I used the following passage from Cornelia Funke’s Inkspell to introduce my fluency mini-unit.
The whole secret, Meggie,” Mo had once told her, “is in the breathing. It gives your voice strength and fills it with your life. And not just yours. Sometimes it feels as if when you take a breath you are breathing in everything around you, everything that makes up the world and moves it, and then it all flows into the words.”
She tried it. She tried to breath as calmly and deeply as the sea–the sound of the surf came into the room from outside–in and out, in and out, as if she could capture its power in her voice.