Oral Readings Plus for College Students

A few years ago I attended a SWADE (Southwest Association for Developmental Education) conference in the Phoenix area along with several other staff and instructional employees from Yavapai College. Along with presenting with three others, I also enjoyed learning from other developmental education instructors from colleges in our region. The best tip I picked up was the oral reading activity to assist students with fluency, pronunciation, and comprehension.

Here is how the oral reading works. First, I read a passage out loud for about two minutes. Then I mark how much text I had covered. Second, I type this text into slides. Third, I add a background and clip art to make the slides visually appealing. Finally, I record myself reading these slides in Jing.

Once these slides are recorded, I save the file in Screencast.com. Screencast gives me a link that I paste into Blackboard. You can use any site that you like, but this one has worked well for me. (11)

When introducing these readings to the class, sometimes I have the students do a pre-reading activity such as completing a K-W-L sheet. K-W-L sheets are broken down into three columns. In the "K" column, students write what they already Know about the topic in the reading. In the "W" column, students write what they Want to learn about the topic. 

If we do the K-W-L activity, now is the time to share the recording. I dim the lights and play the recording. Students have the choice of following along in their textbook or of watching the PowerPoint slides roll through as they listen to me reading the text. Hopefully the modeling of intonation, pronunciation, and pace train the class to use similar positive reading habits.

So what if we don't do the K-W-L activity? Sometimes we skim-read the passage. Some days we annotate the reading. Some days we just dive right in and create an outline or a summary later. But the main point here is that students do more with the reading than to just read it through one time.

After the class listens to the slide presentation, we get into pairs. If we have an odd number of students, one reads with me. I watch the clock and have student A read the beginning of the passage for thirty seconds. Then student B reads the same passage as A. Then both A and B read the same passage a second time.

Over the semester, students get better and better at being able to read out loud, they gain comprehension in a noisy environment, and they gain enjoyment reading in a social environment. If you have a class that needs to comprehend a lot of reading materials, please consider adopting some of these techniques, and you can always ask a reading teacher at Yavapai College for ideas to work with your specific curriculum and/or situation. Enjoy!