Fluency and Remote Learning

Kathi Byington

During this pandemic, teachers everywhere have developed creative, “out-of-the-box” strategies to ensure that their students experience authentic learning and receive immediate feedback to support continuity in their academic growth. Occasionally, this takes the form of tweaking a familiar assignment to not only help students practice an essential skill, but also to give the teacher the information necessary to support student improvement and confidence in that skill. I have found this to be true with my weekly fluency practice.

Under normal circumstances, I would listen to each of my students read aloud a weekly fluency passage from our reading anthology. I’d remind them to pay attention to pronunciation, phrasing, dialogue, and so on, and then ask them to answer a few questions verbally about what they had read. Now, because of my district’s half-the-class, half-day schedule, I do not have enough time with each student cohort to complete this with every student.

Listening to my students read aloud and being able to ask them questions about what they have read is imperative to my Daily 5/CAFE reading instruction, so here is how I have made “lemons into lemonade” under my time constraints:

1. I record the fluency instructions on the learning management system chosen by my district for reinforcement/homework assignments.
2. I ask my students to first silently read the assigned passage or article and the two comprehension questions about it from their reading practice workbook.
3. I then ask students to read the passage aloud while recording themselves. I tell them to focus on a specific fluency skill and to stop after each paragraph and tell me the “who” and the “what” so that I can be sure they are stopping to check for understanding. If necessary, I assure them that if they do not remember the “who” or the “what,” they are allowed to back up and reread the paragraph to find the answer.
4. While still recording, the students then answer the comprehension questions about the passage.

Once they submit their recording of their fluency practice for the week, I listen to it and record my response. Because their fluency reading is recorded, I can comment specifically on what I heard, give them tips on what they can do next time to improve, and celebrate accomplishments just like I would if I was sitting next to them in class. It is a win-win for all of us, and many students say this is their favorite weekly assignment because of my personally recorded response. Frankly, it is my favorite assignment of the week as well!

This pandemic has really thrown a wrench into the normal flow of our year. However, it has also given us an opportunity to take a “status quo” assignment and reinvent it to become more relatable and influential, and to give us a better glimpse into how our students learn and think.