Please come and explain slowly to me ....... NC levels have me lost

[ohmygosh123]

There is a pretty wide gulf between levels children attain in each year - I've got that far - and I get that that is normal. But if a child is doing say Bond books, Schofield & Sims or CGP (which have all been mentioned on here), then what age range equates to what level. Is a 6-7 book what a child who is 2a would be doing, or would they be on 7-8 for example. What age does a level 3c kick in .....

I have downloaded the NC tick box things for each sub-level - so I can work out her level by how much she can do. But I'd find it so much easier to understand in terms of book levels, just because then I'd know which books to get, and not end up getting her ones that are too easy etc.

In context we are overseas and I'm ordering off Amazon, so I can't just go into a bookshop and flick through. I like her to do stuff in english as well as the foreign language, especially maths, so she can do sums in both languages!

So if anyone can tell me - what level your child was on when they did whatever book, I'd be really grateful. I think she's around a 2a/b in most things at the moment and would be in Year 1 in UK.

Ignore the levels. They are being abolished.

If you are abroad the best way to proceed is to buy age-appropriate text books aimed at private schools. I use Galore Park and Bond papers, principally.

Yippeeee - so that was a waste of time reading up on it then! Are they going to be abolished from next year though, or later than that. And everyone on here is still going on about levels .....

But if a child wants to get into a highly selective school, what age level should they be working on in which year. We will be coming back into the UK soon and I'd rather know what we are meant to be doing. Bond 5-6 is ridiculously easy compared to what she is doing over here.......and then I read on some threads that they need to be a year above their actual age group for selective entry ..... but what level does say getting virtually all right at 5-6 / 6-7 Bond equate to. Just so I can get my head round it!

What country are you in?

If you want your DC to go to a selective school, you would do much better ignoring the NC and going with what private schools do anyway.

In rural France (but she's been put up a year).

She did a trial day at a prep school in UK, to get a place for when we come back. They say that there is a wide range of abilities & they differentiate. However I think that they don't really prepare for Common Entrance as kids in this area will tend to go to board at a feeder from 9/11-13, and then go to one of the 13+ boarding schools. (There aren't any selective preps in our area of the UK.) However all the preps I spoke to are also talking about NC levels ...... none of them seem to be massively academic, and I chose this one of the basis of its extra curricular activities, headmistress & behaviour of pupils.

Will able kids at a good private school be working a year ahead in terms of say Bond books?

Did you do the Galore Park Junior English Book 1 when your children would have been in Year 3, as per the title, or did you start it earlier? She's doing Haydn Junior English Book 1 at the moment, which I got when I was back in the UK.

My DD is in CE1 ie equivalent of Y3 but she was a November baby and would be in Y2 were she at school in England. She is doing Galore Park Junior English 1 at the moment - she's about half way through - though she doesn't do it systematically. She does a variety of things, depending on what she has covered at school already (she's in a French school with a bilingual English class for 1/4 of the day). She also does work from Galore Park Junior Maths 1. She did the Bond NVR for 6/7 and 7/8 during the February half-term and basically raced through them.