Oral reading is a key driver of the reader’s fluency. This observation is justified by a set of complex cognitive functions that relate the verbal articulation and the perceptive reception of words and phrases in the reader’s mind. That said, oral reading is paramount to fluency, emphasizing the need to understand its value in building comprehension from mechanical reading. To the fluent reader, oral reading serves the vital purpose of harmonizing words and phrases – the pronunciation, look and feel – to the literal meaning, which helps generate a memorable mental picture in the reader’s mind. As a crucial contributor to fluency, oral reading is a richly endowed mode of learning, considering the surplus benefits it has beyond ensuring enhancing memorization and regurgitation.
Traditionally, oral reading often occurs in an instructor’s presence, which means that apart from comprehension, the learner’s articulation is also kept in check. Most importantly, the presence of feedback makes learning a bi-dimensional transaction as opposed to silent reading. Depending on the nature of the feedback, the fluent learner is poised to benefit by correction or appraisal, which could build morale. Additionally, the interactions can help drive further interest in reading. Nonetheless, oral reading could be manipulated to explore the delicate interface between correct reading and comprehension. The instructor then ascertains that learners judiciously infer the right connotations from stringed together words and phrases.
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Additionally, oral reading builds confidence in the reader’s ability to read, understand, and voice out. As the reader continually articulates words and statements, they gain the trust of their reading skills. Furthermore, the technique also builds useful social skills such as self-expression in the learner. Trivial as it might sound, leadership can be nurtured this way. Children are introduced to leading others to read out loud or help regulate the session. Given the context of a modular oral reading session with a dozen children reading in turn, every participant has the chance to practice out tonal variation, facial expression, and gesticulation alongside the mouthing. Thus, oral reading promotes wholesome learning and skill-building experiences.
Furthermore, oral reading accelerates learning by enabling the student to develop two core decoding strategies: Flex It and Blend as You Read . Essentially, these decoding strategies harness oral reading’s intuitive nature to implement a trial-and-error-like approach to teaching children to articulate words in shifts (UNESCO, 2016). The strategies also serve as helpful techniques when the learner transits from oral to silent reading. Given that oral tasks are often carried out in turns, the learner immensely benefits from the corrections done with the peers in succession. This way, the fluent learner gets exposed to a dynamic learning environment devoid of the disgruntles that befall silent readers when they get stuck on a difficult word or phrase.
Besides, oral reading adds a nuance of fun to learning, translating to an elevated learning experience and progress. If turn-taking is made random and correction is exercised with a casual nuance, learning becomes fun, effectively creating the ideal learning environment. Here, the point is that closed-loop learning, which is characteristic of oral reading, provides for a pragmatic adventure into fairly sophisticated words and phrases (Rupley et al., 2020). Because of that, oral reading positively affects writing skills since articulating the words places the learners in a better position to exercise their neuro-motor skills.
In conclusion, oral reading proves a valuable technique for the reader. As discussed above, the reason is that the approach favours both novice and fluent readers, with the former benefitting from the surplus benefits such as social confidence and mental imaging. Also, oral reading proves complementary to fundamental learning elements such as writing and memorization.
References
Rupley, W. H., Nichols, W. D., Rasinski, T. V., & Paige, D. (2020). Fluency: Deep Roots in Reading Instruction. Education Sciences, 10(6), 1-11.
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). (2016). Understanding What Works in Oral Reading Assessments. (Report number UIS/2016/LO/TD/9) Retrieved 14 September 2020 from http://uis.unesco.org/sites/default/files/documents/understanding-what-works-in-oral-reading-assessments-2016-en.pdf
