Refusing to put dc on next reading level or even assess

[Blueschool]

Dc in in year 2. Has been on same reading level since September.

My dc may not be good at a lot at school, but reading is dc strong point. Not the top of class but quite advanced. Not just my opinion but her previous teachers and helpers.

Her current level is not a challenge anymore. Mentioned this weeks ago. Given a huge list basically telling me why dc is a crap reader in teachers opinion. Very surprised as one area always was praised on reading.

Took it on chin and we worked hard to resolve the issues like "not enough expression".

Dc reading is just fine. I can not find not fault.

My comment I wrote last week was the "book was not a challenge". Teacher took a whole page up in dd reading record to again tell me how crap dc is.

I felt the comments were utterly unfair and do not reflect reality at all. She also told me I could buy books to read at home! Very unfair assumption dc reads for pleasure all the time and has 100+ at home.

She said IF she wants she will assess her after Christmas she will.

My issues are

• I thought parents and teachers were meant to be in partnership with education. How is this a partnership?

• IF dc is genuinely reading badly at school WHY? Why is there such a difference? Why is her educational environment not making her feel confident and supported to show her real abilty?

• Another parent has told me they have had similar issues as the teacher gets herself stressed. Im sorry, but holding a child back because you are stressed is quite something.

What should I do?

There was one child who read stage 6 fine (could have coped with higher probably) but a fair few of them on stage 2 or 3 tbh who really struggled...

Oh and given the standard of some TAs I think there is a huge gulf between being heard by a teacher and a TA on the lower pay scale.Not exactly fair that only one section of a class have access to a teacher's time on an individual basis.

Polka, I'm with you. Simpson I think that's a shame. A terrible shame. Perhaps the parents don't read at home with them - another good reason for making one to one standard practice in school.

If anyone can tell me what the rest of the class is doing when the teacher is taking 5 or 6 for guided reading, and then explain to me why they can't do that during one to one reading, that would be great? It's just I asked a while back and I can't tell if the teachers aren't interested, can't be bothered to answer or are irritated and don't want to. Thanks.

In reply to Cassgate, I don't think so.

I suppose my view is that 'the basics' are best taught in a context, and the most motivating context for children is often in cross-curricular topics / themes which come out of History, Geography, Science or RE. Equally, including subjects like ICT, music, art, dance or D&T allow children a way of responding to what they learn which is not always 'write about this'. I think my teaching, and the learning of my pupils (many of whom come from backgrounds which have given them limited life experiences) would be poorer if 'the basics' weren't delivered through an overall context based on the 'other' subjects of the curriculum.

The only subject that I sometimes feel is 'not valuable' in the particular school that I teach in is French, as for our high SEN / high FSM cohorts it sometimes feels as if that time would be better spent teaching children more of their own language. On the other hand, one of my statemented pupils LOVES French and is well up with the remainder of the class - it is oral and everyone is starting from the same low base.

Teacher

The parent can tell that book is too easy and boring for a regular seven year old. Why can't the teacher?

My argument against real books, (I can't believe I'm arguing against real books!) is this: If the child has predominantly, or exclusively, been taught in school, especially using systematic synthetic phonics, the method involves shielding the child from graphemes that she hasn't been taught yet. So if the parent then exposes the child to real books the child will realise that she can't read when previously she thought that she could.

In our case it's the opposite. The child was introduced first to real books and then to phonics readers via the school. Because her real book exposure is much more varied than her phonics reader exposure the phonics readers have been a complete waste of time and effort.

In defence of guided reading.... reading aloud confidently to a small group is an important skill, leading on towards speaking off the cuff and making presentations, joining in with group work etc.
In defence of some of the silly comprehension questions
.... if you have absolutely no idea what might happen next in a book, you never appreciate cunning twists and surprises in the plot.
....if you can't remember the names of the characters or understand their motivations you can't follow the plot properly.

But like Brycie way up the thread, when I first read at DSs school, I come across several children who seemed to be "held back" on lower levels for no clear reason, then suddenly jumped by 3 levels when they moved to the next teacher.

Learn but my dc were all taught phonics Letters and Sounds at school and it certainly didn't stop them from being able to read real books too.Some kids are still doing phonics in KS2 thats a looooong time never to attempt reading a real book.

I think in the early days yes I see the value of scheme only(although you can get some very basic phonic based real books)but at some point further down the line kids need to have the confidence to read other stuff too otherwise they'll just ignore text they could quite easily read.

"the fact that the OP's daughter is reading at 2c at this stage in Year 2 would indicate that she is on track to reach expected levels at the end of the year"

Cripes - talk about low expectations. No wonder you don't feel the need to do one to one - you don't expect the results you'd get from it.

Brycie, I did answer it, actually, before you asked the question...

In an overall 'reading lesson', I set the objectives for the lesson for a couple of minutes, and set specific tasks for each group (similar structure to a Literacy or Maths lesson, tbh, just the 'whole class teaching' phase is shorter). One group will be reading with me (which I have described in detail above, and as part of which every child will read several pages), the other groups have tasks which address different objectives which fall within what teachers call 'reading' but which don't necessarily fall within the 'layman's definition' of that word. So for example one group might be doing a comprehension exercise. Another might be completing a character description at some level. A third might be showing alternative story endings on a plan. Or, for example, where objectives relate to non-fiction, one group might be taking notes from an online text, another might be highlighting specific features of an information text, a third might be creating their own glossary using dictionaries. All these will be linked to that group's last 'teacher guided' session.

The difference between this and possible activities during 1 to 1 reading. The first is time ratios - each child has a 1:4 or 5 ratio of 'contact' to 'non-contact' time in guided reading, vs a 1: 29 ratio in 1:1 reading. Another is the opportunity to 'set up' activities during the 'guided' session -so for example at the end of today's session I introduced that group's unguided task for tomorrow. I couldn't do that at the end of each child's 1:1 time, there would be no 1:1 time left. A third is text - guided reading groups read the same text, so can all do activities that relate to that text (which you know that they have read and understood), whereas individual readers are all wildly different.

These kids were not read with at home (or certainly the reading diary had never been filled in).

There was guided reading going on today and 5-6 kids were being taken out at a time to a quieter room by the TA.

The thing about me reading to the kids is that whilst I love it and do my best I am not trained and once I have read with a child their name is crossed off the list and that is their 121 reading for the week iyswim.

For those teachers with no TAs or who refuse to let one lead a session....

What on earth happens to the other 25 or so children when your doing 20 minute sessions of guided reading every day?

OK, Polka, but then you've got to have an attentive parent. I don't know how this hypothetical child is coming across these real books. But supposing that it's an unusual experience for her, it seems clear that she doesn't have any real books at home. As I'm typing this the obvious is becoming more obvious still. Some children have been exposed to real books since they were babies. And so the concept of real books is no shock to them. But what about a child who has never been exposed to a real book?

If they can achieve quite complex work as you have described above, quite independently, what's the beef? Why are people saying "but what would they do?" and wringing their hands?

I don't have a TA and I don't do guided reading as I've stated more than once on this thread.

Apparently they can do this blueschool -

"the other groups have tasks which address different objectives which fall within what teachers call 'reading' but which don't necessarily fall within the 'layman's definition' of that word. So for example one group might be doing a comprehension exercise. Another might be completing a character description at some level. A third might be showing alternative story endings on a plan. Or, for example, where objectives relate to non-fiction, one group might be taking notes from an online text, another might be highlighting specific features of an information text, a third might be creating their own glossary using dictionaries. "

but are apparently incapable of independent work during one to one reading.

I don't understand either.

I think the teacher tries to listen to each child every half term, DS (yr3) has been heard by the teacher once this term but I am sure he reads other things in class with her and he has been heard by the TA another 3 times and a parent volunteer once.

As I said earlier DD is in reception and is listened to twice a week ( last week was with the deputy head and DD got to choose which book , so chose a book with a bit of bite to it rather an an ORT/ JP one). Parent volunteers are not allowed to read with kids in reception.

You need to read the second of teacherwith2kids's paragraphs too, Brycie.

Brycie,

On what are you basing your understanding of a 2c? On the few words quoted by the OP earlier on the thread? I am talking about Purple books IN GENERAL, not the few words from that one IN PARTICULAR - are you?

Other teachers - I'm trying to think of the 'real books' that we have in 2b to illustrate the general level and am drawing a blank as I'm tired. Can anyone help out?

(Oh, and Brycie - I teach Year 3, and as I say our intake is challenging. I currently have only 4 children - two statemented due to their very significant SEN, the other two both on School Action Plus - at 2b or below. The vast majority of our children exceed national expectations at the end of Year 2 and just over a quarter of the class are currently reading at the level expected by the end of Year 4.... a situation which has developed since we started doing Guided Reading instead of hasty 1 to 1....)

Bycie if you read back through the thread I did answer your question about what the children in my school do while teacher does guided reading.

Brycie, I did explain in the second of my paragraphs.

A child who does 1 to 1 reading has 5 minutes a week of guided time, and 2 hours and 25 minutes of unguided. Guided reading in a group, 30 minutes guided (for 5 of which I introduce the unguided tasks, which are based on a text that I know that they have all read and understood - not the case for 1 toi 1 reading) and, because I do a couple of guided group overlapping into assembly time, about 1 hour 20 minutes unguided. It's a big difference.

I did read the second paragraph. There was nothing there except the fact that she wouldn't have time to relay the next day's task. Quite frankly if children can do all that during guided reading I can't see why teachers are saying "but what would they do" during one to one reading, unless it's just an excuse. I mean some of them think one to one is a fetish, I can't remember who said that, but goodness me. How said.

Teacher - that was a typical passage from the book, blueschool said. So if that's a typical book for a Y2 at the end nearly of auumn term on track to reach expectations - yes I would say expectations are too low.

Isabelle I didn't see that - can you remember what time you said it.

I think we have here a classic example of the fact that there's 'reading = decoding the words' & there's 'reading = understanding', & they ain't always the same thing....

In that case it is not typical of a 2c book. A book I read earlier this week with one of my SEN readers on 2C was about Edison's inventions, including words like phonograph etc.