Examining oral reading fluency among Grade 5 rural English Second Language (ESL) learners in South Africa? An analysis of NEEDU 2013

CITATION: Draper, K. & Spaull, N. 2016. Examining oral reading fluency among Grade 5 rural English Second Language (ESL) learners in South Africa? An analysis of NEEDU 2013. South African Journal of Childhood Education, 5(2):44-77, doi:10.4102/sajce.v5i2.390.The original publication is available at https://www.sajce.co.zaThe ability to read for meaning and pleasure is arguably the most important skill children learn in primary school. One integral component of learning to read is Oral Reading Fluency (ORF), defined as the ability to read text quickly, accurately, and with meaningful expression. Although widely acknowledged in the literature as important, to date there have been no large-scale studies on ORF in English in South Africa, despite this being the language of learning and teaching for 80% of ESL students from Grade 4 onwards. We analyze data provided by the National Education and Evaluation Development Unit (NEEDU) of South Africa, which tested 4667 Grade 5 English Second Language (ESL) students from 214 schools across rural areas in South Africa in 2013. This included ORF and comprehension measures for a subset of 1772 students. We find that 41% of the sample were non-readers in English (