Top 10 List of Recommendations to Develop Fluency, Prosody, and Accuracy
Fluency is an issue that many middle school students struggle with. Fluency can be developed through the following interventions and strategies, which can all be built into the middle school classroom. Teachers can scaffold fluency in order to support and extend students’ development of fluency. Fluency supports the development of comprehension, and is an essential component of being a good reader.
Repeated Reading
Repeated reading is well corroborated by research. Adapt passages to students’ interests and passions, and have them reread them at least three or four times (likely more!), giving immediate corrective feedback. Have students spend time working with words that they make errors with, then repeat the reading again. Do not focus on time. If you need a step-by-step model, follow the Fluency Development Lesson (Young, Paige, & Rasinski, 2022). Try to avoid timing students or encouraging them to read sections faster, as this is inauthentic.
Choral Reading
Have students read passages together, in chorus. Students will be supported by the other voices and will not feel as nervous as they would reading alone. This will help to develop their fluency and prosody, as they will be scaffolded in both through the collective group. This is a good class morale activity, also, and is generally enjoyable.
Duet Reading
Read passages together with a specific student. They read along with the teacher’s voice as the scaffold, with the teacher providing correction and feedback immediately.
Model Fluent Reading
Explicitly demonstrate for students what fluent reading looks like through read-alouds. Comment on how you read like a storyteller, and ask students to notice how you pause after each sentence and between ideas or passages. Reading aloud builds vocabulary and improves comprehension (Young, Paige, & Rasinski, 2022). Encourage students to develop their metacognition about fluency so that they understand and interrogate what fluency looks like, and can apply the idea to their own reading.
Assisted Reading
Students transition to reading independently through reading along with other voices as a scaffold to support them in moving toward fluency (Young, Paige, & Rasinski, 2022). There are multiple ways to accomplish assisted reading, as described elsewhere in this document, including choral reading, duet reading, and paired reading.
Recorded Reading
Have students read along with a recorded text, like an audiobook, a passage on YouTube, a passage that you or an EA records for the student, or perhaps a podcast with transcript.
Phrase-cue Text
Teachers cue or mark phrase boundaries for students to support them in reading aloud. Teachers might colour code text to allow for easier readability. This is a common speech-giving technique, and can support students in developing their fluency.
Goal Setting
Set specific goals for each reading passage, and also for the student’s progress as a reader in general. It is important for students to become self-aware and to set goals for themselves in order to know where they are going and to celebrate what they accomplish.
Wide Reading
Encourage students to read as widely as possible to develop their accuracy and fluency. The best way to do so is to create opportunities for enjoyment associated with reading, which can be through read-alouds and audiobooks. Ensure that reading is associated with positives, not just discouragement and disenchantment, as is often the case with struggling readers. Allow students to select their own texts, and carve out time in class for students to read.
Echo Reading
Read passages to the student while they follow along silently. Then, have the student read the same section aloud to you. This helps them to hear how it should sound, and to have a framework on which to model their own reading.
References
Wanzek, J., Al Otaiba, S. D., & McMaster, K. L. (2019). Intensive Reading Interventions for the Elementary Grades. Guilford Publications.
Young, C., Paige, D., & Rasinski, T. V. (2022). Artfully Teaching the Science of Reading. Routledge.