Project WORD: Decoding Instruction Designed to Increase Reading Fluency
Principal Investigator:		Roxanne Hudson, University of Washington
Project Mentors:		Joseph K. Torgesen, Florida Center for Reading Research
		Holly B. Lane, University of Florida
Project Goals
The purpose of this project funded by the Office of Special Education Programs (OSEP) is to examine the sub-processes in decoding fluency that distinguish poor from good readers and the best way to teach those basic elements to students with Reading Disabilities (RD).
A three-part hypothesis is being tested:
several areas of reading and decoding fluency explain differences between inaccurate, dysfluent readers and good readers; increasing fluency in sub-processes of decoding fluency will increase fluent decoding; and increasing decoding fluency will improve reading fluency in connected text.
Year 1
We investigated whether individual differences in fluency in lexical and sublexical skills of phonemic blending, letter sound knowledge, recognition of phonograms, orthographic knoweldge, and processing speed predicted differences in the decoding of second grade students.
	year 1 results
Year 2
We conducted a second diagnostic study to answer these research questions: (1) Does fluency explain the variance found in decoding fluency above that which is explained by differences in accu-racy, and (2) does this change as readers develop?
Working with children in first, second, and third grade, we measured the accuracy and fluency of their phonological awareness, letter knowledge, orthographic knowledge, phonogram knowledge, word reading, and nonsense word reading.
Year 3
Using informattion from the previous diagnostic studies, we will develop and test the efficacy of a decoding intervention on the oral reading fluency of children with reading disabilities.