Jorge, or Jorgito, as his friends affectionately called him, loved to play soccer and often dreamed of one day playing in the professional leagues.

One day, the teacher gathered Jorgito and his friends to read a story about a famous soccer player, named Pelé. The name of the book was called, Pelé, King of Soccer/Pelé, El rey del fútbol. Jorgito was enthralled!

After the first reading, the teacher announced that all students would participate in a Reader's Theater. She had a list of everyone's role and began to call them out. Guess what role Jorgito got? He was chosen to be the narrator! Jorgito was mortified!

Jorgito had come from Chihuahua, México, six months ago. Although his English was getting better, he was still not a fluent reader; he struggled to pronounce and understand unknown words and spoke with a stutter. 

Speaking in public made him sweat, and it was difficult for him to get the words out. How could he possibly narrate about one of his most admired soccer players? He knew he needed help, and fast.

Jorgito ran to his friends, Molly, Polly, and Olly. 

"Hey guys, p-p-p-please help me!" pleaded Jorgito.

"What's going on?" asked Molly.

"I've b-b-been chosen to narrate in Reader's Theater about the life of super soccer star, Pe-Pe-Pelé!" Jorgito stuttered loudly.

"WHAT?!" gasped Molly, Polly, and Olly in unison.

"I don't think I can do it!" shouted Jorgito desperately.

"Jorgito," Polly said calmly, "You can do this, and we will help you."

"Yes!" exclaimed Olly confidently, "I have an idea where to start!"

Olly, immediately whisked Jorgito away to the secluded office of Professor Von Vocabulisty. Professor Von Vocab, as his students called him, was a wizard with words (or at least he thought so). After listening to Jorgito's story, he exclaimed shaking his head, 

"Alas, oui, oui, English, Spanish, Reader's Theater, Pelé? Woe, woe, woe!"

Jorgito shot a wide-eyed, terrified glance at Olly

"Professor?" asked Olly inquiringly, "What do you suggest my friend Jorgito do?"

"Here, Jorge, take this list of high frequency words to memorize," said the professor, "Only and only after you've committed them to memory will your reading accuracy and comprehension improve. Good luck and good day!" 

Jorgito almost fainted.

Moments later, Molly came by and proposed a better plan,"Let's re-read together a portion of the book to identify high frequency words and unknown words."

"Gr, gr, great idea, Molly!" exclaimed Jorgito enthusiastically.

Molly went on, "The teacher mentioned that automaticity improves when words are read in context using a monolingual friend as opposed to reading them in isolation." 

Molly helped Jorgito, through several read-readings, identify high frequency and unknown words. She also helped him with pronunciation.  Jorgito began to feel hopeful and more confident with every reading.

Jorgito continued to read and practice, constantly perfecting his dialog. Even though his reading fluency was increasing, Polly couldn't help but overhear  Jorgito reading word-by-word and in random 2-3 word clusters. 

"His tempo is off," Polly whispered quietly under her breath. She suggested to Jorgito, "Let's go pay a visit to Professor Pepé Épée, a fencing champion who can still parse out words and sentences faster than Zorro."

Students who miserably failed fluency time-tests, sought out Professor Épée to master the art of parsing units of text  to increase reading fluency and comprehension. 

"Do  you think that he c-c-c-can help me?" Jorgito asked skeptically.

"Yes, bring the book; it won't take long. In just a few moves, your reading tempo will as swift as Pelés bicycle kick," answered Polly with conviction.