One-Minute Fluency Measures

1. One-Minute Fluency Measures Mixed Messages and Instruction Shahzana Merchant Vanessa Carter Mary Calderbank Zahra Bijarkhna

2. According to The Literacy Dictionary,Fluency has 4 components • Accuracy • Rate of speed • Prosody • Comprehension (Deeney, 2010)

3. Deeney suggests endurance be added as a fluency component Because: • Endurance is a stumbling block for struggling reader • It is a necessary component of a deeper view of fluency. • Some struggling readers have reasonable rate and accuracy for only a short time. • Some readers experience the opposite.

4. One-Minute Fluency Assessmentsonly test for 3 components at the most • Accuracy • Rate of speed • Prosody

5. The Drawbacks of the One-Minute Frequency Assessments • The title is misleading. • It does not check for comprehension. • The student may be given incorrect instruction due to the results of the assessments. • The student may be put in the wrong level. • Eventually, the construct of fluency may be reduced to what is tested: accuracy and rate.

6. What Deeney suggests • Change the title of the test to One-Minute Accuracy and Rate Assessment. • The teacher make a mark to indicate where a minute is up, then have the child finish the passage. • The teacher record the type of mistake (miscue) instead of just making a slash mark. • Incorporate endurance with other assessments, such as, oral reading assessments.

7. continued • Teachers should occasionally use longer texts 4-5 minutes in assessments and informal reading inventories. • Teachers should be aware of both endurance and fluency in instruction. • Decrease readability levels until endurance is achieved. • Get parents on board.

8. continued • Have the child reread books. • Have the child read interesting text. • Gradually increase reading volume.I • Increase expectations.