What Really Matters in Fluency: Research-based Practices across the Curriculum

by Richard L. Allington

Fluency has risen to the top of today’s instructional agenda and yet it is a process that is still unfamiliar terrain for many teachers. To help teachers acquire a fuller understanding of the complexity of fluency development, literacy researcher and best-selling author Dick Allington offers clear recommendations to guide classroom teachers in fostering development with a few modest changes to their daily reading lessons that will strengthen every student’s fluency development in his book What Really Matters in Fluency . Unlike any other book on the topic of fluency, Dick Allington provides a research-base that supports wide, free voluntary reading as an overlooked component in the development of reading fluency along with implications this has for planning fluency interventions. In addition, Dick provides a comprehensive discussion of the factors that inhibit fluency growth and a number of research-based instructional strategies and routines for turning struggling readers into fluent and achieving readers. Teachers will be inspired and confident to teach fluency! Take a look inside...

Genres: Professional Development, Teaching

144 pages, Paperback

First published April 3, 2008

Reviews

[Kim · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great book about fluency and what really works. I love his emphasis on the importance of good teachers rather than commercial packages. There's a lot of good information to share with parents about how the amount of time spent reading makes a difference. With limited hours in the school day and so much to do, it's imperative that parents play a role too. It's probably the most important academic foundation that parents can give their kids!

[ResearchOnDIBELS]

Richard Allington devotes a section of his book to "Why DIBELS is Not a Fluency Assessment", citing several studies conducted on DIBELS, including his own study showing large variations in DIBELS Oral Reading Fluency readings when one student reads three passages. Alternatives for fluency assessment are also provided.

[Maryellen]

Love the politics and respect the practice. Great retrospect and research on the role of fluency instruction: what it is and what it is not! It is giving me great strategies for some of my students.

[Amy · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you're a teacher in grades K-6, this is a must read.