'For Students Who Are Not Yet Fluent, Silent Reading Is Not the Best Use of Classroom Time'

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Debbie_Hepplewhite
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'For Students Who Are Not Yet Fluent, Silent Reading Is Not the Best Use of Classroom Time'

Post by Debbie_Hepplewhite »

This is well worth reading for class teachers - but please preservere until the end to get the complete picture/guidance:

https://www.aft.org/periodical/american ... d-read-how

Drop Everything and Read—but How?

For Students Who Are Not Yet Fluent, Silent Reading Is Not the Best Use of Classroom Time


By Jan Hasbrouck

After more than 20 years as the neglected goal of reading instruction (Allington, 1983; NICHD, 2000), fluency has finally become the hot topic among reading researchers, professional development providers, and teachers. These days it is rare to pick up a reading journal, attend a professional conference, or sit in a faculty staff room at a school without hearing someone discussing reading fluency. Surely most every educator has heard the message that if students aren't sufficiently fluent in their reading, they won't have sufficient comprehension. Given this clear statement—supported by a strong consensus of high-quality research studies—teachers and administrators everywhere are searching for ideas to help their students become fluent readers.

As someone who has conducted research on fluency over the past two decades, I find the current buzz both promising and troubling. As I will explain, fluency is a vital reading skill, but the buzz around fluency is reaching deafening levels—and crucial details from the research are being overlooked. As a result, schools across the country are putting significant amounts of time and effort into two instructional strategies for improving fluency that the research does not support: silent reading and Round Robin Reading (RRR). Developing fluency among struggling readers takes more intensive, carefully guided practice than either of these strategies can deliver. Let's take a quick look at how these ineffective strategies became so popular and move on to an in-depth discussion of what reading fluency really is and how teachers can help their struggling students.
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