Chase Young, Ph.D.
Texas A&M University – Corpus Christi

Reading Fluency as the Bridge to Comprehension
Small Group Instruction for Accuracy, Comprehension, and
Fluency
Break
Building Fluency through Performance
Lunch
Implementing Readers Theater
Extending Readers Theater through Scripting
Break
Student Produced Movies
Powerful Reading Fluency Interventions

According to Hyatt (1943):
Reading fluency began as elocution instruction for the purpose of pleasing oral discourse.
Elocution

Humble to Hopeful
Goodman’s Miscue Analysis
• Goodman (1964) conducted a linguistic study on the cues and miscues of 100 primary school readers; he observed an interesting phenomenon.
Natural intonation came from comprehension of the text, and was portrayed through oral reading. Although many processes were in play, stress, pitch, and juncture manifested with meaning.
Automaticity Theory
• According to Laberge and
Samuels (1974) automatic of word recognition is a prerequisite of comprehension. Automaticity frees cognitive resources used in lower level processing for the higher level cognitive processes necessary for comprehension.

Neglected No Longer

Some Aspects
Neglected

Fluency Matters – Rasinski & Young, 2014

Mastery
Interpersonal
Understanding
Self-Expressive
Performance-Based

Young & Nageldinger, 2014

Use existing, or create your own!

Little Boy Blue, Please Cover Your Nose
Little Boy Blue,
Please cover your nose.
You sneezed on Miss Muffet
And ruined her clothes.
You sprayed Mother Hubbard,
And now she is sick.
You put out the fire
On Jack’s candlestick.
Your sneeze is the reason
Why Humpty fell down.
You drenched Yankee Doodle
When he came to town.
The blind mice are angry!
The sheep are upset!
From now on use tissues
So no one gets wet!

The Land of Nod
BY ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON
From breakfast on through all the day
At home among my friends I stay,
But every night I go abroad
Afar into the land of Nod.
Interpretations
All by myself I have to go,
With none to tell me what to do —
All alone beside the streams
And up the mountain-sides of dreams.
The strangest things are there for me,
Both things to eat and things to see,
And many frightening sights abroad
Till morning in the land of Nod.
Try as I like to find the way,
I never can get back by day,
Nor can remember plain and clear
The curious music that I hear.

Mary Had a Little Pet
By Judith Natelli McLaughlin
Mary had a little pet.
Its fur was black as night.
It followed her to school one day,
Which gave the kids a fright.
Inference
It made the teachers shout and scream,
It gave them such a scare.
For Mary didn’t have a lamb—
She had a grizzly bear.

Poetry Academy
Wilfong (2008)
• increased words correct per minute
• word recognition
• attitude toward academic reading
• comprehension
• improved attitude toward school
Or… Have a full on poetry slam!

Find a poem on www.gigglepoetry.com
Read it.
If you like it, share it.

You can sing poetry, too! 6:55
(to the tune of "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star")
Tinkle, tinkle, little bat,
Wonder where the potty’s at?
Straight ahead or to the right?
Caves are very dark at night.
Little bat, why do you frown?
Did you tinkle upside down?

In fact, you can sing about anything…
Even Tests…

Rock and Read!

Readers Theater Research
• Tyler & Chard (2000)
• Natural Link to
Repeated Readings
• Martinez, Roser, &
Strecker (1998/1999)
• Motivation
• Griffith & Rasinski
(2004)
• Passionate
• Avg GE 5.80
• 93% At Risk On Level
• Young & Rasinski (2009)
• 20% gain in prosody
• 65 WCPM gain (35 expected and 29 previous year)
• Speed Does Matter
(Rasinski, 2000)

The Five Day Format
( Young & Rasinski, 2009 )
•
•
•
•
•
• Your Turn!

Implementing Readers
Theater

Sources for Scripts
• Your Reading Program
• Trade Books
• Textbooks
• Poetry
• Guided Reading Books
• www.thebestclass.org/rtscripts.html
• Your Students…

Readers Theater Performance

Student Scripts, Performances, and Interviews

• Mentor Text
• Straight Up
• Voice Variation of Billy Goats
Gruff
• Parody
• Sophia Finds a Turtle
• Scratch
• King Kong vs Second Grade
• Take it a Step Further with SPMS

The Bad News

Student Produced Movies
( Young & Rasinski, 2013 )
• Phase 1: Grouping
• Phase 2: Idea Development
• Phase 3: Script Treatment
• Phase 4: Storyboard
• Phase 5: Scripting
• Phase 6: Preproduction Conference
• Phase 7: Filming
• Phase 8: Post-Production

Phase 1: Grouping
(Risko & Walker-Dalhouse, 2011; Pachtman & Wilson, 2006)
• Students groups are selected based preferred genre.
• How does this phase connect to literacy?

Phase 2: Idea Development
(Culham, 2011; Dorfman & Cappelli, 2007; Smith, 1994)
• Students choose method for creating scripts: mentor, parody, or scratch
• How does this phase connect to literacy?

Phase 3: Script Treatment
(National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, 2000)
• Students write a summary
• Assign roles
• How does this phase connect to literacy?

Phase 4: Storyboard
(Naughton, 2008)
• How does this phase connect to literacy?

Phase 5: Scripting
(Culham, 2011; Dorfman & Cappelli, 2007; Smith, 1994; Young & Rasinski, 2011)
• As students create their scripts they are analyzing the original text from the point of view of the writer. What did the author do to make his or her writing so engaging? How can we incorporate those features into my script?
• How does this phase connect to literacy?

Phase 6: Preproduction Conference
• The production team meets with the teacher and discuss light edits, materials, and responsibilities.
• How does this phase connect to literacy?

Phase 7: Filming
• The student director runs the production of each scene, with input, of course, from other members of the production (and me). The director carries the storyboard and script, leads the class to filming locations, makes sure all props and materials are ready, and directs characters’ actions and assists with their lines.
• How does this phase connect to literacy?

Video

Phase 8: Post-Production
• Students learn how to upload the movies into the software, drop clips into the editing line, delete unused takes, reorder and cut clips, configure special effects, utilize transitions, add music, and create title and credit sequences.
• How does this phase connect to literacy?

SPM Written and Produced by Second Graders
Genre: Comedy. Method: Parody
Video

SPMs and Literacy
• Students reflected on their reading preference, identified different genres, composed summaries, drafted sequences, used their knowledge of story structure to deconstruct text and turn it into a new creation, rehearsed the script focusing on expressive and meaningful reading, proficiently wielded multiple technologies, and offered their unique understandings of text.
• They had a purpose.

SPM

What I learned from Lightning

Discussion One
• Which aspects of your instruction do you feel are most effective, most efficient?
• How do you make them so?
• Do you know the research that supports your effective instructional practices?

Case Study (Mohr, Dixon, & Young, 2012)
• Lightning was a third-grade student. His oral reading was choppy, halting, and boring. His low reading rate
(55 words per minute, WPM) was hampering both his reading achievement and Lightning’s sense of himself as a reader. He did not enjoy reading, had no favorite books, and his progress was slow even in small-group configurations. Lightning had begun the year on the
Developmental Reading Assessment (DRA, Beaver, 1991)
Level 18, approximately one year below grade level.
After six weeks of guided reading intervention, he showed no assessed growth. His DRA level remained the same.

The Method of Repeated Readings (Samuels,
1979)

Visually Representing RR
18-24 in 8 Weeks

Discussion Two
• In which instructional aspect could you or teachers you have observed be more effective or efficient?
• What seems to hinder the effectiveness of this instruction?

Case Study
• Despite his improvement in reading speed (approx 70
WPM), it was noted that Lightning’s expression did not consistently match the meaning of the story. Though he was excited about his progress, he still not enjoy reading.

Speaking of Prosody: Fluency’s Unattended
Bedfellow (Dowhower, 1991)
• Automaticity
• Rate
• Prosody

The Limbic System

Case Study
• Lightning’s progress with repeated readings was remarkable.
• He does need to read text more prosodically.
• As a reading professional, you have to make a choice.

Read Two Impress
( Young, Mohr, & Rasinski, 2015 )
• CMSE (if you feel the Education World needs more acronyms) is a NIM and RR Hybrid
• This stacked intervention using NIM and repeated reading was used for another eight weeks. Lightening’s DRA level increased from a 24 to a 30, only slightly behind the third grade expectation. Lightning read the DRA-level 30 text with very good comprehension, 99% accuracy, at 99 WPM, and great expression—a score of 4 according to the rubric.
• After the completion of the study, 2 weeks later, he read a 34 and was excited from the program.
• 10 Weeks: 24-34.

Discussion Three
• Compare the advantages and disadvantages these two modes of reading and the hybrid. Consider the role of the teacher and the students. What tends to interfere with using these modes efficiently and effectively in a classroom?

Case Study
• Lightening clutched his new Diary of a Wimpy Kid book and said, “Now, don’t forget about your chubby little buddy, Mr. Young!”

Learning from Lightening
• Appropriate Assessments
• Analysis of Assessments
• Research-Based Instruction
• Evaluation of Instruction
• Teacher and Student
• Modification of Instruction
• Stacked Instruction

Discussion Four
• How are effectiveness, efficiency, and engagement related to literacy achievement?
• How can teachers increase student engagement in addition to their own effectiveness and efficiency?
• Tell us about a time when you were very engaged in a reading or writing task. What characterized this experience that teachers could replicate in their instruction?

Task (if time)
• In small groups, make a list of things teachers do to manage students and to teach students. Compare these listed items and the time given to them. How could a teacher save even 20-30 minutes a day in order to have more time for rich instruction?

chase.young@tamucc.edu
www.thebestclass.org