Planning for Wide Reading
Starting early in a student’s education and continuing
through high school, extensive reading is an important
source of new vocabulary (Nagy and Anderson 1984), as
well as providing students exposure to a range of text types,
information, and ideas. Students in grades nine through
twelve are expected to read an increasing variety and
volume of literature and informational texts, including literary
nonfiction and informational/expository texts in English
language arts and other content areas.
Providing opportunities for students to engage in
extended periods of structured independent reading of
self-selected challenging books, accompanied by supported,
individualized reading instruction can have a positive effect on reading achievement (Reis, and others
2008; Taylor, Frye, and Maruyama 1990). When planning an independent reading program, teachers
design structures for recording what students read and students’ progress toward meeting their
reading goals. Students are taught how to select books that interest them and are at the appropriate
level. Student choice is the hallmark of an independent reading program. Teacher librarians and
classroom teachers seek to connect high school students with books and other texts that inspire,
delight, and challenge adolescent minds and spur them to read more. (See chapter 2 in this ELA/ELD
Framework for more information on wide reading, independent reading, and planning an independent
reading program.)
Foundational Skills
Ideally, by the time students enter high school, their
knowledge of foundational skills is well established. They
have a large base of sight words—those they recognize
instantaneously—and they rapidly and effectively employ
word recognition skills to identify new printed words. In
short, they access printed language efficiently.
However, students who for a variety of reasons have not
developed proficiency in the foundational reading skills by
the time they enter grade nine need intensive instruction in
these skills so that they can access grade-level content as
soon as possible.
Fluency, which includes accuracy, rate, and prosody,
continues to develop as students engage in wide and
extensive reading. Rate of reading varies, however, as it
should, with the text and the task. Fluency is important
in that it supports comprehension. The greater the ease with which students can identify words
accurately, the more cognitive resources they have available to engage in meaning making. If students
are experiencing difficulty with fluency, that is their reading is slow and labored, it is critical to
determine the reason. Some students may have inadequately developed decoding skills. Others may
not be familiar with the language (e.g., vocabulary, grammatical structures) or the content knowledge
in the text, both of which may also impact fluency. Still others may not have developed automaticity
with printed language.
In high school, it is critical for teachers to understand that pronunciation differences due to
influences from a student’s regional accent, primary language (for ELs or other bilingual students),
or home dialect of English (e.g., African American English) should not automatically be interpreted
Providing opportunities
for students to engage in
extended periods of structured
independent reading of self-
selected challenging books,
accompanied by supported,
individualized reading
instruction can have a positive
effect on reading achievement.712 | Chapter 7 Grades 9 to 12