Current reading assessments put emphasis in the five components of reading competency, neglecting the self-efficacy needs of students. When students struggle with one of or all five components of reading competency, they could have negative feelings about themselves as a reader. This article offers teachers and effective user friendly assessment…

Teachers have used the method of repeated readings to build oral reading fluency in students with and without special needs. A new fluency building intervention called interval sprinting uses shorter timing intervals (i.e., sprints) across a passage. This study used an alternating treatment design to compare repeated readings and interval…

Evidence is growing that physical activity can impact cognitive functioning. This study examined the associations between physical activity, sedentary behavior and attitude toward physical activity on measures of literacy. Community literacy center participants (n = 20, mean age = 9.5 yrs.) wore accelerometers for three days and completed the…

Fluent oral reading is essential for success in elementary school. In this study, we investigated the effectiveness of enhanced reading fluency instruction for struggling readers. In a response-to-intervention context, the effort represented a primary intervention available to all students but provided only to those judged likely to need…

Reading is a vital skill for functioning in society. People need to read road signs, prescription labels, restaurant menus, and job applications just to make it through everyday life. Unfortunately, approximately 20% of the population (Washburn, & Joshi, & Binks-Cantrell, 2011) are said to be dyslexic which means they will struggle…

Over a 12-week period, the researchers implemented explicit and systematic reading instruction using grade-level fiction to evaluate the effects on the oral reading fluency and comprehension of seventh and eighth grade urban students at risk of academic failure. Ten students in the experimental group were provided systematic instruction consisting…

This study examined the relationship between two reading curriculum based measures (oral reading fluency and MAZE) and the reading and mathematics subsections of a high stakes test administered at the 5th and 6th grades. Bivariate correlations were conducted between each curriculum based measure and each subsection of the test. Results indicated…

This case study examined the effectiveness of three fluency interventions (i.e., repeated reading, audio listening passage preview and teacher modeled listening passage preview) with a fifth grade student struggling with fluency skills. When compared to baseline, each intervention increased oral reading fluency by the end of the 7 weeks of…

Research suggests that oral reading fluency frees up working memory so readers can focus on the meaning of a text, but traditional instruction in oral reading can be problematic in classrooms with students at different reading levels. Differentiating instruction, providing motivation to practice, as well as timely corrective feedback are practical…

The effects of preteaching key words on fluency in connected text were examined with three third-grade general education participants. Researchers used a multiple base-line design (i.e., Baseline and Wordlist Intervention) and found that preteaching increased fluency in connected text written above the participant's instructional level of reading…

Literacy instruction is once again at the forefront of school reform throughout North America. Numerous federal and state initiatives in the United States, such as Reading First and Response to Intervention, have either recommended or required that educators use research based curricular materials and instructional practices. This study is reports…

Programs that promote family literacy, as defined by Hannon (2003), are "programs to teach literacy that acknowledge and make use of learners' family relationships and engagement in family literacy practices." Why are such programs important for young learners? According to Livingston and Wirt (2003), children who have homes with books,…

Balanced literacy has been proposed as a compromise or middle ground between philosophical approaches to reading instruction that stress teaching of word recognition and those that stress construction of meaning. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness of the READ 180 balanced literacy supplementary instruction program on…

Students beyond the primary grades who struggle with reading lack basic word attack ability and are thus unable to read new words with accuracy. However, there has been little research that reveals the specific word attack errors students exhibit. In this study, 123 struggling adolescent readers receiving special education services were given the…

Adolescents with Emotional and Behavioral Disorders (EBD) present deficits in literacy skills, in part because their disruptive behaviors interfere with task engagement. Antecedent manipulations, such as those based on behavioral momentum theory, can increase students' contact with reinforcement, leading to greater task engagement. This study…