The purpose of the study was to examine the effects of two instructional approaches designed to improve the reading fluency of 2nd-grade children. The first approach was based on Stahl and Heubach's (2005) fluency-oriented reading instruction (FORI) and involved the scaffolded, repeated reading of grade-level texts over the course of each week. The second was a wide-reading approach that also involved scaffolded instruction, but that incorporated the reading of 3 different grade-level texts each week and provided significantly less opportunity for repetition. By the end of the school year, FORI and wide-reading approaches showed similar benefits for standardized measures of word reading efficiency and reading comprehension skills compared to control approaches, although the benefits of the wide-reading approach emerged earlier and included oral text reading fluency skill. Thus, we conclude that fluency instruction that emphasizes extensive oral reading of grade-level text using scaffolded approaches is effective for promoting reading development in young learners.
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