Got Fluent Readers?

Do your students struggle with fluency?

This seems like a big battle every year.  You have a few students who really suffer with being fluent readers.  You tell them to practice reading like they talk, but still every time they read they... sound...like...a...robot.  You read to them so they can hear great fluency, but still no progress.

This year I have done tons of oral writing to help my kiddos with their fluency.  

The biggest connection I have found is if a child talks slowly, they are probably going to be a slow reader.  

We use Whole Brain Teaching in my classroom, so using Teach! Ok! is perfect for helping my students with their fluency.

Another way I am helping my students with their fluency is by using Reader's Theaters.  

Have you heard of these?

They are WONDERFUL for helping with fluency.

This past week my students got their first taste of Reader's Theaters.  I explained it to them as if they were going to be actors or actresses performing in a show.  They thought that was so cool.  I explained and showed them how to highlight their parts.  This was confusing for some of them.   They wanted to say the name and what they said.  I had to clarify for them that the name was who's part is was.  In a show you watch you don't hear the actor say Bob: I am going to the store.  You just hear Bob say, "I am going to the store."  This seems to help them visualize it better.  Next I put them in their groups for their story.

I gave the students about 10 minutes to read through the story.  

I walked around and listened and offered advice.  I found that I had to remind the students to pay attention while everyone was reading.  They needed to be ready to go when it was their turn. 

I think this Reader's Theater needed up being a challenge because a lot of the words were difficult.  Plus, for their first one the groups were too big.

The next day we started our next Reader's Theater.  This story only had three parts. 

We started out again highlighting our parts and then I placed them in groups.  The students really seemed to get this part better so we were off to a great start.

Once the groups were made and placed around the room I gave them some time to practice.  This time watching the kiddos, I could tell that they were understanding what to do and having a much better time with it.

Once time was up for practicing, I had each group perform their story.  Wow!!!  What a difference a day made.  I could tell how beneficial using Reader's Theaters in my class were going to be.  

The students seemed to really enjoy reading the story the second day.  They were reading with expression and most of them sounded great!

I would like to use more Reader's Theaters in my classroom.  I am going to make a goal of every other week if not every single week. I think it would make a great Friday activity that will help the students and motivate to become flueut readers.

I plan on taping my groups the next time we do one of these kinds of stories.  I think I will tape them throughout the year because it will be a great way to show parents how their child's fluency has improved throughout the year. 

We also learned about Veteran's Day this week.  We wanted to THANK all the Veterans!

I hope you have a great week!!

Have a Wolfelicious day!

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Fluency and Mother's Day!

How are your students with fluency?  Well, mine are getting better and better.  
Our reading program, Read Well, has fluency built into each unit.  Students have to be able to read so fast in each unit to help them understand the story.  If they can't do this, their grade suffers.  After two units of not getting the fluency, we (teachers) are supposed to stop and work on the areas that the students are suffering on.  My minders have struggled with fluency.  Then I got an idea to help them... 

I staple reading passages into their folder that they need help with.  Passages from the same unit they are on.  Then I partner the students up and have them practice their reading.

I taught the students how one student is the coach and the other one is the reader.  One begins the story and then they switch jobs at every sentence.  I do this at every sentence because it makes both students pay attention or they don't know where to read.  I time the students reading and then after a few minutes I have them stop.  Then we start again, but this time they switch who goes first and they go back to the very beginning.

We have learned all the phonograms we have to for kindergarten.  54 phonograms to be exact.  The double phonograms are very tricky.  We practice them every day by saying them out loud and we also practice writing them.  I have been adding different ways to have the students write them because they are super tricky.  This folder is a Handwriting Folder (you can read my post about them here) and I use this sometimes to help my students learn about the sounds.  I say a sounds and the students trace it!  The students love doing this. 

Next weekend is one of my favorite days.  It is Mother's Day.  We always have a Mother's Day Tea at my school and the students give their present to their mom on that day.  This year I wanted to make something new.  

I wanted to make something that mothers would treasure!  

I wanted to make something that mothers would appreciate.  

I took a couple different ideas and came up with what I wanted my students to make.  

Are you ready?

Each student got a canvas.  Two letter M's were taped on the canvas.

Next, we talked about flowers.  Then we painted flowers on the canvas together.  I showed them step by step what to do under the document camera.

Then, the next day we added the background/leaves to our beautiful flowers.

Once the background dried, we ripped of the taped M's.

A beautiful MOM flower for a beautiful Mom!

I took a picture of each of my students holding a bouquet of flowers.  I printed them off and added them to a frame the students painted.

Last we wrote a letter to our Mom's telling her why we loved her.

I love how everything turned out! I think it is precious and I hope the mom's love it too.

Have a Wolfelicious week!

Jamberry Independent Consultant
http://aprilwolfe.jamberrynails.net

Working on Fluency

Working on Fluency

We use Read Well as our Reading program at my school.  During the guided reading part of Read Well the students have to be able to say the sounds, blend words, know sight words, and read the passage fluently.  I have noticed that my kiddos are struggling with the fluency part so I have been on a mission to help them.  Here are some of the things I have been doing with them.

I copied all of the homework our reading program has.  I clipped them together and everyday I pull for reading groups the students start at the beginning and read as far as they can for five minutes.  I mark where the students left off and then the next day we compare where the end up.  We see if it is further or at the same spot.  I stress to the readers that if they are missing words that they are not helping themselves, so they need to make sure they are reading accurately.  Here is one of my kiddos doing this. 

 

With this reading program there are two types of reading we do each day.  One is the story I read the little words and the students read the big words.  Then after that story there is a solo story for the students to read.  I usually have the students read it all together first and then I call them one by one to read it out loud while the others point and follow along.  Here is a sample of one of my kiddos reading the solo story.

Everyday we practice smooth and bumpy blending.  There are always sounds and words that the kiddos practice.  There are also sight words on the sheet that they practice.  I go back and do the previous pages each day.  I have the students read the words and if they have trouble reading it, they can blend it to figure it out.  I think that repetition is key when working on reading and especially reading fluently.  Here is an example of a student completely the practice pages. 

Every third day in a unit for small group reading the students play a game.  The students LOVE these games.  They ask if they can play the game everyday.  One of the games is like Chutes and Ladders.  The other game is a bingo game.  I usually play the bingo day differently.  Sometimes I say a word or blend a word and the kiddos have to find the word and put a manipulative on it.  Sometimes I have them read and blend each box.  These games are great practice for blending and reading the sight words.  Here is a video of one of the students playing the game.  I have learned with the Chutes and Ladder game that if I flip the dice it keeps the game moving faster.

 I feel fluency is always difficult for students.  The more practice I can do with the students on fluency the better readers and writers they will be.



I am going to leave you with my son singing the ABC's.  

 

Fluency Board, Sound out words

Fluency Practice

I have been working with my class on Fluency.  This is such a difficult lesson for students to understand and be able to do.

Fluency Board

The Fluency Board can be used with sight words and/or letter recognition.  The Fluency Board has a table on the paper.  4 rows and 5 columns.  Each row consists of the same 5 words or letters but in a different order.  Using this helps the child to learn to look at all the letters to figure out the word instead of guessing.   

Student reading me her Fluency Board

Here is a *freebie* of the Fluency Board I use.  After I assess the students knowledge of letters and sight words, I go back and look at the ones they missed.  Then I plug the ones they missed into the Fluency Board.  I have a parent volunteer, intern, assistant, or myself read with each student as often as time allows.  Click on the picture below to download the board. 

**Freebie**  Board

Stretching Out Words and then Bumpy Blending

We use the Read Well program in kindergarten at my school.  One of the great things about that program is that it really teaches the students to sound out words and how to apply the sounds.  I took some video clips of some of the things I do with the students during small group reading time. 

 

In this clip, the students are stretching out words and then bumpy blending.  I give the students a word and they use a slinky to help them stretch (blend) out the word.  Then they put the slinky down and bump (segment) the sound.  Then they tell me how many sounds make up the word.  We do this every day during small groups. 

This has helped my kiddos sound out words for spelling.  It is funny to watch them write sentence because you see them stop write and stretching out the sounds.  :)  I love when I see them using things they have been taught.