DRA Goals & Reading Recovery

Here is a guide for minimum DRA Level monthly goals:

Fall (level 4+)

January (Level 8+)

February (Level 10+)

March (Level 12+)

April (Level 14+)

 May (Level 16+)

What is fluency?
Fluency is the ability to read, speak, or write easily, smoothly
and with expression. In reading, fluency skills are the ability to see the
"big picture" rather than reading word for word. Reading fluency is often
associated with smooth and even-paced reading.

Fluent readers can immediately recognize text or frequent clusters of letters. They have a good site word vocabulary and can see phrases as whole thoughts and not individual words.

If a reader struggles over these common letter patterns, their reading becomes choppy.  Students lose the ability to comprehend when they are struggling over words.  Their energy and focus is often spent on just figuring out the word and not understanding the text in front of them. To help these children, we want to identify why they are having difficulty decoding words and include interventions in their daily instruction.

Fluent readers read aloud almost effortlessly and with varied expressions. They sound natural and unrehearsed. Fluent readers are reading and comprehending simultaneously. 

Fluency develops over time with practice.  Young readers inevitably will sound choppy as they are just beginning to understand how language works and how to break the text into natural sounding chunks.  With time and many opportunities to practice reading, young readers develop these skills. Young readers also need to hear stories being read aloud.  Modeling fluent reading by reading aloud is most beneficial.

To increase fluency-
	Students need to participate in repetitive readings of the same materials- teacher reads, students read with a partner, choral readings of the same passages...
	Have students tape record their oral reading and listen to their own reading.
	Daily oral and silent reading practice of at least 20 minutes!
	Read to a buddy-  Helps increase reading time because it is fun to read with a buddy.
	Have child read aloud to a parent, sibling, a relative, the dog, anyone who will listen!
	Model reading a passage with expression and fluency to the child and then ask them to read it (Echo Reading). Some children need to hear fluent reading first before attempting to model it themselves.
	Choral reading- everyone reads together.
	Have students read silently at home as part of their weekly homework. Silent reading DOES increase fluency, but it has to be done daily. The more children read the more automatic it becomes.

Emergent Readers = Levels 0, A,1,2,3,4

Early Readers = Levels 6,8,10,12,14 (This is where we need to be mid-year)

Fluent Readers = Levels 16 + (18,20,22,24,26,28+)

Reading A-Z Correlation Chart

Reading Styles and Strategies

Reading Tips for Parents

If your child is part of this wonderful intervention please be sure to do the daily homework. It is essential for your child's success. The homework consists of a book and reading a sentence the child has created and putting the words back into "reading" sequence order.

1. Reading Familiar Books: The child rereads several familiar books to practice making their reading sound like natural speech.

2. Rereading the New Book from Yesterday: The teacher writes notes to record what the child reads. This helps with lesson planning and knowing if the level of difficulty is a good fit. Following the reading, the teacher points out something the child did well, then reinforces a reading strategy that the child needs to use in becoming a more fluent reader.

3. Letter and /or Word Work: The child does letter and word work to help him or her become a better problem-solver when reading and writing.

4. Composing and Writing a Story: This is when a child may talk about and write a story sentence about something of interest. As the child moves through their individualized program, they receive less and less teacher assistance as they become able to write the story on their own.

5. Cut -Up Story Sentence: The teacher writes the child s story on sentence strip and cuts apart the phrases, words, or possibly letters, that the teacher wants to call attention to. The child assembles the story and reads it.

6. The teacher introduces a new book carefully selected for its learning opportunities.

7. Reading a New Book: The teacher has picked a new book that the student should be able to read without much difficulty, and a bit of problem-solving. The teacher first introduces the book with the pictures and any new text or language. The child reads, with the teacher providing guidance as needed. Afterwards, a teaching point is selected to help the child use their strengths to sort out a confusion, or to reinforce good problem-solving.