Promote comprehension with fluency. Perhaps one of the most important factors in helping students attain the habit of good reading is fluency. Fluency is the bridge between decoding and comprehension. Fluent readers move beyond the challenge of decoding to create meaning from the written word.

Children need to learn the names of letters and the sounds associated with each letter or letter combination. Sight words should become so familiar that there isn't any hesitation when they are encountered in a sentence or passage. Many emergent readers lack fluency as they begin to read. The cause of fluency problems for beginning readers is that they are processing many new things at the same time. They are just beginning to expand their sight vocabulary and are learning word-identification strategies. For beginning readers, fluency may be considered a developmental process. As they learn more reading strategies they become more fluent.

Older students often have difficulty reading fluently when they lack a basic sight vocabulary and effective word-identification strategies. Fluent readers, on the other hand, have a variety of comprehension strategies that they apply to the text before reading, during reading, and after reading. Fluent readers are in charge of the process.

Once fluent readers begin reading in earnest, they add another set of skills and strategies to promote comprehension. A fluent reader sees reading as an opportunity to gain knowledge about the world and to feel more self-secure in school and among peers.

St. Ferdinand's reading program teaches reading skills that promote and encourage students to become fluent readers.

Thursday, January 14, 2010
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