Does instruction in reading fluency improve reading comprehension?
Research sometimes, but not always, demonstrates that instruction that increases reading fluency also increases reading comprehension abilities (Gersten, Fuchs, Williams, & Baker, 2001). That fluency represents a level of expertise beyond word recognition accuracy, and that reading comprehension may in fact be helped by fluency is also claimed (NICHD, 2000, Section 3). Strecker, Roser, and Martinez (1998) concluded that fluency and comprehension enhance one another. However, it has been argued that lack of fluency correlates with low reading comprehension ability. Paris (2005) pointed out that readers who are not fluent have a wide variety of associated problems including limited word recognition, prior knowledge, vocabulary knowledge, and genre knowledge. Thus, a lack of fluency may well be a proxy for all of these other factors that affect comprehension (see Paris, 2007, this section). Paris cautioned, “dis-fluency is correlated with poor reading comprehension, but high fluency is no
