[Reading-hall-of-fame] RE: Reading-hall-of-fame Digest, Vol 42,
Issue 1
Jay Samuels
samue001 at umn.edu
Wed Nov 4 14:38:37 GMT 2009
Jan, you ended your e-mail message with the following question: " So? >From a teacher's perspective I'd like to know what do we mean, what does research mean by 'fluency'?
Why is fluency so important in early reading? Is it more important than comprehension?
Maybe Don, these questions might be the starting point for an article.
Jan
What we mean by fluency is the heart of a heated controversy. I feel partly responsible in that I did not do as good a job as a should have defining "fluency" in the National Reading Panel Final Report. The definition of fluency is derived from automaticity theory which states a person is automatic at a task when the person can do two difficult tasks at the same time. If a person can do two demanding tasks simultaneously, at least one of them is automatic. For example, driving a car through heavy traffic and talking to a passenger seated next to you. It is the driving that is automatic. Fluent readers can decode the text and understand it simultaneously. Since the definition of fluency embraces simultaneous comprehension, your question about what is more important, fluency or comprehension, puts me into a position of "it depends". In the end, to me, it is comprehension that is more important. Take the case of the struggling beginning reader who slowly works his way through a sentence decoding the words one by one, and then having decoded all the words retraces his steps over the sentence only this time to grasp its meaning. As a teacher, I am happy the student has comprehended the sentence. But, in my talks to students, I remind them of the following, "Beyond accuracy to automaticity". Accurate word recognition followed by comprehension is a slow process and our goal as reading teachers is to go one step beyond and to develop fluent readers who can do both steps at the same time.
Accurate word recognition, speed of decoding, prosody in oral reading, are all only what I call the indicators of fluency but they are not the sine qua non of fluency. Fluency is the ability to do two things at the same time, decode and comprehend simultaneously. Our profession is in need of tests that measure two things at the same time, decoding and comprehension. As I pointed out in a previous mailing DIBELS type tests encourage a regrettable mind set in some students. They think that reading speed is all that is important. We need to instill in students what I think of as "engagement" the need to engage comprehension and thinking processes as we read.
But wait! Haven't I painted myself into a corner. Doesn't decoding precede meaning? I worried about this problem until I started to get into the research on eye movements. It is only during the eye fixation pause in reading that there is uptake of information and processing. During the length of a typical fixation pause in reading, about 1/3 of a second in duration, that the two reading tasks can take place at the same time. In fact there are several models of what happens during an eye fixation that demonstrate 1/3 of a second is enough time to do the two tasks.
The ability to read with fluency to me is a bit of a miracle. For about 8 million years our species has been hard wired to process spoken language, language by ear. But it has only been for about 7000 years that our species has been processing language by eye, i.e., reading. Yet, with training we can overcome some of the design flaws of the retina and read with fluency. jay
-----Original Message-----
From: reading-hall-of-fame-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk [mailto:reading-hall-of-fame-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk] On Behalf Of Jan Turbill
Sent: Wednesday, November 04, 2009 4:29 AM
To: Leu, Donald
Cc: reading-hall-of-fame at lists.nottingham.ac.uk
Subject: Re: [Reading-hall-of-fame] RE: Reading-hall-of-fame Digest, Vol 42, Issue 1
Hi all
I would like to offer some comments observations and questions. Maybe
musings is a more appropriate term. Sorry I can't quote any research
on the topic. But here goes - this issue of fluency has interested me
from several perspectives for many years. I began my teaching life as
a kindergarten teacher (many years ago). Fluency was a key goal for my
students and I worked hard to develop their 'fluency'. A fluent reader
is a successful reader, was the message the Infants Mistress (sort of
like the principal of the k-2 part of the school) gave to us young
teachers in her care. My class' reading ability whether it be Kinder,
grade 1 or grade 2 was measured by their oral reading fluency. Several
years of this led me to wonder -- and I still see this thinking and
practice in classrooms today.
First there seems to be a view that fluency in reading can be measured
by speed and accuracy. For instance, teachers have been testing how
many words a child can read accurately in a minute for years (long
before DIBELS). As a result many teachers and children tend to think
speed is important in reading. Second fluency 'testing' can only occur
in oral reading not silent reading and thus reading aloud is valued
over silent reading. Yet many children got high marks but had little
or no understanding of what they'd read. Others whose reading was
considered less fluent because of the errors, or slowness or 'lack of
expression' had great understanding of what they'd read.
So? From a teacher's perspective I'd like to know what do we mean,
what does research mean by 'fluency'?
Why is fluency so important in early reading? Is it more important
than comprehension?
Maybe Don, these questions might be the starting point for an article.
Jan
Sent from my iPod
02 4448 5017
0438098641
On 04/11/2009, at 7:52 PM, "Leu, Donald" <donald.leu at uconn.edu> wrote:
> Now THIS is how these new online technologies SHOULD be used:
>
> Long-time leaders in our field engaging in powerful discussion about
> central issues, each with a long history of the finest contributions
> in research to their specific area of work. I am sitting here
> marveling and in awe of the exchange. Thank you David, David,
> Arthur, and Jay!!!!
>
> Truly a memory I shall not soon forget! I hope it continues.
>
> Perhaps it is too naïve to think that someone should pick this up an
> d publish the discussion, assuming it continues at such a high level
> with such important minds, as they continue to look more deeply at
> this central issue. I wonder if the RHOF should initiate a series o
> f discussion topics and try to replicate what we have all just read,
> in other areas with other voices? Perhaps it might begin with an i
> ssue or with a recent, important study.
>
> Maybe this is too unique to these voices and this issue, though, or
> that my early morning mind gets too excited, too easily. I am
> holding my breath, hoping this important discussion continues.
>
> In all cases, thank you!!
>
> Cheers,
>
> Don
> --
> Donald J. Leu, Ph.D.
> John and Maria Neag Endowed Chair in Literacy and Technology
> Board of Directors, International Reading Association
> University of Connecticut
> 249 Glenbrook Road
> Storrs, CT 06269-2033
> Office: 860.486.0202 Office Fax: 860-486.2994
> Cell: 860.680.3752 Home: 860.447.8881
> The New Literacies Research Lab: http://www.newliteracies.uconn.edu/
>
> "Every one of us is given the gift of life, and what a strange gift
> it is.
> If it is preserved jealously and selfishly, it impoverishes and
> saddens. But if it is spent for others, it enriches and beautifies."
>
> -- Geraldine Ferraro.
> Acceptance speech at the 1984 Democratic Party National Convention.
>
>
>
> ________________________________
> From: Jay Samuels <samue001 at umn.edu>
> Date: Tue, 3 Nov 2009 23:35:15 -0500
> To: "P. David Pearson" <ppearson at berkeley.edu>, Arthur N Applebee <AApplebee at uamail.albany.edu
> >
> Cc: <reading-hall-of-fame at lists.nottingham.ac.uk>, <gaysu at pinnelleducation.com
> >, David Olson <dolson at oise.utoronto.ca>
> Subject: RE: [Reading-hall-of-fame] RE: Reading-hall-of-fame Digest,
> Vol 42, Issue 1
>
> If I understand Pearson's comment correctly, he is stating that if
> you take an indicator of fluency such as reading speed and make it
> into the goal, you are creating a possible problem. Conversely,
> however, if lack of processing speed turns out to be a problem, to
> ignore the student's problem simply adds to the student's troubles.
> The diagnostic solution? Reminds me of a little saying, "Different
> strokes for different folks.".. jay samuels
>
>
> From: P. David Pearson [mailto:ppearson at berkeley.edu]
> Sent: Tuesday, November 03, 2009 10:08 PM
> To: Arthur N Applebee
> Cc: P. David Pearson; David Olson; Jay Samuels; reading-hall-of-fame at lists.nottingham.ac.uk
> Subject: Re: [Reading-hall-of-fame] RE: Reading-hall-of-fame Digest,
> Vol 42, Issue 1
>
> What all of this says to be is that comprehension skills and
> strategies, like phonics skills and strategies (and like the
> assessment of enabling skills), go awry when they become goals not
> tools to assist learning or, put differently, when they become ends
> not means. So a skill or strategy brought forward at a particular
> moment to solve a particular problem, might be just what a student
> needs to achieve that productive cumulative experience in a domain
> of knowledge or inquiry. But set aside, isolated, and taught and
> practiced as an isolated end unto itself becomes an irrelevant
> curricular appendage.
>
>
>
> But to move to the other end of the continuum--the direct refusal to
> offer kids any advice about how to enact a routine of some sort to
> solve a problem of some sort--seems equally as misguided.
>
>
>
> So the only think that makes sense is the situated instruction and
> enactment of any sort of "procedures", whatever label--skill,
> strategy, process, or routine--we give it.
>
>
>
> David P.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> On Nov 3, 2009, at 6:06 PM, Arthur N Applebee wrote:
>
>
> David,
> I think you are touching on a central issue-the difference between
> novice and expert may be a function of the knowledge of the domain
> gained through cumulative experience, rather than the attainment of
> specific knowledge or skills through direct instruction. But we
> often focus on the skills, rather than the guided immersion in the
> domain that leads to productive cumulative experience. We framed
> our AERJ study of discussion-based approaches to the development of
> understanding in part in terms of the literature on comprehension
> strategies, but the results suggest that the process of sustained
> and focused discussion, without an emphasis on specific
> comprehension strategies, has a powerful effect on learning. Our
> work was with middle and high school students, but I think the
> general principle is true across ages.
> Arthur
> (Arthur N. Applebee, J. Langer, M. Nystrand, & A. Gamoran,
> Discussion-based approaches to developing understanding: Classroom
> instruction and student performance in middle and high school
> English. American Educational Research Journal 40:3, 685-730, 2003. )
>
> ________________________________
>
> From: reading-hall-of-fame-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk
> [mailto:reading-hall-of-fame-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk] On
> Behalf Of David Olson
> Sent: Tuesday, November 03, 2009 4:54 PM
> To: Jay Samuels
> Cc: reading-hall-of-fame at lists.nottingham.ac.uk
> Subject: Re: [Reading-hall-of-fame] RE: Reading-hall-of-fame Digest,
> Vol 42, Issue 1
>
>
> Jay et al:
>
> In my view "processing speed" is merely a reflection of one's
> knowledge. But I think the question raises a more general
> question. In reviewing a bunch of papers on literacy, it occurred
> to me that there is a considerable gap among experts (like
> ourselves) on the following issue:
>
> Do tested differences between the good and poor readers, the
> literate and the non/less literate, provide a reliable guide as to
> what should be taught.
>
> I think not. And that included speed of processing. Whereas most/
> many literacy researchers seem to think that if good/poor readers
> differ on, say, short term memory for letters, vocabulary, sentence
> comprehension, inferencing, etc. that implies that such "skills"
> should be taught. That assumption is taken for granted by most
> prescriptive reading programs. I don't agree.
>
> How about you?
>
> David
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> +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
>
> P. David Pearson
>
> Professor and Dean
>
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>
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>
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>
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>
> website for presentations: www.scienceandliteracy.org <http://www.scienceandliteracy.org
> >
>
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>
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> ~189290/page/fc6f1431-1058-4118-80f1-9249dd68c3b6
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