reading levels

[mrsmcv]

my dd is 5, in Y1 and I've finally persuaded her teacher to move her up a level on oxford reading tree books. By the time she moved her up dd was thoroughly fluent and thoroughly bored. Her teacher has described her as being 'hesitant' at her first attempt on this new level though the teacher says dd does know all the words she's reading.

I'm not being funny or pushy, but if dd knows all the words she's reading, without sounding them out, does it matter that she's hesitant when she's reading out loud something that she's never seen before? I am deliberately leaving out the level she's on here cos I don't think it matters.

I want to ask the teacher to explain but she has become very defensive with several parents in the class about reading levels. Personally, I'm content that dd is enjoying reading outside school and curious about books and very able to read words around her including notices, signs, the newspaper etc. but I do think it's a shame that she now hates all reading connected with school because it's just so tedious for her.

If it's easy can she not just read it quickly and do something else? Reading out loud is a very important skill. I think DS's school reading books are for practising this skill (and comprehension if part of the homework). It should not be tedious if she can do it quickly, how much of a book does she have to read a night?

The thing that I find myself explaining to a lot of parents (and rightfully so because they all want the best for their children) is that to be able to move up a level the children have to demonstrate that they can do a lot more than just decode or read the words in a book fluently. There are a lot of other skills that are as importnant when reading which are forgotten about. Yes, reading aloud confidently and with expression is one of them, but so are things like comprehension. Is the child just reading or does he/she actually understand what they have just read? Are they gaining information from the text on different levels? There are also other things like recognising full stops and other punctuation and how they affect how the text should be read.

I can't access them now because I'm on maternity leave but my school sticks a copy of these additional reading targets for the level the child is reading into their reading record each time they move up a level to allow parents to see what their child should be doing when reading this level. Maybe ask at school and see if they have anything like this that you can have a copy of?

I would also try an encourage your child to read anything and everything that interests them. The ORT books are only a small part of encouraging a love of reading and if they're not enjoyed then you need to try and develop that enjoyment elsewhere.

Good luck and I hope all this makes sense. I think I've caught all the typos but I'm NAK so you never know!

Thanks for this somersaults, I have had weeks of what feels like battling to me and probably to the teacher as well but did loads of research, asked teacher to benchmark formally (which confirmed higher reading level) and asked her to paste in her reading record the additional targets like self-correcting so that I know what i'm looking for. I know teachers have to tick so many boxes but to a non-teacher, these are just baffling. I am the first to admit I don't trust anyone to do anything properly and I do think parents need to participate with kids education - more than that, I want to cos I think it's my job to support learning. all much clearer now - thanks to you both for advice