Secondary school - reading age.

[Iloveitall]

My year 7 has come home with a slip about their star reading report. It seems a load of gibberish to me but it says reading age is 10.05. I’m assuming that means 10 years and 5 months? Seems so low. Guess we will be upping the reading in our house this summer.

@AmyandPhilipfan

My 12 year old has just been assessed at having a reading age of 8 years 11 months. I knew his reading was a bit behind but I was shocked at that and the teacher did say it was possible he’d rushed through the test on that day and made silly mistakes. When I tested him (purely reading words, not comprehension) at the start of the first lockdown he was 9.6 then when I tested when he went back to school he was 11.6 - I worked my kids hard! 😆 So I’m not sure what’s happened.

It's great that you worked hard over lockdown to improve your dc's reading but I don't see how you can reliably assess a child's reading age without taking comprehension into account. Understanding what you read is the whole point of the process.

Whether your dc's school used Star Reading or a different method, they will probably have included comprehension which could be why the result was lower than you had expected.

Op if you have library membership then you can borrow ebooks and audiobooks to download into your devices for 3 weeks.

Does he see you reading for pleasure?

Yes he sees me reading a lot. He’s always amazed how quickly I read through a book too. I always encourage hi to sit with me in the garden in the sun and read a book but he doesn’t always want to.

The Percy Jackson series is great fun, so I'm sure he'll enjoy them.
My Y7 DS is a complete book addict. He has just finished Michelle Paver's Wolf Brother series. Skulduggery Pleasant is probably his favourite, tbh, but you need to be able to 'get' sarcasm (so my elder child does not.get on with them!).
What things has he had to read for school this year?
Patrick Ness, Francis Hardynge are both popular around this age. DS likes Philip Reeve too (Mortal Engines series, Railhead, etc)
Things like the Guinness Book of Records are quite fun, and not daunting as they're the kind of thing you can dip into, skip pages, etc.

• although several Patrick Ness and Frances Hardynge books are meant for older teens.

OP if you look at the MN Books section there are lots of “Recommend me books for a 12 year old boy who likes X and Y” type threads.

@Iloveitall

Yes he sees me reading a lot. He’s always amazed how quickly I read through a book too. I always encourage hi to sit with me in the garden in the sun and read a book but he doesn’t always want to.

That's good. I think between that and making interesting books available to him he will pick it up. It's been a disrupted couple of years so I'm not surprised if some children are testing below their expected reading level. The stress of it will affect us all in some way.

My dc came out at around 11 at 8yo. Weve been reading the year 5/6 recommended reads .
Also a series of unfortunate events.
I try to get dc to read 1hr a day but it's more like 40 min average.
Agree with others re library and library online books too.
Or kindle samples to try a few books first.
It does get harder as they get older as they might still like younger books. And secondary they probably have a lot of other homework.
If the test adjusts then getting early q wrong will make a big difference