Gifted Kids Is My Child Gifted? How Reading Fluency Develops By Carol Bainbridge Carol Bainbridge Facebook LinkedIn Twitter Carol Bainbridge has provided advice to parents of gifted children for decades, and was a member of the Indiana Association for the Gifted. Learn about our editorial process Updated on September 13, 2020 Fact checked by Emily Swaim Fact checked by Emily Swaim LinkedIn Emily is a board-certified science editor who has worked with top digital publishing brands like Voices for Biodiversity, Study.com, GoodTherapy, Vox, and Verywell. Learn about our editorial process Print sean boggs / Vetta / Getty Images Reading fluency refers to the ability to read quickly, smoothly, easily, and with expression. To read fluently, a reader must understand how the symbols on the page (the letters) are related to the sounds of the language, how those sounds are blended together to form words, what the words mean, and what the words together in a sentence mean. Stages of Reading Fluency In the initial stages of learning to read, a reader is so focused on decoding the words on the page that they don't have much mental energy left to spend on meaning. To decode the words, a beginning reader sounds out the words—they are connecting sounds to the letters they see and are trying to blend those sounds together to form words. Then they must know what the word means. If a reader encounters an unfamiliar word, the decoding is much more difficult because they then have to try to get the meaning of the word from the context, from the surrounding words. That, however, means that the reader must be able to decode those surrounding words and remember them, and then figure out the meaning of the unfamiliar word. You can see that there is quite a bit involved in reading. The Value of Decoding Skills for Students Decoding vs. Reading With Expression As a reader becomes better at decoding the words, they'll be able to read words more quickly. But that does not mean that they'll be able to read with expression. Reading with expression means that a child is not reading in a monotone, with all words getting equal emphasis. Knowing which words to emphasize requires that a reader understands the meaning, not just of the individual words, but of entire sentences and even entire passages. They must also understand the significance of the words and sentences. That means that if they are reading a story, they must understand the story. Notice the difference between these two readings from The Three Little Pigs: "I'll. Huff. And. I'll. Puff. And. I'll. Blow. Your. House. Down.""I'll huff! And I'll puff! And I'll BLOW your house down!" In the first reading, the child recognizes each individual word. That is one of the initial stages of reading. At this point, the child is able to decode the individual words, but they are not able to put the words together to generate meaning. This is not a fluent reading. In the second reading, the child is not only able to decode the individual words but is also able to understand how the words work together to create meaning. They recognize not just words, but word groups. They know which words make a sentence and where the emphasis goes. To be a fluent reader, a child must be developmentally ready. In other words, their brain must be sufficiently developed. It is why early reading is seen as a sign of giftedness. 1 Source Verywell Family uses only high-quality sources, including peer-reviewed studies, to support the facts within our articles. Read our editorial process to learn more about how we fact-check and keep our content accurate, reliable, and trustworthy. Vaivre-Douret L. Developmental and Cognitive Characteristics of "High-Level Potentialities" (Highly Gifted) Children. Int J Pediatr. 2011;2011:420297. doi:10.1155/2011/420297 By Carol Bainbridge Carol Bainbridge has provided advice to parents of gifted children for decades, and was a member of the Indiana Association for the Gifted. See Our Editorial Process Meet Our Review Board Share Feedback Was this page helpful? Thanks for your feedback! What is your feedback? Other Helpful Report an Error Submit