Reading Fluency

READING FLUENCY

INTRODUCTION

Reading fluency is the ability to read connected text rapidly, effortlessly and automatically (Hook & Jones, 2004; Meyer, 2002). Readers must develop fluency to make the bridge from word recognition to reading comprehension (Jenkins, Fuchs, van den Broek, Espin & Deno, 2003). It is essential for all students to read fluently as they are “learning to read” up to Grade 3, but beginning in Grade 4, they are “reading to learn” (Chall, 1983). Middle school students represent a crucial starting point because they are in the midst of an important transition: they are now regularly being asked to apply their knowledge of how to read to learn from texts (Chall, 1983; Hagaman & Reid, 2008). Students with learning disabilities (“LD”) are most at risk for presenting difficulties in fluency, due to their weak ability to read sight words, decode new words, read phrases and sentences automatically and rapidly, leading to difficulties in reading comprehension (Chard, Vaughn & Tyler, 2002; Meyer & Felton, 1999).

Despite recent attention to reading fluency and ways to improve fluency, effective interventions for improving fluency are not widely known (Chard, Vaughn & Tyler, 2002).

FLUENCY

LaBerge and Samuels (1974) presented an automaticity theory of reading argued that proficient word-recognition skills underlie fluent reading and adequate comprehension of text. According to the model, fluent readers are characterized by the ability to read quickly and without conscious effort (Logan, 1997). Dysfluent readers, by contrast, are identified by their excessively slow, laborious reading, which, in turn, impairs comprehension. 1

Similarly, Perfetti’s (1977, 1985) verbal efficiency model suggested that slow word processing speed interferes with automaticity of reading, and therefore, with comprehension. Perfetti extended this explanation to suggest that slow word reading may be due to working memory. Thus, both rapid reading of

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