Reading Resources

Research Says.... 

The Short Version About Reading

One of the expectations in LISD is that students read for 10 minutes per grade level daily.  That means that for 6th grade a student is able to read for 60 minutes daily. With reading we are looking at multiple factors for successful reading: comprehension, fluency, and stamina. When we are looking at a 6th grade student reading for 60 minutes, it means that they are able to keep focused on their reading for 60 minutes continuously. This means to have text without getting distracted by things around us or by personal needs such as getting a drink or moving to a more comfortable location. By the end of 6th grade we should be closer to the 70 minute mark.

People who read with fluency are able to read the word without having to break it into its parts. When we are little we break words into letters and relate them to letter sounds. As we grow we start to recognize letter sound combinations, and eventually words we see frequently come naturally to us. When our brain is able to recognize the whole word our brain is capable of relating the word to the sentence. The part becomes the word instead of the letters. It is essential to have fluency in order to be comfortable reading more complex and lengthy texts.

Once we improve fluency to where the word is the part instead of the letters we get into comprehension. We look at how the word creates meaning within the sentence. As we grow in our reading skills we start to notice how the placement of the word can change meaning or use he other words in the sentence to decipher meaning to that word.

All of these things are essential to being a reader, but they are also things we will work on for life. The continued growth and application of our reading skills is what makes us a life long reader. I guess what research is telling us is that it's hard work to become a reader and that work is never done. It just changes as we focus on our reading skills.