Reading Fluency Norms

A lot of attention is given to fluency, but the measures are not always provided to parents regarding the expected rates of reading at different points. Fluency is the ability to read smoothly, accurately, with correct intonation and phrasing, and speed. I mention speed last because it is too often the only thing people think of when they hear 'fluency'. Speed is important because students need to be able to get through passages with enough mental energy left to think about the information they've read. However, it is not a good idea to encourage students to read as fast as they can. Speed comes naturally when decoding skills are strong, a large sight-word inventory is in place, and when correct phrasing for longer sentences is understood. If a student needs to build their speed of reading, these are the skills to address that will naturally build smoother reading.

Below is a chart from Reading Rockets (http://www.readingrockets.org/article/fluency-norms-chart)
It shows grade level expectations for reading rates broken up into Fall, Winter, Spring and by percentile achievement levels. When fluency is tested, it should be with grade level material that has never been read before (sometimes called a cold read). If errors are made during the reading, a deduction for each error is applied so that the score reflects the number of correct words read per minute.

2006 Hasbrouck & Tindal Oral Reading Fluency Data

Grade	Percentile	Fall WCPM*	Winter WCPM*	Spring WCPM*	Avg. Weekly Improvement**
1	90 75		81 47	111 82	1.9 2.2
	50		23	53	1.9
	25 10		12 6	28 15	1.0 0.6
2	90 75	106 79	125 100	142 117	1.1 1.2
	50	51	72	89	1.2
	25 10	25 11	42 18	61 31	1.1 0.6
3	90 75	128 99	146 120	162 137	1.1 1.2
	50	71	92	107	1.1
	25 10	44 21	62 36	78 48	1.1 0.8
4	90 75	145 119	166 139	180 152	1.1 1.0
	50	94	112	123	0.9
	25 10	68 45	87 61	98 72	0.9 0.8
5	90 75	166 139	182 156	194 168	0.9 0.9
	50	110	127	139	0.9
	25 10	85 61	99 74	109 83	0.8 0.7
6	90 75	177 153	195 167	204 177	0.8 0.8
	50	127	140	150	0.7
	25 10	98 68	111 82	122 93	0.8 0.8
7	90 75	180 156	195 165	202 177	0.7 0.7
	50	128	136	150	0.7
	25 10	102 79	109 88	123 98	0.7 0.6
8	90 75	185 161	199 177	199 177	0.4 0.5
	50	133	151	151	0.6
	25 10	106 77	124 97	124 97	0.6 0.6