Which strategy can improve students' fluency in reading?

Repeating reading of familiar texts is a highly effective strategy for improving students' fluency in reading. This approach allows students to practice reading texts that they are already familiar with, which builds their confidence and enables them to focus on improving their speed and expression without being hindered by decoding new words. Familiar texts provide a safe environment for practice, allowing students to enhance their phrasing, intonation, and overall fluency through repetition.

The process of reading the same text multiple times can lead to greater automaticity, where students can recognize words quickly without needing to sound them out each time. As fluency increases, so does comprehension, since students can devote more cognitive resources to understanding the meaning of the text rather than merely decoding it.

In contrast, while options like listening to audiobooks and reading silently can support literacy development, they do not inherently engage the reader in the same way as repeated oral reading of familiar texts does, particularly for fluency. Reading new and complex texts can be valuable for learning new vocabulary and concepts, but it does not directly facilitate fluency as much as familiar text practice does.