Why Is Oral Reading Important?

This is actually more of a rhetorical question than anything else. Growing up, I never really minded oral reading, because I was always a strong reader, but I never preferred it either. I'm not talking about teacher read aloud, I'm talking about oral reading from a student perspective.

The reason a lot of students read orally is so the teacher can hear how well they are reading. Unfortunately, there is often a disconnect between oral reading skill and silent reading skill. I know this because it happens with me. Yes, I can read well orally, but I can read extremely quickly silently, and feel like I retain more.

For a lot of students, once that metacognitive awareness is in place (which for some starts to happen around the age of 11 or 12), maybe oral reading won't be as important as far as it relates to trying to assess student reading.

I'm not an expert by any means on this, I'm just throwing it out there. If you read this and have anything you want to add to the discussion, please, comment.