4 Ways to Promote Better Reading Fluency for Kids

Part 4 of Our Series: Reading Roots — The 5-Step Journey for Kids

Reading Time: 2 mins, 16 secs

storytelling father and daughter, smiling, sitting on the bed looking at an open book

What is reading fluency? According to WebMD, reading fluency refers to a person’s “ability to read with proper speed, accuracy, and expression.” In other words, fluency is directly correlated with how readers — children, in particular — understand and enjoy the things they read.

Strategies for Improving Your Child’s Reading Fluency

Developing strong reading fluency doesn’t happen overnight. There are several ways to help improve fluency in young readers, including modeling, repeated reading, pacing, and expression.

Here are four ways to practice these critical skills:

1. Model Strong Reading

Teachers and parents use modeling to showcase a skill to children. Help your child improve fluency by reading passages out loud and encouraging them to follow along on their own. When reading out loud to kids, choose texts that are at or above their reading level so they can hear proper pacing, inflection, and expression. To aid in comprehension, pause occasionally to ask questions about the passage.

Tip: Turn reading into a family activity by inviting the whole family to enjoy a story together. This is an easy way to practice reading aloud and model good reading skills.

2. Re-Read Passages Multiple Times

Repeatedly reading the same passage aloud multiple times and stopping to decode tricky words helps kids gain confidence and enhances their familiarity, leading to better accuracy and understanding.

Tip: For added practice, challenge students to read to each other in groups so they can mimic one another and adjust their reading patterns accordingly.

3. Practice Pacing

Pacing refers to the rate at which a story is told. When learning to read, pacing can be difficult for students who need more time to sound words out or identify definitions. Easy ways to practice pacing include chunking sentences into related groups and using punctuation marks as cues to regulate reading pace. These activities help students learn the rhythm of the text and can help them to understand a story piece by piece.

Tip: Have readers track words or sentences with their hands or pointers so that you can see the pace at which they are reading.

4. Be Expressive

Like pacing, expression is essential to reading fluency because it helps readers connect emotionally with the story. To practice expression, children can act out the story and channel the characters’ emotions through the pitch of their voices. This can be helpful to students who struggle with overall comprehension and identifying the tone of the story.

Tip: Start with short stories or rhymes to help readers get into the rhythm of being expressive.

Ultimately, becoming a fluent reader takes time and requires a lot of practice. By practicing modeling, repeated reading, pacing, and expression with children, parents, and teachers can help them grow their confidence and become better readers.