Early+Years+Readers

//**What have you learnt about Early Years Reading practices in terms of identifying suitable texts, assessing fluency and comprehension through your engagement with early year’s learners? **// Identifying a suitable text for students is immensely important in the development of early year’s readers. Books are organised into levels of difficulty in order to scaffold children’s reading development and ensure that they get sufficient practice. Susan Hill (2006) states the five concepts that the levels of text difficulty are based on � Complexity of concepts in the text � Complexity of syntax and vocabulary � Length of text � Size and placement of text on a page � The amount of contextual support in the illustration

Assessing fluency and comprehension of a student gives you an indication of which level of difficulty they should be reading at. **Fluency is the ability to read text accurately, at a suitable speed and with confidence. ** It can be considered a bridge between the act of decoding words and the development of reading comprehension. As children become fluent readers, they begin to think less about the words and more about the meaning of the sentences they're reading. Fluent readers become able to respond to the material with emotion and thought. Hill (2006 p.168) shows that if a reader is fluent � Words are read together in meaningful chunks, meaning that the tone or expression of the reading is more appropriate � There are few examples of word-by-word reading � There is attention to syntax and punctuation

Reading Fluency Rubric:
 * || ** Level 1: ** || ** Level 2 ** || ** Level 3 ** || ** Level 4 ** ||
 * ** Rate ** || Very little variation of rate || some variation of rate to suit the text || Attention to rate to suit the text || Full attention to an appropriate rate to suit the text ||
 * ** Phrasing ** || Reads word-by-word with frequent long pauses in between || reads mostly word-by-word but some 2-word phrases and perhaps 3 or 4 word phrases || mixture of word-by-word reading and phrased reading || reads in larger meaningful phrases with few word-by-word slowdowns for problem solving ||
 * ** Pausing ** || Very little awareness of punctuation || some awareness of punctuation and layout of print || Attention to punctuation and layout of print on the page || full attention to punctuation and layout of print on the page ||
 * ** Stress ** || Very little emphasis on appropriate words || Some awareness of emphasis on appropriate words to reflect the meaning of the text || Attention to emphasis on appropriate words to reflect the meaning of the text || Full attention to emphasis on all the appropriate words to reflect the meaning of the text. ||
 * ** Intonation or expression ** || Little expression interpretation || Some expressive interpretation || Consistent expressive use of tone, pitch and volume || Varied use of tone, pitch and volume interpretation evident throughout ||

Comprehension Table:


 * || Child 1 || Child 2 || Child 3 || Child 4 ||
 * Ability to answer literal questions || YES || YES || YES || YES ||
 * Able to answer interpretive questions || YES || YES || YES || YES ||
 * Ability to answer inferential questions || NO || YES || NO || NO ||

The implications for teachers regarding these results are that all students are at different levels and educators need to adjust their teaching methods to suit each child's individual needs. Results show that the more fluent the reader is the more likely they are to understand what they have read. Therefore answer the comprehension questions and in particular the inferential questions. However during our interview process we noticed children were more able to concentrate when reading a book that focused their personal interests.