How are your year 1 readers doing?

[imamearcat]

I know there's a big range etc. And have looked over previous posts, but this year has been a bit different to usual years!

Summer born DD in an independent school. She was on red for ages until I emailed her teacher this week and not she's come home with blue! I'm a bit annoyed at the teacher tbh but that's another story.

I'm hoping blue is ok for a younger Y1? I have read with her a lot over the summer and it seems like it's starting to click. But I know some kids in her class are reading chapter books!

DD is year 1.
She can recognise letter sounds but she's not blending yet.
We did Reading eggs every day over lockdown so I feel if she was ready to blend she would be. It will "click" for her in its own time.

Oilyvoir I have reception and yr2 DCs. The yr2 is sent home with a random assortment of anything between turquoise and lime, and at home she is reading shorter chapter books like Dick King-Smith and Roald Dahl so she is a fairly competent reader. In terms of fluency, she reads the scheme books easily so we use these to improve pace and expression. I doubt she'd have any difficulty reading a few levels up, although the levels now seem to be about building stamina - pages may have a decent-sized paragraph. This definitely does not translate into fluency with all books however, as now we are venturing into non-scheme books it is obvious how carefully chosen the words in the scheme books are. We are meeting a lot of new (to her!) words that can't be decoded, so for that reason I insist she only reads chapter books with me or DH for the moment. Tracking down from one line of text to the next is also proving a tricky skill to master.
As a result I would say we saw very fast progress in reception and the first half of year 1, but now it is/seems slower as it is about building knowledge of sight-read words, pace, expression, not relying on pictures, and not missing out 3 lines of text every so often!

I think they just become faster decoders and in their head.
So the only issues are non decodable words.
So something like ballet
Yes there really is no difference after about blue.
It may be why readers before school have seemed to progress so quickly as parent has available books isnt spending time at the wrong level etc.
We only read books once (except something like the ballet one). But that dc memory was very good.
Dc2 i thing is going to need a lot of practice.
It's odd as i have a very poor short term memory but good long term. Dp the reverse and he has bad grammar etc. And dyslexia on both our sides but worse on his. And yet dc1 finds reading easy.

@PutYourBackIntoit

This evenings yellow book was a non fiction about Bees.

The book reads:

'The Bee flies to a flower. Some pollen sticks to the Bee. The Honeybee flies to the next flower. Seeds are made when the Bee drops pollen into the flower.

My dd reads each word perfectly, and I think to myself, wow I think it's starting to click.... and then she reads so purposefully and confidently

'Seeds are made when the Bee drops love into the flower'

Now I'm wondering if she's read it at school already and memorised it (wrongly!) Made me grin though, a loving Bee 😍

Dropping love sounds so much nicer than dropping pollen. :o

I remember listening to one child read in class. He read his book beautifully and confidently. I thought I'd try him quickly with one from the next level up. He turned each page of the new book and recited the text from the first book instead. I was actually very impressed with his memory. :o

@Smellybluecheese it might be worth asking school to send non fiction if you can't get them to adjust book bands. School book bands aren't that far out for DS but we were still getting nothing out of the formulaic Biff and Chip they were sending home as he could sight read all the words, manage the length and answer what limited comprehension questions you can ask about them. I asked for them to send some non fiction as I didn't think I'd get anywhere with the book band discussion. It's much better, as the specialised vocabulary by topic means he's now learning something each book. I'm then reading much more interesting fiction with him at home.

I'm a reading chest advocate. I have also brought it after reading about it on here and as 9631 says... Get all over it... I too had both ends of the reading spectrum..
My older needed the scheme until she was a free reader, middle year 1 on. Reading chapter books as many others were. Thankfully her teachers in year 1 and 2 let her do her own thing whilst shackled to the rs on very simplistic books.. The other dc was also shackled but in a different way... She was on stage 6 in year 2 march and with the reading scheme we got her up to 9. She's just read an easy chapter book on her own and I'm hoping she's nearly a free reader.

Parents really do need to clue themselves up with reading schemes.. Get flash cards for high frequency words... Do anything to encourage reading... I have bribed..

Throw everything at it whilst also keeping things fun.

@Duckchick funnily enough we got a non-fiction book this week. I will definitely ask for more, thankyou.

I have a question for parents of fluent readers - either because they are older or because they learnt early. Generally speaking (and despite the best slowing down efforts of school) do children progress from blue upwards quickly because at about blue the penny just drops?

Yes, they do. In my experience, once they have covered all the phonics sounds (which I think is orange, but I might be wrong) and can read fluently without sounding out (other than the occasional new word) then the higher reading levels are just an exercise in stamina - they don't seem to get any more difficult IMO, just longer.

We always read alongside the reading scheme, so when they were reading fluently, I'd get them to read the first sentence, then paragraph, then page, then alternate pages of whatever chapter book we were reading at the time, helping them with any tricky words. We found the upper levels of the reading schemes fairly pointless to be honest.

Yes, blue is when it clicked for mine too.

Doesn’t matter what books the other children read. Every year the variation is huge. In my Y1 class there are still 2 children that can only read cvc (cat, dog, mum) words and some that are reading books aimed at around age 7, with most falling in between. If they are reading fluently with high accuracy and can answer questions on what they have read, they are generally ready to move on.

No idea what red and blue books are. We have Oxford Reading Tree and Lighthouse.Our Year 1s are on stage 2-7.

I have can't understand why people are so adamant that some dc can't read chapter books in year 1?when my dd finally clicked she took off like a rocket and was reading chapter books in middle to the end of year 1. Well away in year 2.

My other dd, no! Literacy issues...