ORT in reception

[Nickknighg]

My son is in reception and is currently reading his ort book with green band on it and says stage 2. I am confused if it is stage 2 or stage 5 as the ort site suggests. If so, is he far ahead? Or lagging? Please help.

www.readingchest.co.uk/book-bands
If the books says stage 2, it probably is. You could google the title to check.

Mine's on green and it's stage 5 in our school - but it's obvious anyway because she did pink, red, yellow and blue before that. Don't know whether it's ahead (of what??) or whatever.

it's the third term of reception, you would probably expect them to be in stage 5. 2 is a bit too slow. 5 is just on track i think.

it really depends on the school. Soms race through the levels and some deliberately slow it down to focus on comprehension. My kids are in a very academic selective prep school and most Reception kids now are still on level 3, some on 2, very few on 4 or 5. My dd is on level 4 but can actually confidently read level 7 or 8 books at home, but school somehow gives easier books. I have never pushed for more, bc she is having fun and enjoying the books, and I remember with dd1 I used to worry about why they were moving so slowly, but now in Year 2 they are pretty much all free readers, have read all the Roald dahl and enid blyton books etc, so it seems to be a good approach.

It is really pointless to know what levels kids are on bc I know some fluent readers on level 3-4 and some who really struggle in year 1 but are on level 5 or 7, it depends entirely on the teacher's approach and says little about the child's reading ability.

what’s the title of the book?

If the school are using the older style look and say books the ORT Level/bookband/Stage thing can be a bit confusing.

Lots leave reception on two. Not so many leave on five tbh.
Look it up here www.stmarysrcmidd.rochdale.sch.uk/files/files/ortbookbands.pdf

I always thought yellow (stage 3) was the expected level at the end of reception - stage 5 sounds a bit high.

It probably is stage 2 (the colours don’t always match up between book bands and ORT stages if they are older books). Perfectly normal to be on stage 2 at this point in reception.

It depends on whether they’re using the phonics books or the old look and say books I’d guess.

Stage 2 would be about right at the end of reception for the older scheme. But they’ve aligned stage 4 with phases 3/4 of Letters and sounds with Floppy’s phonics so stage 2 would be on the low side for end of reception.

As a parent who have slightly older child, what book level they are on end of reception doesn't really matter later on. What really matters is, if they are getting phonics, and enjoy reading. No one talks about book levels in ks2, and majority has got reading(decoding) by then. What makes a big difference after that stage is if the child love reading or not.

I'd say it'd probably be 2.

DD2 is in reception and top set, she's on stage 3 (equates to yellow) of the old (and I mean old, the stamp in the book shows the school got the books in the early 90s) Biff, Chip and Kipper books.

At home she can read much more, but her teacher makes them read every book in every stage.

I get it though, builds confidence. Once they get to free reading then book bands are all a thing of the past anyway, and what really matters is that they're confident and enjoy it.

Tbh top group on yellow could be unusual but varies from year to year and school to school. Ds was on turquoise this time last year