need opinion on progress of fluency objective

You’re not missing anything. You’re right, the goal has not been addressed at all. So the question is, is the goal being addressed in instruction and the teacher is just filling in the form with the standard words (because she prioritizes her time to instructional things, perhaps, and is doing it in her sleept) or… hey, an IEP is a piece of paper, it doesn’t actually have anything to *do* with what I teach in theclassroom, right? That’s this set of worksheets that I found in the back closet…

(Truth probably somewhere in between…)

I don’t even think that objective is worded very well. But nevertheless, increasing fluency would be increasing words read CORRECTLY per minute. If accuracy is only in the 80’s, it sounds like to me the teacher needs to go back to second grade level text to work on fluency.

Janis

Because the reading selections are done by grade levels…with WPM integrated into the levels… She is using grade level as his final benchmark…I think…but what do I know…I’m not a teacher…just an SLP

It may be Read Naturally which the instructor said she would start about 3 weeks ago because I hadn’t noticed any fluency programs going on. I looked in my child’s folder 2 weeks ago and noticed the papers for recording wpm and such of the Read Naturally program were not filled out. I am getting the spedial ed director for the district to come in and see what’s going on . My child has done the Read Naturally program before and says she is not doing it at school. So I don’t know what is going on. Thanks for your help.everyone.

BE sure to document this little glitch in life, in writing. It can be in the form of a thank you letter to the special ed person going in to check things out — and of course copy the principal and the teacher. You say something to the tune of “I would like to thank you for stepping forward to observe and evaluate my child’s reading instruction. As you know, I am concerned because on her IEP, progress in fluency was reported as her accuracy in reading passages at dfiferent levels, and did not measure how fluently (words per minute) she could read at an accurate level (90% or more). I look forward to hearing from you in the next two weeks about how fluency is being addressed in her reading instruction, and how it will be measured. This school year is nearly half over, so I am hoping that this apparent omission of vital instruction to meet her goals and objectives will be addressed in a timely manner.”

Thank you for your guidance. That is a great idea. I had e-mailed the teacher asking for the wpm and what the errors were and am waiting to hear back. That will be a great follow up e-mail to the special ed director. Thanks for your help-

As much as I had learned about fluency- the probe should be something that the child can read with the accuracy greater than 95%- more than 5 errors per 100 words is considered a frustration level and should not be used for fluency evaluation. Thus, if the child is reading with only 80-87% accuracy the probe for fluency should be a lower level reading material (unless this is poor wording and it refers to 80-87 wpm- with unknown accuracy).

For fluency evaluation you should se the WPM (words read per minute) and errors per 100 words (for that probe, which should not be greater than 5/100).

Only then one can say that the child is reading so many words per minute.

For your reference- my child is just doing repeated readings in his LD school (reading the same passage until he masters it and also reading words in isolation for the more difficult words from that passage). They read until he reads 150 wpm for passage reading (after the errors are subtracted). The children usually do not make that many errors because they always start their fluencies at the low level- below what their reading level is. Just through repeated readings: my son was reading 4th grade material in the summer of last year with ~80 wpm- the initial read (rereading it at least twice daily until he could pass the paragraph at 150 wpm); today he is reading a 7th grade material with the initial read of 80-106 wpm. This is still low reading rate but he has made tremendous progress if one remembers where he was 15 months ago….They need to read at least twice daily- now in middle school- three times daily and twice on weekends and holidays (EVERY DAY NO EXCEPTIONS- including all vacations).

Ewa

Ewa, you did a better job explaining what I was trying to say! I think her son’s teacher does not understand fluency work at all, based on the information we have been told.

Janis

I think you may be right that she doesn’t understand fluency. I had E-mailed her asking about how many words per minute she is reading and what kind of errors were being made on the passages. She E-mailed me back saying she tested her on the book “Balto” that she is currently reading. She was at 80% accuracy with that book. The other two books she was tested on were third grade level books and she had an 87% an 85% reading accuracy. Words missed were simply decoded wrong. I think I am being clear in my questions but maybe I am not. but she doesn’t seem to be answering my questions. I have E-mailed her again asking for how many words per minute my child is reading. I also wanted a clearer understanding of what the errors were, but will E-mail later. The good news is the special ed director E-mailed me back and said he will view class after the holidays. (thanks Sue) Hopefully things will be better. Most of the reading class is taken up with the AVKO spelling , behavior issues are making it a very long session from what I viewed. I hope I can keep up with this as at times I feel like giving up, and I am nervous as the special ed director said he and the principle will view class and meet with me.The principle is nice but I don’t feel he understands my child’s needs as I have talked to him before about phonics and how my child needs it and he said children don’t need it after second grade.

Yes, that does not sound encouraging at all. She shouldn’t even be reading a book that she can only read 80%. I’m sorry to say, but sometimes resource is worse than no services at all.

Janis

Point out nicely to the principal that yes, students don’t need phonics after they have *mastered* second grade — but of course your child’s problem is that she did not master that skill in second grade, so she needs to catch it up.

wouldn’t it be easier to just sit down with the teacher and clean up the objective so you are on the “same page” about what is being or not being measured?

I have tried talking via E-mail and talking to her, but was getting no where. I finally sent a letter to her letting her know I wanted my child’s needs met. She sent them on to the principle ( which she told me) and special ed director (which I didn’t know).Still nothing happened, then after searching the school web site I found the special ed director’s E-mail and I E-mailed him my concerns. He and I did talk on the phone and he said he had her letter there of my concerns (It makes me wonder if he would have done anything unless I got a hold of him). We’ll see what the new year brings hopefully a better reading program and which me luck on my child’s speech therapy. Thanks everybody-

Since fluency is affected by passage difficulty, the objective should have both the reading level, words/minute, and accuracy defined within it. Ex: Given a one minuted timed passage at 3rd grade level, student will read at a rate of 100 wpm with 95% accuracy, averaged over three trials.

Hi guys…how’s everyone been doing?

Hi yourself :-) Pretty Peachy! Take off your coat & stay awhile …

Hi, Susan Long! Boy, have I missed seeing you here! Please do check in more often!

Janis