Fluency
How does increasing high frequency and vocabulary knowledge help improve fluency in reading?
Jamillah Simpson
Dr. David Koppenhaver
Re 5710
February 24, 2011
“I'm sure we would not have had men on the Moon if it had not been for Wells and Verne and the people who write about this and made people think about it. I'm rather proud of the fact that I know several astronauts who became astronauts through reading my books.” Arthur C. Clarke (1917 - ), Address to US Congress, 1975
This quote helped me to think about my students and how reading should be such an important part of your life. You can be anywhere, do anything, go anywhere just by reading a book. Books can make you smile, make you sad, and educate you. Why aren’t my students enjoying reading as much as I do? Then I began to listen to my students read. And my question was answered. They read choppy, stop for long periods of time to try to sound out words and can’t remember anything that they have read. So I began to reflect on myself as teacher and see if I have given my students every opportunity to be successful. The one thing that I thought of was the fact my students had trouble on reading sight words/high frequency words and vocabulary words. These are the thoughts that initiate me to ask the following question:
How does increasing high frequency and vocabulary knowledge help improve fluency in reading?
Reading fluency is a primary element in the reading process. It is the ability to read orally with speed and efficiency, including word recognition, decoding, and comprehension (Chard & Pikulski, 2005). One reason for the lack of knowledge base on reading fluency development is that very few early interventions or descriptive studies target fluency as an important outcome (Speece 387-399). By the time children are in the first grade they should be able to read words by sight and through decoding strategies. Ultimately children must be able to accurately and quickly identify words in text.
Interventions
Traditionally, literacy interventions are typically watered down instruction and segmenting of text that results in a lack of comprehension and interest (Allington, 2002). One way to help students achieve fluency is through the use of word walls and word wall activities (Callella, 2001). Using the Word wall as a teaching tool began as a way for teachers to motivate children as they worked to internalize newly learned terminology (Green, 1993). Word walls are bulletins boards that contain a collection of high frequency. There activities include games that focus on using the word wall to learn sight words. Three ways to make your Word Wall active is through movement, music, and modeling its use. Movement promotes children’s thinking as it helps their brains grow and develop (Diamond, 2000). The reading racetrack experiment showed that the reading racetrack procedure was effective with students who have disabilities. The improved reading fluency and reduced error rate was a direct result of the reading racetrack procedure (Hyde 50-53).Readers Theatre was another intervention that I read about and was able to use to show that vocabulary knowledge is important in order to read fluently. In the research the students in the Readers Theatre class made significant growth in two aspects of fluency: fluidity and expression. Such fluency growth is important for struggling readers, “while fluency in and of itself is not sufficient to ensure high levels of reading achievement, fluency is absolutely necessary for that achievement because it depends upon comprehension” (Pikulski & Chard, 2005, p. 517).
Teacher Background
How teachers and students in Reading First schools are doing in the area of reading fluency was a question that some of my articles answered. In one article they also interested in what teacher knew about reading fluency, one of the five key areas of reading emphasized in Reading First. Also they were interested in what reading fluency development of their students and most importantly, the relationship between teachers’ knowledge of reading fluency and their students’ growth in rate and accuracy. The study demonstrates that teacher knowledge about reading fluency matters. In general, teachers who knew more had students who read quickly and accurately (Holly, Lane& Hudson, Roxanne & Leite, Walter& Kosanovich, Marcia& Strout, Meridith, 57-86). Teacher education is such a huge part of being a high qualified and flourishing teacher. Staying on top of the latest interventions, technology and other educational benefit will help improve your teaching and your students. Learning new ways to teach high frequency words and vocabulary keeps you and your students fresh and motivated for change. “If you keep doing the same thing, you will get the same results.” So sometimes you have to change what you are doing in order to get a different outcome.
Implications for the future
This study meant a lot to me and my classroom. I feel like students who come from a low income house should be given the same opportunities or more than other students. A lot of times I believe some teacher look at those students as no hope, no future, and why even try. But that is the wrong attitude to have and if you have that kind of attitude you defiantly shouldn’t be teaching. Providing students with a print rich environment, where they learn and are exposed to words, literature, and educated teachers will help to improve reading and allow student the opportunity to be successful. When students have high frequency word knowledge and vocabulary knowledge they are able to read better and with more fluency. With this come comprehension, motivation, and so many other things. Fluency is so important for students to increase in their reading because it is one of the foundations to being a thriving reader. I will defiantly use what I have learned through this in research in my classroom. I will use different strategies such as word walls, reading race tracks, and readers theatre to help build high frequency word knowledge and build vocabulary. Using these strategies and focusing on the words will help my students become better readers and ultimately build their fluency. If teachers are well educated and prepared daily for success then all will be victorious.
Annotated bibliography
"Every Child A Reader High Frequency Words and fluency." Sep. 1998: 1-7. Web. 25 Feb 2011. <
The purpose of this article is to inform the reader about different strategies that will help with the learning of high frequency words and increasing fluency. The article says that proficient readers recognize the vast majority of words in texts quickly, allowing them to focus on the meaning of the text. So if students do not know high frequency words or take too much time reading than their comprehension will be low. The heart of independent reading is rapid recognition of high frequency words. Beginning with 25 of the most frequent words and extending by the end of primary grades to 5,000 words. It’s not that easy for a teacher to teach beginning with those 25 words. The teacher has to do more in order to provide the best opportunity for the students to learn. Because these high frequency words are not phonetically correct. Students most of the time, are not able to sound them out. They have to just know the words when they see them. The article says rapid recognition of this core group of high frequency words is gained through extensive involvement in reading and writing. This article talks about 3 strategies to improve high frequency words and fluency. Word walls, selecting appropriate text and multiple activities for fluent reading are the three ways. When using multiple text students should be exposed to choral reading, partner reading, independent reading, and home reading.
This article relates to my question about high frequency words. I am interest in effective strategies to teach high frequency words. This article gives me a background of how many high frequency words that a student should know and at what grade level to be proficient. I teach first grade and as a teacher it is important that you know what is expected of your little ones. This article gives a lot of information that I need to know. Children who finish first grade with the ability to read end of first semester first grade text are considered proficient or primer. This articles also answers my question by providing strategies such as using word walls to increase high frequency words. Clusters of words from a list, such as the 100 most frequent words in written English, can be presented in lessons and activities. One effective way of presenting these words is the word wall. (Cunningham,1998). So this article helps me in answering my question because it lets me know what the 100 most common words in English and tells me that using a word wall in indeed an effective way to teach high frequency words.
Hyde, Carrie A., (2009). The Effects of Reading Racetracks on the Sight Word Fluency and Acquisition for Two Elementary Students with Disabilities: A Further Replication and Analysis. The Open Social Science Journal, 2009, 2, 50-53.
The purpose of this study was to see the effects of reading racetracks on the sight word fluency for two students with disabilities. The study used two elementary students that attended a K-6 resource room. Angie was a female sixth grader who was learning disabled. She received services in reading and writing. Matthew was a fifth grader who has mild mental retardation. He receives special education services in reading, writing, and math. Both students were chosen because they had deficits in reading. The setting of this study was in the resource room for reading, writing, and math at a public elementary school. In the study they used the Dolch Sight word list, a stop, a watch, graph paper, pens and data collection sheets. The reading racetracks were simply drill sheets designed to resemble an automotive racetrack. The Dolch lists were high use words that the students needed to identify in their reading. There were two types of reading racetracks used in this study. Both types of tracks contained 28 cells. The first type of racetracks consisted of seven sight words that were repeated in random order. For Angie every fifth racetrack was a review containing 28 different words that were introduced in the four previous racetracks. For Matthew every third racetrack was a review of 14 different words from previous lessons. Both students read orally a word list made up of Dolch Sight Words. The results were that both students overall fluency of sight words increased by using the racetracks.
This study helps answer my question about effective ways to teach a high frequency words by informing me of the racetrack method. By using the racetrack students can work on fluency and sight word knowledge. Because sight words are just that, “words you know just by sight.” Using this can help student to build confidence and improve their fluency of reading high frequency words. So this racetrack method is one good and effective way to teach high frequency words. I can use this in my classroom for my students that are struggling with fluency and to give those students that are struggling the opportunity to do something a little different. Playing a game with this racetrack could be a lot of fun and educational all at the same time.
Bliss, Stacy. "Enhancing an English Language Learning Fifth Grade Student's Sight Word Reading with a Time-Delay Taped Words Intervention." School Psychology Review. 35.4 (2006): 663-670. Print. (Bliss 663-670)
The purpose of this study was to see if a student who is ELL can use sight words to help enhance English learning. In this study they used time delay tape interventions. For students who have immigrated to the United States from non-English speaking countries, English literacy skills are often fundamental for success in the American education system. They were investigating the effects of a modified taped word intervention on Dolch word reading of a fifth grade student who speaks English as a second language. The student completed a daily self managed intervention where he listened to list of 30 sight words while reading along, attempting to read the words before he heard it on the tape. The participant was a 13 year old boy. He and his family had emigrated from the Ukraine to the United States 2 years prior to the implementation of this study. This boy lived with his parents, two older brothers, and a younger sister. The primary language at home was Russian. He spoke Russian very fluently but was poor developed in reading his native language. At school, he was able to communicate with his teachers and peers in English consistently. He was enrolled in a general education fifth grade classroom and received additional instruction from a teacher specializing in ELL. His teachers were worried about phonemic skills and his frustration level was increasing because of his inability to read English text. So the teachers wanted to develop an efficient procedure that could be used to enhance his ability to read common English language words. The dependent variable was the number of words read correctly with 3 sets. On the first day the primary experimenter trained him on how to implement the self managed treatment. The goal was for him to complete this everyday. Following only one treatment his sight word recognition improved. Across the three word lists, his sight word reading accuracy increased rapidly and was maintained throughout the time of the study. Some informal reports were that his general education teacher reported that he now volunteers more when reading aloud and his parents say that they notice him speaking more English more.
This study answers my question because it talks about how using sight words will help students to read and with accuracy. I know that accuracy and reading all have to do with fluency. Using sight words to help build accuracy and reading will eventually help improve fluency in reading. Its good to see a study done on an ELL students because it gives me the information that using sight words will help increase all types of students. In my classroom I have about half ELL students who are really low learners because of the language barrier. I have some students who just say that they don’t understand anything that I say. So I could defiantly use this method of recording myself reading the words, giving them time to repeat or to read before I do on the tape. I can really see how this will help improve my students reading, accuracy and fluency. I am excited about this new intervention that I will use in my classroom and cant wait to see how well it will help my ELL students.
Jasmine, Joanne & Schiesl, Pamela, . "The Effects of Word Walls and Word Wall Activities on the Reading Fluency of First Grade Students." Reading Horizons. 49.4 (2009): 301-314. Print.
The purpose of this study was to improve the reading of high frequency words with first grade students. `The study was done with twenty first grade students, 11 boys and 9 girls at a rural public elementary school. The age of these students are six and seven years old. The study was done over a 4 week period. In groups of 4, students participated in one 40 minute learning word walls station a week. They did different activities throughout these 4 weeks that promoted sight word recognition and word wall building. During the 3rd and 4th week one teacher observed five randomly chosen students to examine how accurately they were completing word wall activities during their 40 minute station time. At the end of the 4 weeks data showed that reading fluency for these students increased. Students increased words read per minute. Even though most students improved some students still struggled with reading fluency and reaching the 40 word per minute expectation for the first grade. The struggling of fluency was thought to be because students were focusing on sounding out the sight word. This study proves that word wall activities might have been a factor that helped to build and strengthen high frequency word vocabulary resulting in an increase in fluency. Both pre and post test indicated that there was growth. So using word wall activities is one way that can increase fluency in reading.
This study helps me answer my question because it clearly gives me an idea about word walls and increasing fluency. This study proves my questions to be true. Using word walls, which consist of high frequency words, will increase fluency. As long as the teacher does it consistently and makes things fun for the students. Word walls are something that I use every year with my students. We introduce words and put them on our word wall, sometimes 5 a week. But using the word wall after that, I seldom do. Students should be using the word wall at all times during writing, reading, and any literacy where it would be appropriate. Referring to it and giving them activities to use to promote that will help increase high frequency word knowledge and ultimately increase fluency.