A student reads 62 words in a minute. The teacher marks 7 errors. The parent asks: "Is 55 good?" The teacher pauses. The score is 55, the parent is right, and neither of them has a way to say whether 55 is where it should be.
This guide covers how oral reading fluency, or ORF, is given and scored, where the 2017 compiled norms come from, and how to use a score in an IEP baseline and goal.
What ORF is
Hasbrouck and Tindal describe ORF as the most widely used curriculum-based measure. The student reads aloud from an unpracticed passage for one minute. The examiner notes errors: words read or pronounced incorrectly, omitted, read out of order, or pronounced by the examiner after a 3-second pause. Then the examiner totals the words read correctly per minute, or WCPM.
So the student above, with 62 words attempted and 7 errors, has a WCPM of 55.
NCII's list of sample goal skills puts passage reading fluency, also called oral reading fluency, at late first through fourth grade.
Two jobs: screening and monitoring
The authors say ORF is used for screening and for progress monitoring. For screening, the questions are how a student compares with peers and whether the student is at risk, and the answer comes from fall, winter, and spring benchmarks. For monitoring, the questions are whether the student is making expected progress and whether the instruction is working. That needs frequent administration, a graph, and a goal. The goal can be based on benchmarks or on expected rates of progress.
Over several weeks, the authors say, a graph may show significant, expected, or below-expected progress, and teachers can then decide whether to change instruction, continue, or change the goal. That matches the decision rules in decision rules: when to change an intervention.
Where the norms live
Hasbrouck and Tindal's 2017 report compiles ORF scores from three commercial tools (DIBELS 6th Edition, DIBELS Next, and easyCBM). Its table gives words correct per minute for fall, winter, and spring at the 10th, 25th, 50th, 75th, and 90th percentiles for grades 1 to 6. NCII's goal-setting guide points teams to it when a tool has no published benchmarks, and says a summary table is on the NCII website.
This site does not reprint the table, because the table belongs to its authors and your own tool may publish different benchmarks. Read the numbers in the report itself, which is linked in the sources below. Use your tool's benchmarks first, since NCII says most published tools provide them.
Reading a score against a benchmark
NCII's baseline example shows the idea. A third grader reads 55 words correct per minute on a grade-level passage at winter benchmarking, and the expected winter benchmark is 97. Put the two numbers side by side and the gap is plain: 42 words per minute.
That one comparison tells a team and a parent more than "below grade level." It also tells you how large the gap is, which shapes the goal. See how to set an IEP baseline for three-probe medians.
Three probes to a baseline
Suppose the student reads three different grade 3 passages on three days. Each probe is scored as words attempted minus errors.
| Day | Words attempted | Errors | Words correct per minute |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 60 | 8 | 52 |
| 2 | 64 | 6 | 58 |
| 3 | 62 | 7 | 55 |
In order, the scores are 52, 55, 58, and the median is 55.
That median goes in the present levels with the dates, the passage level, and the comparison to the benchmark. Keep the raw attempted and error counts too. They show whether a score changes because the student reads faster or makes fewer errors, which are different things to teach.
From score to goal
NCII's guide gives three ways to set the number, and ORF fits each of them.
- Benchmark. Use the tool's spring benchmark. With invented numbers, if the spring benchmark is 110 and the baseline is 55, the growth needed over about 30 weeks is 55 divided by 30, or about 1.8 words per week.
- National ROI. Multiply a published weekly growth rate by the weeks left, and add the baseline.
- Own growth. For students far below benchmark, use six to nine of the student's own data points to find a slope, then apply NCII's formula.
NCII says the benchmark may not suit students significantly below it. Work out the weekly growth the benchmark requires and compare it with typical rates, as in rate of improvement explained.
Giving the probe the same way
The authors describe ORF as standardized: an unpracticed passage, one minute, the same error rules. Keep these steady.
- Same level. If you start with a grade 3 passage, keep using grade 3 passages. A change in level is a change in what you measure.
- Unpracticed passages. Use a fresh form each time.
- Same conditions. A quiet place, the same adult, the same time of day.
- Same scoring. Apply the error rules the same way. Two scorers should agree.
NCII notes that goals may be set below grade level, but the IEP team decides. If the team uses a lower-level probe, record the level in the baseline line.
Telling the family
A parent hears "55" and has no way to place it. Say it with the comparison and the plan, using your own tool's numbers: "Maya read 55 words correctly in one minute on a third-grade passage. The winter benchmark for third grade on our tool is 97. Our goal is to reach the spring benchmark, which means gaining about two words a week. We will test every week and show you the graph." Then answer questions. That is one paragraph, and it gives the family the same facts the team has.
What a WCPM score does not show
Fluency is one indicator. The authors call WCPM a robust indicator of overall reading development in the primary grades, but a team reading a student's whole picture will want more than speed. A student can read quickly without understanding, or slowly with strong comprehension. Understood adds that for reading, comprehension matters as well as words per minute. If your goal is only WCPM, say so, and consider a second measure for comprehension.
Fluency scoring errors
- Counting words attempted, not words correct. Subtract errors.
- Using the wrong season's norm. Match fall, winter, or spring.
- Mixing tools. A score from one publisher is not a score from another.
- Practicing the passage. It stops being an unpracticed passage.
- Comparing a student to a norm and stopping there. Use it to ask what the instruction should be.
See also curriculum-based measurement basics and the glossary.
Baseline probes and percentile targets
The sources do not say how many passages make a baseline for ORF beyond NCII's three-probe options, nor which percentile a goal should target. Those are team decisions. Your tool's manual governs how its probes are scored.