To want more than 1 book per week.

[mealychump]

Am hoping you can tell me if IABU or not before I go in and see my DS's teacher.

DS has just turned 5 (august baby) and has started Year 1 at a new school since we moved house.

He had a really slow start to reception and it took him ages to start reading. Initially I wasn't worried as he was only 4, but everyone else started to pick it up and he seemed to struggle. His then teacher wasn't that worried but he didn't reach the expected level by the end of reception. He finished on red books (just about) but had been on pink for ages.

New school put him straight on red books, thats all fine and i'm happy. Suddenly, it's starting to click. Slowly but surely he's getting it and making some progress. However, at his new school they only change the reading books once a week! So we are only getting one new book a week. We read it a few times but I really think he needs more than this to make better progress and help him to catch up.

His previous school gave him a book every day or every other day, I thought that was the norm! I want to go and discuss this with his teacher and see what she suggests. But before I go in and ask for multiple books a week, I wanted to hear what other schools do. If his previous school was a real anomaly with lots of books per week then I guess I have to accept I might be stuck going through this at snails pace. How on earth though, is a slightly struggling reader supposed to progress if they only get one bloody book a week!?

Other than pestering school for more books, is there anything I can do?

Rubbish. You’re deliberately ignoring my point

But seriously, think about it. A class of 4 year olds, all roughly the same place at the start of the year. Do you think the school can afford 25 copies of each book, so that each child can go through each band in exactly the right order?

Think of the space that they would take up! The teacher is going to be tackling the pink band sounds before the red band digraphs and so on and that is it. The band books aren't sub-divided.

YAB massively U

first, have a word with the teacher

more importantly, why don't you buy the books yourself? They cost next to nothing second hand and there are always parents who are trying to get rid of theirs.

YABU to think that it's up to the school to provide everything.
I can't wait for parents to have to make financial contribution and lose their entitled attitude.

Well as I say luckily our school manage it no problem.

We subscribe to Reading Chest and get an unlimited supply of decodable reading books.

Also buy the Julia Donaldson songbirds set. They’re amazing.

or start a book club with other parents - I am sure a lot of people would be happy to buy one set of books and swap, as opposed to buy so many and drown under the books!

I think you're going to have to make up your mind whether I know loads about how this stuff works because I have apparently done year 2 more than once, or I'm totally clueless, because at the moment you're arguing both.

Go ask the other parents. Your kids aren't all on the same three books at once. They're on random books from the book band. It works, because the bands all cover the same sounds. They're supposed to.

Google the Oxford Reading Tree schools catalogue and look at how much schools have to pay for books. Calculate the cost of 25× every book in a band x every band.

Buy them yourself or go to the library

@Passthecherrycoke that really isn’t how the book bands work. It isn’t that they’ll all be working on the o_e sound this week so send out X book.

There will be an enormous box full of red book band books and the teacher will pull out the closest one.

They aren’t sub divided by a certain sound that they’ve worked on at school this week.

Library is a good idea or you can buy reading books on eBay for quite cheap.

My DC’s teachers vary. Some give them a new book every day, others once a week. My DD (8) had the same book for two weeks until I wrote a note in her journal asking for a new one. We have hundreds of books at home so it’s not a huge issue.

“Go ask the other parents. Your kids aren't all on the same three books at once. They're on random books from the book band. It works, because the bands all cover the same sounds. They're supposed to.”

I don’t think for a second they’re all doing the same 3 books. Where on earth did you get that idea from?

@Onatreebyariver I don’t think it works like that either

however your simple “pull it out of the box” method does contradict the TA on page 1 who described a very involved process that might take up to a whole hour, also used as the reason why OPs school can only send home 1 book a week

All OP is asking is whether it’s unreasonable To expect more than 1 book a week. I’m astounded there are so many posters arguing it is

Please donate books you have finished with to schools too. The school my child went to really appreciate it.

@Passthecherrycoke

Last year when DC2 was in Reception, we had an awful lot of duplicated reading books from school - the worst one being the book he got 6 different times, including twice on the same page of his reading record. In Reception the teacher / TA gave out the reading books rather than the pupil choosing them.

So I strongly suspect that our school uses a method of checking which book band pupil is on, then pull the first book out of the box. On the bright side, they did give DC2 a new book as soon as he’d finished the old one, so we weren’t stuck with the repeated books for long.

The TA’s post you mention shows that some schools do take a lot more care over choosing books for pupils, but that’s not universal for all schools.

My daughter is in reception and they get a new book once a week, on a Friday. She's a good reader for her age and one book a week is nowhere near enough for her, and she wouldn't read the same book two days in a row, so we have to supplement. We've bought an Oxford Reading Tree set by Julia Donaldson and another set from Ladybird I think, both very good.

I'd be interested to know how often your children all have 1:1 reading time at school with a teacher or TA (or parent volunteer). Ours seems to be about once a fortnight which really doesn't seem a lot. I'm going to ask about it at parents' evening next month. It's not really much of a concern at this stage as we do read a lot at home but is this the norm for reception?

Ours don't have 1:1 reading time -regularly - they have guided reading in a small group (5 or 6 of them) once a week and as far as I can tell they read a maximum of a page or two each. I think they may read to a teacher/ TA 1:1 maybe once a half term/ term?

I suspect that they also work out very quickly who gets regular reading time at home and who doesn't and concentrate resources like parent volunteers to those who don't.

DC2 typically read to an adult about twice a week when he was in Reception last year.

That’s dropped to between once a week and once a fortnight so far this year - Year 1. But DC2 reads at home daily and is progressing well with his reading. I suspect, like the pp above, that the teacher is focusing more of the reading resources on children who aren’t frequently reading at home and / or children who are struggling with their reading.

That would make sense if they were using what little resource they have available to those who really need it or don't get it elsewhere.