Read Naturally Live: Adapting to Meet Individual Students’ Needs

Recommended Adjustments to Read Naturally Live Default Settings:

• Change required read alongs from three to two or one.
• Change to whole-story timings for the Practice and Pass steps.
• Set initial goal of 25-30 wcpm higher than Cold Timing score if doing whole-story timings.
• If students are reading several levels below grade level, turn off writing steps (Prediction and Retell).

Explanations for These Adjustments:

Reduced Number of Read Alongs

Read Naturally Live’s default setting is three required read alongs. However, students in middle school and above often don’t need this many, especially if they are actively reading along. We recommend changing this setting to two at first and then potentially either adding or dropping a read along as needed. If a student is actively reading along—lips moving as they read along, or whisper-reading along with the narrator—one read along is often sufficient. Conversely, if the student does not seem to be actively reading along, you may need to increase the required read alongs to three. You may tell the students, “If I see you actively reading along, then you only need to do one read along. If you’re not actively reading along, you’ll stay at two, or I might have to add one.” This often motivates older students to complete an active read along—and an active read along will build fluency more efficiently than silent reading.

Whole-Story Timings

Older students also need to work on reading endurance. Stories in the upper levels of Read Naturally Live are intentionally longer in order to get students used to reading for longer reading stretches of time at school, during standardized tests, and for fun. As such, we recommend requiring students to complete whole-story timings (as opposed to Read Naturally Live’s default setting of one-minute timings) for the Practice and Pass steps.

While most older students respond well to whole-story timings, note that exceptions should be made for students who struggle with motivation and self-esteem. These students will experience quick success with one-minute timings. Then, after the students gain confidence in their reading ability, the teacher can adjust the settings to whole-story timings.

Initial Goal of 25-30 wcpm Above Cold Timing Score (if Whole-Story Timings)

For students doing whole-story timings, we recommend setting a lower initial goal. Typically, Read Naturally recommends setting the student’s initial goal by adding 40 to the Cold Timing score. However, when students are doing whole-story timings, it can be challenging to keep up that pace the entire time. Setting the initial goal by adding 25-30 words to the Cold Timing score is often more sustainable for students doing whole-story timings.

Turn Off Writing Steps (If Students Are Far Below Grade Level)

For students who are reading several levels below grade level, we recommend turning off the writing steps, especially the Retell step which takes more time than the Prediction step. This allows the students to dedicate more time to actual reading, which is often their most urgent need. However, if the teacher’s objective is to simultaneously develop writing skills, these steps can be left on.

Recommended Adjustments to Read Naturally Live Default Settings:

• Turn off writing steps if not seeing story progress of two to four stories completed per week.
• Allow students to complete Cold Timing Step independently if wait time for teacher assistance is too high.

Explanations for These Adjustments:

Turn Off Writing Steps (If Not Seeing Sufficient Story Progress)

Elementary-aged students should complete two to four stories per week. Turning off the Prediction Step, the Retell Step, or both, is often a good solution when you are not seeing sufficient story progress. Typing can be challenging for younger students, and they might be spending too much time on these writing steps to move through the stories at an appropriate pace. Predictions and Retells are important for comprehension, however, so we recommend requiring the students to tell an oral prediction/retell to the teacher if these steps are turned off. Some teachers leave the Prediction on as a reminder that students should think about what they are about to read. Then teachers will turn the Retell Step off and ask the student for an oral retell when the student is completing the Pass activities with the teacher. When the steps are left on, the teachers tell the students to simply type in a letter in the text boxes as a placeholder.

Independent Cold Timings

If there are more than six students per teacher, students might be waiting too long for the teacher-required steps and thus not progressing quickly enough. In these instances, we recommend allowing the students to complete their cold timings independently. Read Naturally Live’s default setting is to require a teacher for the Cold Timing Step, but students can be trained to do their cold timings by themselves. For students doing independent cold timings, we recommend doing one teacher-required cold timing every other week. This ensures that the teacher will have accurate data points from which to monitor performance.

Recommended Adjustments to Read Naturally Live Default Settings:

• Reduce read alongs to 2, and require students to click on bolded vocabulary words prior to completing the first read along.
• Require oral (vs. written) retell.

Explanations for These Adjustments:

Reduce Read Alongs and Require Vocabulary

English Language Learners often need to focus on building vocabulary. It is highly beneficial to require these students to learn the definitions of the bolded vocabulary words in the story prior to starting the Read Along step. Before starting their first read along, multilingual learners should click on each bolded vocabulary word and read along with the definitions. They are more likely to retain the words’ meanings if they learn them as they are preparing to read the words in context. After reading the vocabulary, multilingual learners can complete their read alongs. Due to the extra time it takes to read along with the vocabulary, we recommend changing the number of required read alongs for multilingual learners from three to two.

Require Oral (vs. Written) Retell

We also recommend requiring multilingual learners to do the Retell step orally. You can have the students record their oral retells in another application, or they can tell it to you when you meet with them for the Pass step. Requiring an oral retelling allows multilingual learners to practice speaking the English language. You can turn off the Retell Step for these students, and then ask the student for an oral retell while completing the Pass Activities together. 

See this section of the Read Live User Guide for all the information you need on how and when to adjust these Story Options and more.