*1.1. Background*

The most common approach to assist children who present with reading di fficulties in Irish primary schools is to withdraw them from the regular classroom and provide learning support tuition either individually or in smaller groups [3,4]. Research on the nature of reading instruction provided in these withdrawal settings indicates an emphasis on cognitive and metacognitive processes with less attention paid to motivational instruction and the role played by a ffective factors [5–7]. However, the affective aspects of reading have been shown to contribute unique variance to reading achievement, and di fferences in reading attitude and motivation have been implicated in the socioeconomic gaps in reading achievement found consistently worldwide [8–11]. Young students, who have di fficulties

in learning to read, need to be particularly motivated in order to engage in a process where they have already experienced failure [7]. The extent to which they are motivated by their *early* reading instruction, therefore, has a significant impact on the likelihood of them succeeding in reading, which in turn can impact on their school experiences in later years [12]. Consequently, finding ways to motivate young children to read is identified as a priority in reading research [13].

This paper presents the results of research carried out on the e ffects of fluency oriented reading instruction (FORI) on the motivation for reading among struggling readers from areas of low socioeconomic status. Research in the area of motivation has an extensive history and has long been regarded as having a key role in reading achievement [14]. Hence, a better understanding of the relationship between fluency oriented reading instruction and motivation to read has practical and theoretical implications. If this particular type of reading instruction is found to significantly impact on motivation to read, this would indicate a need to focus more on improving oral reading fluency skills. Conversely if motivation to read has a subsequent and sustainable e ffect on reading skill development, this would indicate a need to integrate more techniques into early reading instruction that are focused on improving student motivation to read as well as techniques that specific reading skills.

#### *1.2. Description of Study*

The study, which was conducted in three disadvantaged primary schools in the Dublin Northside Partnership catchment area, examined the e ffects of an on-site reading intervention on the motivation for reading of struggling readers. The intervention, which was based on fluency oriented reading instruction, took place in learning support classrooms in these schools. The research focused on students in First Class who were receiving learning support for reading and were identified as having poor motivation for reading. The study is specifically focused on students in First Class as research has shown this to be a critical period of rapid skill development that can take readers from word-by-word reading to fluent speech-like reading by the end of that grade [15,16].

#### *1.3. Rationale for Fluency Oriented Reading Instruction*

Helping students become fluent readers is a central goal of early reading instruction [17–19]. Students who do not develop reading fluency by the middle grades of primary school normally struggle with reading throughout their lives [20,21]. While numerous reading theories and a wide range of research have focused on explaining how children learn to read [20,22,23], there is still much debate amongs<sup>t</sup> reading researchers, parents and teachers over which types of early reading instruction are most e ffective [24–26]. In addition to early reading instruction that focuses on phonics, word decoding skills, vocabulary development, and comprehension, reading instruction that builds a child's oral reading fluency is now considered by some reading researchers to be a vital but often neglected element of a balanced reading programme [18,20,21,27].

Fluency oriented instruction was selected based on research indicating that reading fluency is an important factor when considering a reading intervention for students experiencing di fficulties with reading in the early years of primary school [28]. Oral reading fluency is seen as fundamental to the holistic development of reading skills as children move from word-by-word to fluent, expressive reading [29–31]. It has been identified as a particularly salient factor when considering the achievement, or lack of achievement, for young struggling readers who have a greater deficit in reading fluency than in word recognition or comprehension [30,31]. Other research suggests that word recognition and reading fluency di fficulties may be the key concern for upwards of 90% of children with significant problems in reading comprehension [32].

#### *1.4. Fluency Oriented Instruction and Struggling Readers*

Fluency in any activity is achieved largely through practice and repetition—the musician rehearses, the athlete engages in training drills, the actor spends time rehearsing pieces that will eventually be performed on stage, and the child learning to ride a bike spends hours repeating the same basic

skills in a quest for competence. The practice referred to in these contexts involves the repetition of a particular tune, skill, movement, or composition many times. Similarly, fluency is achieved in reading through repeated practice of selected texts. While skilled and competent readers who have mastered decoding (word recognition) are often able to achieve and maintain fluency in reading through wide and independent reading, for poor readers, repeated reading of the same text is an essential method for achieving fluency [18,33]. Research on repeated reading as an instructional strategy indicates that when students orally practiced a piece of text they improved on their rate, accuracy and reading comprehension of that text [34]. Such an accomplishment is to be expected given the same text is revisited many times. However, it is also found that when students moved to new passages, their initial readings of those new pieces are read with higher levels of fluency and comprehension than the initial readings of the previous passage, even though the new passage was as difficult as or more challenging than the previous piece [33].

#### *1.5. Motivation and Reading*

Traditionally, research carried out on motivation as it pertained to education focused mainly on the concept of achievement or academic motivation as a broad construct generalized across all domains in a child's academic experience. Only in the relatively recent past has research focused on the intersection of motivation and reading achievement [7,35]. Researchers and educators who have conducted investigations specifically in the field of motivation for reading have found the concept to be multifaceted with a recognition of the affective domain as a critical element in reading instruction [36,37]. Once the affective aspects of reading were recognised as important in skill development [36], a variety of constructs were posited by theorists to explain reading motivation and how it influences students' reading engagemen<sup>t</sup> [38,39].

Since the ultimate goal of literacy instruction is 'the development of readers who can read and who choose to read' [40] (p. 19), it is now generally accepted by teachers of young children that reading motivation plays a critical role in reading development [41,42]. Research on motivation has thus provided compelling evidence that success in reading demands the integration of cognitive, language and motivational engagemen<sup>t</sup> [37]. Recently, there has been a growing interest in the impact of motivation in the early years, leading researchers to focus specifically on the motivation of readers in the lower grades [43–45]. Researchers in this area argue that it is still unclear how broad the construct of reading motivation needs to be to capture the early development of reading skills [46]. What is clear is that there are a variety of possible reading motivations that can influence children's engagemen<sup>t</sup> in reading and their reading performance [47,48].

#### *1.6. Importance of Motivation for Struggling Readers*

Research has indicated that up to ten percent of the variance in reading performance measures of students in the higher primary class levels is attributed to reading motivation [49]. If individuals believe they can be successful at an activity they strive to master that task. As students become more motivated to engage in the reading process, they are subsequently more likely to be successful [50]. Therefore, students who experience instruction that increases their motivation for reading at an early stage in their schooling are more likely to have a positive academic self-concept. Conversely, a lack of student engagemen<sup>t</sup> with literacy is identified in the literature as a fundamental obstacle to achievement in our schools [51] with the likelihood that struggling readers become poorly motivated to read if they repeatedly experience failure in acquiring even the basic reading skills [52,53].

Some researchers have proposed that poor motivation may be a defining feature of reading failure [54,55]. Children at risk for reading failure are likely to hold more negative self-concepts [53,56,57], display less emotional self-regulation [58], and avoid reading activities [59,60]. Morgan and Fuchs [41] in reviewing the research on reading motivation presented a number of studies that point towards a bidirectional relationship between motivation to read and reading skill development. Students tend to read competently and more frequently and without fear of failure when they are motivated to engage

in the process [47]. Conversely, children who struggle with reading frequently become de-motivated, read less and become even weaker readers as they progress through the grades [61]. For this reason, motivation can be a compensatory factor, potentially mediating other discrepancies of struggling readers by creating a cycle of increased competence, increased motivation, and increased reading amount [62].
