Career Kit materials can pose a challenge for  mid level ESL and intermediate BE students–no surprise, since workplace texts in the real world are often quite challenging, with specialized language and conventions.  To the rescue come two Adult Education teachers in Long Island, Lisa Wright and Susan Giuliano, who have used fluency practice in a class of mixed intermediate ESL and BE students to boost reading comprehension and fluency.  Reading fluency refers to the ability to read smoothly at a speaking pace, and is most often built through repeated readings of a text.  It is an important foundational skill for reading comprehension and extremely important now that the TABE 11/12 requires students to read so much more text than the TABE 9/10 did.

Transcribing Videos

Lisa and Susan had their students watch videos in the Community & Social Services CareerKit, then they gave them transcripts of the videos and had them practice reading the texts out loud in groups until they had ironed out their pronunciation and fluency issues.  After reading, they answered questions about the text. It turned out that this produced a significant bump in reading comprehension!

Simplifying Vocabulary

Lisa and Susan also found the website, Rewordify, which simplifies complex text.  Simply copy in the text you want students to read and the website will produce a simplified version of it.

Lisa’s and Susan’s Adapted Lessons

To see how the fluency lessons work and view the transcript of the dog-walking video from the Community & Social Services Career Kit, click  here.

Additional Resources for Fluency Practice

To see other materials from the Community & Social Services Career Kit that have been used for fluency practice click here,

and here,

and here,

and here.