FLUENCY

Reading fluency is a pre-requisite for the comprehension that is the purpose of all reading.

Fluent reading is defined by Hudson, Lane and Pullen (2005) as'...accurate reading of connected text, at a conversational rate with appropriate prosody'. In other words, reading involves accuracy, automaticity, and prosody.

Accuracy - the ability to decode written words with error.
Automaticity - the ability to read quickly and with relative ease. The rate at which a person reads depends not only on their skill, but also on the purposes of their reading and on whether they are reading orally or silently.
Prosody - the ability to read in a way that mirrors the sounds of natural spoken language. This includes intonation (the rise and fall in tone), stress (the prominence given to particular syllables, words or phrases) and rhythm.

(The Art & Science of Teaching Primary Reading, Christopher Such)

Reading fluency is based on the frequent practice of sound-spelling correspondences and phonemic awareness skills that constitute phonics instruction.

Fluent reading is acquired only through repeated decoding; it is this that allows the spellings of words to become 'glued' to the pronunciations already stored in a reader's memory. This process is called orthographic mapping.

(The Art & Science of Teaching Primary Reading, Christopher Such)

NSW DEPT OF EDUCATION

What is fluency?

Fluency is reading expressively with accuracy and at a good pace. It is one of the key components of learning to read. It is the progression from developing automatic word recognition skills to comprehension.

Dr Deslea Konza defines fluency as the ability to read text accurately, quickly and with expression. Dr Tim Rasinski explains it as ‘reading with and for meaning’.

Fluency is made up of three core components:

Accuracy is the reading of words correctly.
Rate is the speed of word identification. It is usually recorded as words read per minute.
Prosody is the sound of the reading. This can be explained as the expression used when reading.

The following video discusses the three components of fluency.

NSW DEPT OF EDUCATION

Why is fluency important?

Fluent reading acts as a bridge between automatic word reading and comprehension. It is the link between reading words quickly and effortlessly, and understanding and comprehending text.

The reader needs to have developed the skills of phonological awareness, phonics and have a good sight word vocabulary to develop into a fluent reader. These foundational skills of word recognition need to be recalled quickly to the point of automatic recall. This automaticity of decoding and recall of words is to become unconscious. This then allows the cognitive space for the reader to access the meaning of the text.

NSW DEPT OF EDUCATION

WHAT DOES FLUENCY LOOK LIKE IN THE YEARS 3 - 8 CLASSROOM?