grade below. My first question is: Should these checks be done after the student has been exposed to the passages? They are taken directly from the leveled reader that we read each week, however, I test most of my students prior to us reading the leveled reader. My theory was if they were fluent readers, it shouldn't matter if it is a "cold reading". I got a sticky note today telling me that I need to consult with the literacy coach on fluency strategies since my students fluency is dropping. Seems perfectly natural to me since the texts we are reading are becoming more and more difficult and the vocabulary mose sophiscated. What is the point of this weekly recording? It isn't making them better readers. Is this just a cover your rear type of documentation? Help!!!! Rosie _______________________________________________ Mosaic mailing list [email protected] To unsubscribe or modify your membership please go to http://literacyworkshop.org/mailman/options/mosaic_literacyworkshop.org. Search the MOSAIC archives at http://snipurl.com/MosaicArchive. _______________________________________________ Mosaic mailing list [email protected] To unsubscribe or modify your membership please go to http://literacyworkshop.org/mailman/options/mosaic_literacyworkshop.org. Search the MOSAIC archives at http://snipurl.com/MosaicArchive.
