Improving Your Reading Fluency

A Comprehensive Guide to Reading more Effectively.

What is Reading Fluency?

The word “fluency”, is derived from the Latin word fluens, a term used to describe the act of “flowing freely” or being in a “state of relaxation”. When we define “reading fluency”, we are looking at the reader’s ability to read with ease and competence. Everyone with the ability to read has their own distinct level of reading fluency. But this cannot simply be achieved with the best English grammar book at your disposal. To possess this skill, the person must have the ability to read the text accurately, quickly, and with appropriate expression.

This is why you learn how to learn English reading skills the right way. Fluent reading is something you can learn in the comfort of your own home. It’s something that can be easily integrated into your daily routines and practiced often.

In this blog, we will explore some easy exercises you can use at home to improve your reading fluency. It will cover the most effective reading comprehension strategies. We will begin with defining the 3 basic mechanics behind reading, and then provide helpful techniques to improve these mechanisms. Through extensive research, it has been found that Accuracy, Automaticity, and Prosody are the essential modes of learning fluency for students.

Accuracy

Accuracy in reading is the reader’s ability to identify words without error. It is the most essential component of reading fluency. This requires the reader to accurately identify graphemes (letters) and phonemes (sounds) while decoding them at the same time. When a reader has learned the relationship between words and sounds, they are well on their way to becoming a fluent reader.

Judging by this definition, accuracy may seem like it’s the only skill required to decode sentences. But reading is so much more than knowing words. It must be accompanied by perfecting the reading rate (automaticity) and expression (prosody).

Accuracy can be easily measured by the number of mistakes compared to the word count. If you make more mistakes than the word count, you need to practice your word recognition more. Pay attention to punctuation as one of the essential components of fluency practice. Try timing yourself to find which words take longer to identify, and work from there. This will improve your automaticity as well.

Automaticity

The definition of the term automaticity is “the quality or fact of being performed involuntarily or unconsciously, as a reflex, innate process, or ingrained habit”.

During independent reading, you want to develop automaticity with various speed-based exercises. Studies have shown that many factors will contribute to your automaticity in reading. The best way to identify an automatic reader is by judging their rate of reading. If they can carry long phrases without stopping to pause, they have strong automaticity. If the reader makes pauses between each word, then they will need to improve their reading rate with practice. But this is not a race; automaticity is less about reading fast, and more about reading with ease.

The automaticity of a reader is heavily influenced by their accuracy and fluency skills. Readers who cannot place words in their proper context will take more time working through lengthy passages. This trouble can be identified by setting a time limit on reading, and evaluating the information you managed to gather in that time.

Prosody

Prosody is the reader’s ability to read with the correct expressions. To possess accurate prosody, the reader must demonstrate the proper pitch, tone, volume, emphasis, and rhythm in their reading. It requires the opposite of silent reading, where instead the essential element of this task is sight reading aloud. Without the correct expression, attitudes cannot be conveyed cohesively. Anger may come across as happiness, sarcasm might be taken seriously, and all other humor will fall flat.

This is usually the last skill of fluency to be perfected, as understanding where to use expression requires a subconscious effort that cannot be accessed in the more practical phases of silent reading comprehension. Choppy readers may implement additional strategies to this sight reading so they can achieve better fluency skills.

To test your prosody. Try reading a text which has complex emotion to an audience (ie. poems, songs, stories) and ask them how they feel after. If you have perfected your prosody, the audience should mirror the feeling you were attempting to convey.

As you can see, reading fluency relies heavily on reading to yourself and others. Speech and reading are so intertwined that you cannot expect to become an expert reader without speaking first. This is why babies always begin speaking before they can read. Consistent practice of prosody is essential to fluency because sound and meaning are forever intertwined.

How do we improve our reading fluency?

Now that we know the 3 skills our brain must acquire, we need a strategy. If you’re lucky enough to have access to classes, these tips can be helpful supplements. However, most people delay improving their reading fluency because they have other time commitments. Not everyone can put the time aside to outsource classes.

Luckily, the 3 aforementioned skills can be learned through a collection of at-home exercises. We understand that most people seek easy methods of practice that can be used any time, any place. Reading should be accessible to all students regardless of where they are in the world. Below we have identified some simple, but effective tactics to use at home. Most of which can be achieved independently.

Learn Sight Words

Knowing this is one of the most essential skills in common reading practice. Sight words usually come in the form of adjectives and verbs. These are the commonly used terms like “they” “it” “when” “how”. They are the thread that sews sentences together. By becoming proficient in sight words before learning nouns and less-common vocabulary, the reader will be able to piece together sentences with more accuracy.

A simple activity for students to improve their comprehension skills of sight words is:

• Writing them all down and hanging them in places you see often (fridge, office pinboard, bathroom mirror)
• Arrange them alphabetically, this will help your mind see them as essential instead of randomized (ie. a, an, at, are, as, at, and, all, about, after)
• Repeatedly highlight them in sentences and define them as you go! Practice makes perfect.

Preview Vocabulary

In a learning environment, the teacher will often teach you a collection of nouns to search for in sentences. This is an excellent and effective method of teaching vocabulary and boosting fluency levels, because it activates the part of the human brain that aims to gather information. Think of it like a word search, only instead of incoherent letters surrounding the words, they’re surrounded by recognizable sight words.

You can accomplish this at home by:

• Choosing a text with the subject matter you’re looking to learn (ie. “Preview Vocabulary” books on animals, food, and plants)
• Use search engines such as Google to find keywords you’re looking to learn
• Find a friend who wants to work on their vocabulary, and preview words for them before they read a text

Comprehension

Not understanding comprehension is one of the greatest reading difficulties and the ultimate goal for student progress. So it’s essential to implement these key strategies in your daily practice. After comprehensive reading passages, it’s important to test yourself to see if you genuinely absorbed the information. If you’re learning a new language, try keeping a notebook nearby so you can summarize what you have just read. Be sure to:

• Identify the Who, What, Where, When, and Why (if applicable)
• Summarize in paraphrased terms
• Explain to someone else what you have just read in detail

Relaxed environment

Try to make this as fun as possible! If you find academic methods of learning to be off-putting, try using social media and other leisurely activities as a tool for improving your reading fluency. Use subtitles when you watch your favourite TV show or invest in exciting accurate reading material like adventure stories or funny comics. The aim is to make your learning environment something you will enjoy coming back to.

You can also make the environment more relaxed by involving friends in your activities. This will make reading classroom practices a fun environment. Some aspects of reading you can enjoy with friends are:

• Reading aloud to each other
• Communicating over messenger apps in the desired language
• Sharing progress and congratulating each other on your success

Reading Aloud

Extensive research has been put towards analyzing the relationship between reading aloud and reading competency. The easiest way to identify students’ reading capabilities is by asking them to read something aloud. This is because stronger readers with a high-level understanding will be able to successfully incorporate the 3 skills of reading fluency (accuracy, automaticity, and prosody).

In order to achieve this intermediate level of reading fluency, it’s important to use reading aloud as your primary method of testing yourself. If you find that you can incorporate all of the 3 research-based practices with ease in your reading, then you know you can start increasing the difficulty and complexity of your reading material. This critical reading skill can be measured by:

• Recording yourself and comparing it to someone of an intermediate reading level
• Timing yourself to see how long it takes to string together a cohesive sentence
• Testing yourself with expressive readings such as joke-telling or reading a poem

Listening

Studies have shown that audio-assisted reading builds a stronger foundation for reading development than simply reading alone. A study in Japan showed that students who read while listening had the highest overall scores in reading fluency compared to students who used silent-listening and listening-only techniques. This study also showed a preference for students having the assistance of written-text to aid their listening. Through this experiment, students who listened while they read had a greater understanding of phonetics, expression, and overall understanding.

Phonetics are impossible to perfect without hearing them first. Before you read something, try listening to it first to increase your retention. With apps like LillyPad, you can have any audio book passage you want to be read aloud to you before you attempt reading it yourself. Think of it as your own personal vocabulary preview.

LillyPad is a specialized tool designed to integrate the convenience of an e-reader with the benefits of a reading companion. This app is perfect for the student who wants to improve their reading fluency from the comfort of home. Aside from the plethora of reading material provided in Lilly’s library, you can personalize it as well. Any academic journal, novel, or file you have can be imported into this e-reader. Once you have curated a selection of material you feel inspired by, you can read everything in 4 different ways with Lilly!

Frequently Asked Questions

Learn from History – Follow the Science – Listen to the Experts

Reading fluency is a skill that everyone can acquire. By working on your Accuracy, Automaticity, and Prosody through the tips we shared above, you will be on your way to a world of expressive, coherent reading skills to accompany you through life. If knowledge is power, then reading is the battery! Charge your battery today with LillyPad.

What’s the one thing that makes LillyPad so special? Lilly! She is your artificially intelligent English tutor, and she has people talking all over the world! Lilly makes improving your English easy. With Lilly you can read in four different ways, and you can read just about anything you love. And learning with Lilly, well that’s what you call liberating!

For learners of all ages striving to improve their English, LillyPad combines the most scientifically studied and recommended path to achieving English fluency and proficiency with today’s most brilliant technologies!

Additionally, the platform incorporates goal setting capabilities, essential tracking & reporting, gamification, anywhere-anytime convenience, and a significant cost savings in comparison to traditional tutoring methodologies.

At LillyPad, everything we do is focused on delivering a personalized journey that is meaningful and life-changing for our members. LillyPad isn’t just the next chapter in English learning…

…it’s a whole new story!

Do you want to improve your English? Visit www.lillypad.ai.

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