4 Steps to Teach Reading Fluency
- National Center on Improving Literacy
- Mar 24
- 1 min read
Updated: Apr 30
It is important that students have opportunities to practice reading aloud with teacher feedback to develop fluent and accurate reading with expression. Reading connected text daily supports students’ reading accuracy, fluency, and comprehension. Here are four steps teachers can use in the classroom to help students build literacy fluency with text.
1. Repeated Readings
Read the same passage several times.
Aim to reduce the time and number of errors with each attempt.
Use this strategy with students individually, with a peer, or in small groups.
2. Goal Setting
Identify the number of correct words to read per minute.
Set a goal to read farther in the passage or make fewer errors.
Define weekly learning targets to monitor progress over time.
Identify an end-of-year grade level target for number of words read per minute.
3. Corrective Feedback
Give immediate feedback if a student makes an error.
Have the student sound out and repeat the word.
Have the student go back and re-read the sentence.
4. Graphing Performance
Let students see their progress by having them graph their performance.
Have students compare their first read-through to the next read-through.
Have students track their targets and progress over time.
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Suggested Citation
National Center on Improving Literacy (2020). 4 Steps to Teach Literacy Fluency with Text. https://www.improvingliteracy.org/post/4-steps-to-teach-literacy-fluency-with-text
