Reading Psychology, 22:95–109, 2001

Copyright © 2001 Taylor & Francis

0270–2711/01 $12.00 + .00

FLUENCY SNAPSHOTS: A QUICK SCREENING TOOL FOR

YOUR CLASSROOM

CAMILLE L. Z. BLACHOWICZ
National Louis University, Evanston, Illinois, USA
DIANE M. SULLIVAN
Downers Grove, District 58, Illinois, USA
CHAR CIEPLY
Wheeling, District 21, Illinois, USA

In this article, the authors present a research-based, classroom tested assessment

tool, the Classroom Fluency Snapshot (CFS). This assessment is grounded in the
research that establishes fluency as an important component of initial reading
instruction and in the work on the efficacy of curriculum based measurement .
The article presents the case of one classroom in which a teacher uses the CFS as
a pre-, post-assessment. Rich classroom examples, details of the teacher’s
interpretation, and instructional decision making are shared along with ideas
for instruction.

“What books should I use with my class?” is a perennial question

we encounter in Fall staff development sessions. Starting off the
school year with a new class is a challenge for all teachers, espe-
cially those just beginning their teaching careers or changing
schools or grade levels. Whether using themed trade book materi-
als, a reading series, literature circles, a core literature book, or
other approaches, teachers need an idea of the range of the stu-
dents in the class before they can begin to choose appropriate
materials. Also, teachers need a rough idea as to which students
might require extra support in core texts and textbooks where all
students are expected to participate with a single-level text. One
index of a student’s ability to handle a core text is the fluency with
which the text is read (Kuhn & Stahl, 2000). In our work in staff
development with new and experienced teachers, we have found

Address correspondence to Camille L. Z. Blachowicz, National Louis University, 2840

N. Sheridan, Evanston, IL 60201.

95
96 C. L Z. Blachowicz et al.

that Classroom Fluency Snapshots (CFS) provide an easy-to-use

tool that gives teachers a starting point for looking at a class. A
CFS is a chart displaying the performance of each member of the
class on a timed reading of grade level material (See Figure 1).
We call it a “snapshot” because it is meant to be suggestive,

FIGURE 1. Terry’s Fall snapshot.

 Fluency Snapshot 97

not definitive, of reading behavior, much like a photo, which cap-

tures a moment but is not as informative or revealing as a video of
the same event would be. Snapshots give you the initial hunch;
you need to follow up with more detailed and personalized obser-
vation and assessment. Before sharing our process for construct-
ing and using CFSs, we’d like to share the theory that underpins
this process and some of the positive outcomes in teacher growth
that we’ve seen resulting from its use.

Why a Snapshot of Fluency?

Research supports the notion that the ability to read fluently (at a
good rate, with good accuracy and proper intonation and phras-
ing) is highly correlated with many measures of reading compe-
tence (Shinn, 1989; Streicker, Roser, & Martinez, 1998). For the
reader, fluency requires good decoding skills, the strategies to or-
chestrate these in reading real text, and comprehension to moni-
tor what is being read to make sure it sounds like language. So, in
taking a snapshot of fluency, one aspect of authentic reading per-
formance is being tapped (Shreiber, 1991).
For the teacher, listening to students read and charting their
development in fluency is also a way to measure the effect of in-
struction. Unlike most standardized measures which only show
large changes in behavior, fluency measurement is sensitive to small
increments of improvement. This can be very important to stu-
dents experiencing difficulty; finding a measure sensitive to small
improvements is motivating for both them and their teachers. It
also is a process that develops the teacher’s skill as an observer of
one aspect of reading performance (Clay & Imlach, 1971). Ques-
tions that are raised as a result of fluency assessment deal with
issues of language competence, prior knowledge, vocabulary and
appropriateness of materials. In using these snapshots across sev-
eral districts and many schools, we have found teacher spontane-
ously identify several issues that they want to study for their own
professional development.
One underlying issue is raised by fluency assessment is the
use of “right level” materials (Pinnell & Fountas, 1999). To dem-
onstrate fluency, students need to use materials which do not
present a decoding and word recognition challenge along with a
fluency challenge. The materials used should be independent level
98 C. L Z. Blachowicz et al.

materials or instructional materials that have become manageable

because the students have already had multiple exposures. Typi-
cally, these are materials on which a student is at least 85–90%
accurate at the start of the fluency process. If a student is not flu-
ent in reading the selected materials, teachers raise questions such
as: “Is this an appropriate language structure for this student?”
“Are these appropriate concepts for this student?” “Is there some
decoding issue that should be strengthened?” “Is the issue vocabu-
lary? Can students not self-monitor because of vocabulary and con-
cept difficulty?” Also, issues about appropriate rate for grade level
reading are raised as well. So the matching of students with text
becomes an important concern.
This naturally leads to concern about materials and their lev-
els. In our project district teachers spontaneously raised the issue
of leveling and scheduled a leveling party which resulted in a dis-
trict wide list of materials. They then had immediate chance to
test out levels on the students with whom they were working.
Uses of fluency snapshots also leads to a recognition that on-
going instructional assessment is an important component of the
instructional process (Barr, Blachowicz & Wogman-Sadow, 1995).
For many teachers, the snapshot process identifies students for
special focus and they often decide to follow through with regular
running records or other individual assessments. For teachers al-
ready doing running records, the added rate information is one
more item to help them keep tabs on their students.
Besides these positive outgrowths of looking at fluency, the
use of a fluency measurement passage can also help students’ read-
ing. Fluency is not only a good measure of one type of reading
performance but working towards fluency is also a good treatment
for reading difficulties. Having students do a lot of reading at an
appropriate level, with a teacher, tutor or peer supporting them
and helping them self-monitor is also a good way for students to
practice their way to competence, especially for students consoli-
dating their print skill learning in grades 2 and 3 and students
needing reading assistance in other grades (Kuhn & Stahl, 2000).
It leads to holistic approaches such as partner reading, reading
workshop, reader’s chair, cross-age reading, and many other tech-
niques which allow students to develop fluency in the context of
authentic reading. So CFS is not only an effective screening device
 Fluency Snapshot 99

it is also a tool for raising teacher consciousness about important

issues in instruction (Hoffman, 1987).

What is a Classroom Fluency Snapshot?

A Classroom Fluency Snapshot is a chart displaying the perfor-

mance of all children in a particular class or group on a one minute
reading of the same piece of text (See Figure 1). It is used for
gathering different types of information and has four basic goals:

1. To get a quick sense of the class baseline in the fall

2. To identify those students who may need special support and/
or more time when working with grade level material
3. To help with selection of independent reading material
4. To chart the progress of student fluency over the year as a mea-
sure of progress

Let’s look at how one teacher prepared for and implemented the
snapshot process.

Preparing the Materials

The texts and/or passages that are used for this type of assessment
are ones that is a passage typical of the type and level that the
teacher wishes to use for instruction. The first thing you need to do is
to select some reading material that is representative of the materials
you will actually be using in class. This can be a core novel, an
article from National Geographic World, or a short selection from a
magazine or basal anthology. Try to avoid highly technical mate-
rial or unusual and exotic vocabulary. Choose a passage that will
take the students one or two minutes to read and make a copy for
each student to be assessed and a master that you might laminate.
For example, Terry, for her fourth-grade class, used a passage
about Amelia Earhart (See Figure 2).

Administration

Each student is assessed individually but it only takes 2 or 3 min-

utes per student. One good way to manage the process is to place
each child’s name on an index card. Once you have your class
100 C. L Z. Blachowicz et al.

FIGURE 2. Marked passage.

stack, divide it into five piles. Do one pile each day and you have
your whole class assessed by the end of the week.
Begin each session by sitting in a comfortable place and in-
troducing the student to the process and the text. The directions
should be something like: “I would like you to read this passage
about ______(add any sentences to prepare the students that you
think are relevant.) I’d like you to read this at a comfortable rate
 Fluency Snapshot 101

as accurately as you can. You may start (start timing).” In this prepa-
ration statement prepare students for the concepts they are going
to encounter.
Let the students read the first line or so without timing or
marking. Then begin timing for 1 minute. Each time the student
makes a miscue, put a tick mark in the margin or over the word, or
mark the exact miscue if you are a skilled marker. As the student
reads, place a tick or qualitative mark over each error or, if you
prefer a running record model (Clay, 1993), tick each word cor-
rect. This can have a more positive effect on the reader. You may
tape the reading if you wish to do any analysis later; you may also
make notations if you are experienced in assessment. We have
found, however, that this can be somewhat daunting for a new or
inexperienced teacher, so starting with simple miscue ticks is a
good entry-level procedure.
At the end of one minute, make a mark for the last word and
let the student complete the passage, either with you or at her
desk, depending on your time constraints and classroom organi-
zation. Count how many words were read in one minute and sub-
tract the number of errors a student made. This will give you a
cwpm (correct words per minute) score. If you have more time
and prefer to have the student read the whole passage, just calcu-
late correct words per minute at the end.
Terry administered the snapshot to Eliza starting with an in-
troduction of the passage. Terry covered the passage with only the
title, “Amelia Earhart” showing. She said, “I am going to take a
sample of your oral reading. The passage you are going to read is
about Amelia Earhart, the famous pilot. Read it in your best voice,
don’t rush or don’t drag; read it the way you think it should sound.
OK? Any questions?”
See Figure 2 for Terry’s notation on Eliza.
After the reading is completed, many teachers like to ask for
a short retelling, some comprehension questions or for a response.
Terry asked, “What do you think might have happened to Amelia
Earhart?” And then probed for what some problems were that she
might have encountered (e.g., mechanical problems, no comput-
ers, bad weather, illness, others) if the response was limited or
seemed confused. She had questions selected in case she needed
to probe. She then ended with a positive comment on Eliza’s read-
ing and went on to the next student.
102 C. L Z. Blachowicz et al.

Over the course of the week Terry completed her class analy-
sis and charted them on the chart seen in Figure 1. She did this by
counting the number of words each student had read correctly in
one minute (cwpm). She counted the words read in one minute
and subtracted the errors. Eliza read 120 of 124 words correctly,
or 120 cwpm (correct words per minute).

What’s an Error/Miscue?

Generally, words mispronounced, substituted, inserted or omit-

ted or pronounced for the student after a 4-second pause are
counted as errors. Do not count repetitions or hesitations as they
are accounted for in the slowing of reading rate but mark long
hesitations with a slash mark and indicate obvious disregard or
insertion of punctuation. Immediate self-corrections do not count
as errors. In examination of 290 fluency snapshots scored for er-
ror analysis or miscue analysis, the resulting charting showed very
little variance in relative layout whether or not error count or mis-
cue count was used. So an error count may be used when consis-
tency and simplicity of approach is desired with miscue insights
being applied to interpretation. In looking at Eliza, Terry saw good
fluency, with a fine rate for a 4th grader and a 97% accuracy. She
understood the passage and her miscues were not meaning chang-
ing. In later literature circle reading, Terry saw that Eliza corrected
most of her miscues, unlike this sample. So Terry decided that
fluency was probably not an issue for Eliza. She also thought that
Eliza would probably be able to handle more challenging materi-
als. She added Eliza to the class chart; Figure 1 represented her
charting in the fall of the school year.

What Can a CFS Tell You?

Looking at her chart, Terry first noted that Marci, Ned and Candy
read at a rate well below that of the other class and of norms for
children of their age (see Figure 3). She felt, at the start of the
fourth grade, a target of 90 words a minute would be suitable with
good accuracy.
If these three students were to be reading the same class book
as the rest of the students, she would, first of all, need to give them
 Fluency Snapshot 103

Typical Rate Ranges

Grade level Oral Reading

Rate
1 30–70
2 60–90
3 80–120
4 100–130
5 120–150

Adapted by Morris, Gilmore, & McCracken, cited in Barr, Blachowicz, & M. Wogman-
Sadow, 1995 and from J. E. Habrouck & G. Tindal (1992, Spring), curriculum based oral
reading fluency norms for students in grades 2–5. Teaching Exceptional Children, 41–44.
FIGURE 3. Examples of rate norms.

more time for each assignment. She also wanted to watch Alex
and Laura and make sure they had enough time.
Conversely, William and Heather might need some extra read-
ing to do. She was concerned about Eve’s racing and wanted to
find out if that was the reason for her poor comprehension by
doing some more detailed analyses of comprehension through
and informal reading inventory with listening passages and diag-
nostic teaching. Terry also wanted to work more closely with Angie
to determine the strength of her decoding skills and her appro-
priate instructional level. She did note that Marci and Ned, even
though slow readers, had a good grasp of the passage, whereas
Candy did not, even when probed. Candy also had unusual phras-
ing which was more word by word. As Marci was a thoughtful girl
who thought and responded slowly and deeply, this reading was
typical of her language performance as well. Ned, however was
quite a speedster and his many hesitations, especially before hard
words, made his reading slow and he read in a monotone, unlike
his regular speech.
These questions generated from the snapshot helped Terry
think about her next steps: supporting the students who needed
more time in core class materials, probing the reasons for their
less fluent performance (concepts, natural style, decoding) and
focusing on those students who needed more detailed assessment.
She also thought about what materials and methods she could use
to improve the fluency levels of her students and how to make
sure to check on a student who seemed to be rushing and to have
104 C. L Z. Blachowicz et al.

extra or more challenging materials ready for early finishers. And

she decided to plan some fluency work for her classroom, target-
ing especially the lowest fluency students and Eve to get her to
slow down.

Working on Fluency

There are many ways to highlight fluency for instruction both in

large and small group materials (Blachowicz, Fisher, Massarelli,
Moskal & Obrochta, 2001; Opitz, Rasinski & Bird, 1998; Rasinski,
1989; Rasinski & Zutell, 1990). Figure 4 summarizes some com-
mon approaches and references for further reading. Since Terry
was a new 4th-grade teacher, she decided on three approaches.
First, she was going to be sure to read to her class every day to
provide a good model of reading. She also invited other adults
and upper grade students in as guest readers to do modeling. Sec-
ondly, in her novel study unit, she had each student pick a passage
of the day that was something they felt exemplified a piece of good
or beautiful writing. The students shared their passages with each
other and also shared them with their parents at home. Each day
she picked the index cards of five students to hear their “passage
of the day.” This helped her make regular observations of each
student; by the end of the week she had made sure she reached
each child. Lastly, she worked with two of her target students each
week on repeated readings and taped readings.

Using CFS Across the Year

In January, Terry assessed her students again. This time she could
see that Eve had taken on a more appropriate rate, that Marci and
Ned were making slow but steady progress but that Alex seemed
stymied and Candy was stuck also. Angie had moved but took with
her Terry’s diagnostic notes for improvement. Working with the
reading specialist and with a detailed analysis using an informal
reading inventory, she had determined that Candy’s instructional
level was at 2nd grade and was working with her instructionally at
that level. Her rate and fluency at that level was good and though
she still needed support on core level materials, she was making
progress. Alex, on the other hand, remained an enigma. He could
read and understand 4th-grade materials but wasn’t making much
 Oral Heading Techniques to Develop Fluency

TECHNIQUE DESCRIPTION REFERENCES / Gr. level

1. ADULTS MODEL a. Adult read aloud (including modeled Morrow, L. M., et al. (1995). Reading aloud
discussion & involvement to children: Characteristics and relationships
a. Read aloud b. Adult models as students follow text, between teachers and student behaviors.
b. Assisted Cloze/Assisted supplying omitted words and refrains. Reading Research and Instruction, 35, 1:85-101.
Reading c. Unison reading: Adult leads and children (K-6)
c. Neurological Impress chime in; adult model fades as students gain
d. Echo Reading fluency. Zientarski, D. P. & Pottorff, D. D. (1994)
d. Students read orally or silently with tape Reading aloud to low achieving secondary
recording students. Reading Horizons, 35, 1:44–51. (8–12)

2. a. BUDDY READING a. Two friends take turns reading together. Shany, M. R. & Beimiller, A. (1995)
Assisted reading practice: Effects on
b. PAIRED READING b. Stronger reader and less fluent reader read performanceof poor readers in Grades 3 and 4.
together. Reading Research Quarterly, 30, 3: 382–395. (3-4)

3. REPEATED READINGS Students read the same 50- to 200-word text Samuels, S. J. (1979). The method of
two or three times repeated readings. The Reading Teacher, 32
403–408 (all grades remedial)

4. CHORAL READING Prose, poetry, fiction, or nonfiction. McCauley, J. K. & McCauley, D. S. (1992).
These include antiphonal or cumulative Using choral reading to promote language
learning for ESL students. The Reading Teacher,
45, 7:526–533. (all, ESL)

105
FIGURE 4. Oral heading techniques to develop fluency.
106
Oral Heading Techniques to Develop Fluency
TECHNIQUE DESCRIPTION
5. READERS THEATER a. Students read parts from scripts and texts
b. Intertextuality: Several nonfiction sources
are synthesized to create scripts.
6. STORY THEATER One of several student read parts while others
Mime the action
7. CHAMBER THEATER Rehearsed reading of parts. May combine
techniques of choral reading, readers theater
and story theater to create a unified
presentation.
FIGURE 4. (Continued) Oral heading techniques to develop fluency.
REFERENCES / Gr. level
Stayer, F. Z. & Allington, R. L. (1991).
Fluency and the understanding of texts. Theory
into Practice, 30, 3:143–148. (4-7)
Young, T. A. & Vardell, S. (1993). Weaving
readers theatre and nonfiction into the
curriculum The Reading Teacher, 46, 5: 346-406.
(intermediate)
(all grades)
Wolf, S. A. (1994). Learning to act/Acting to
learn: Children as actors, critics, and characters
in classroom theatre. Research in the Teaching of
English, 28, 1:7–93
 Fluency Snapshot 107

progress. Terry decided to work with him each day using repeated
readings.
Terry’s end of the year snapshot (Figure 5) indicated that most
of her students were operating in an appropriate fluency zone. Both
Ned and Marci had made progress, Alex had zoomed using the
repeated reading approach and Candy had made slight progress
on grade level fluency. She was now reading 3rd grade materials at
instructional level and her fluency there was developing.

FIGURE 5. Terry’s Spring snapshot.

108 C. L Z. Blachowicz et al.

Things to Think About

If you use a CFS you need to use your own expertise and knowl-
edge to make decisions. How long do you want to have the chil-
dren read? We know that short timings are like short tests of
anything else, sometimes we do our best and sometimes we need
more time to show what we can do. For some children the time
limit may produce a really skewed impression. Secondly, should
you deduct errors or miscues? Try it both ways and see if your pic-
ture changes. As with deciding whether to do a cold or prepared
reading, we have found that the profile of the class remains the
same but students do a bit better in prepared situations and when
non-meaning changing miscues are not counted as errors. But since
this is only a screen you have to balance that against the time it
takes you to do a longer reading and a more detailed analysis. The
important thing is to do the same thing with each student and
from month to month.
What about norms? The idea of CFS is to establish your own
norms but class comparisons in a school can help you determine
which classrooms might need more assistance from other profes-
sionals and can help explain variation in the standardized test per-
formances of one class in a school or district. While rates will vary
based on the conceptual difficulty and structure of a text, some
typical ranges such as those shown in Figure 3 can help you think
about your class and the “big picture.”
CFSs make a great measure to take the “reading temperature”
of your class on a regular basis. Often they show growth where
other measures are not sensitive. This can be especially important
for slow developing students who need these signs of progress.
Snapshots can also provide a ‘reality test’ of the materials you
choose and help you to plan for extra support for students who
need it. They also will suggest to you which students might need a
more sensitive matching of student to learning materials and pro-
vide one more measure of progress for your students.

References
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teachers: An instructional approach. White Plains, NY: Longman.
Blachowicz, C. L. Z., Fisher, P., Massarelli, J., Moskal, M. K., & Obrochta, C.
 Fluency Snapshot 109

(2001). Everybody reads: An effective school program for fluency development . Re-
port to the Illinois State Board of Education. Unpublished manuscript.
Clay, M. M. (1993). Reading Recovery: A guidebook for teachers in training. Ports-
mouth, NH: Heinemann.
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ior variables. Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior, 10, 133–139.
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Kuhn, M. R., & Stahl, S. A. (2000). Fluency: A review of developmental and remedial
practices. University of Michigan, Ann Arbor: Center for the Improvement of
Early Reading Achievement
Opitz, M. F., Rasinski, T. V., & Bird, L. B. (1998). Good bye round robin reading: 25
effective oral reading strategies. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann
Pinnell, G. S., & Fountas, I. (1999). Matching books to readers. Portsmouth, NH:
Heinemann.
Rasinski, T. V. (1989). Fluency for everyone: Incorporating fluency instruction
in the classroom. The Reading Teacher, 42, 690–693.
Rasinski, T. V., & Zutell, J. B. (1990). Making a place for fluency instruction in
the regular reading curriculum. Reading Research and Instruction, 25, 85–91.
Schreiber, P. A. (1991). Understanding prosody’s role in reading acquisition.
Theory into Practice, 30, 158–164.
Shinn, M. R. (1989). Curriculum-based measurement: Assessing special children. New
York: Guilford.
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