reading year 3

[emma123456]

What happens after white books, when they become a free reader? How do you measure their progress as a parent? I remember doing sra at primary school. Do they move onto something similar at juniors?

At DD's school white level isn't the highest level, they band KS2 books as well. As far as I can remember at her school there are lime, brown, grey (silver), sapphire and magenta book bands, after white.

I am thankful for this as DD (Yr2) is reading lime/brown books and was at the end of Yr1, I would be uncomfortable with her being labelled a free reader at such a young age.

I know that some schools do end book bands at KS1 (usually lime level, rather than white), but I don't know how the teachers ensure the children are reading appropriate books in order to improve their reading skills - especially if the children aren't guided into choosing particular books.

mine aren't Yr3 yet but if you are talking about book band white/10 then I think the majority of schools at least do lime/11 before letting them choose from the library. There are levels beyond that which some schools use for home books and others just use for guided reading from what I can work out.

If it is a separate middle/junior school so they have started at yr3 I expect many of them will still use scheme books as they get to know the children's true reading levels.

my daughter is just reading harder books at home having gone beyond lime/11, as the books get longer and more complex then she is making progress IMO as a parent.

I should add school still have books above lime but she is young so is doing sort of fill in books which are more age appropriate

In my DC school they cannot choose their own books till at NC L3 and the reading books go up to lime (11).

DD (yr1) can choose her own books but IMO has zero guidance in what she chooses although her choice so far has been very good (fluke IMO).

DC's school have a lime level after white and then what they call a "free reader" level - though it's not free reading from my point of view as they still have to pick books out of a box. (they don't move to true free reading until they've been on this level for a good while - in DS's case 18 months).

The school measures reading age (though only up to 10.6 so not so great for showing progress as they basically are at 10.6 once they move to the top level) and also gives their NC level at parents' evenings and at year end. Once they're at lime or beyond you really don't see vast leaps of progress like you can do at the lower reading levels though.

DS1s Junior School use a reading scheme. They use treetops which goes up to L16 I think so follows directly on from L11 (Lime), I believe this is up to Y5/6.

At his infant school they went up to Lime level then were classed as free readers. The books within the 'free reading' bit were not any more challenging to read but they were longer ie Roald Dahl type books and more interesting than the reading scheme ones.

emma, it depends on the school - as you can see

At ours, they used to move on after white level (when dd1 was in KS1). Now, they read lime level and we have a few copper etc books too.

Then, they are free readers in terms of what they pick to read in their spare time and at home - but they still do guided reading every day in small groups, and those books are obviously picked by the teacher. So after they become free readers, I would get feedback from the teacher as per other subjects.

DD appears to have gone back to scheme style books, starting with an illustrrated children's version of Oliver Twist. Er, there's a reason it's not a children's book, it is really sad with an incredibly brutal ending, I was not happy, but DD was so pleased to have a Charles Dickins book (like Matilda) that I didn't have the heart to moan. In year 2 their lovely teacher lent her own children's novels out to the free readers.

I think people are confusing book bands with scheme books. DD's school has book bands up to magenta level (around NC level 5 I think?), but actual reading scheme books in her school (such as ORT, Rigby Star etc) stop at around white/lime level.