So how often do your Y1 children get their reading books changed?

[LunarScream]

ds1 is in Y1. They're supposed to get their books changed twice a week - but ds1 hasn't had his changed on 5 out of the last 6 book change days.

And as the school is insisting that they read every book at each ORT level, including all the extension stories, AND the snapdragons AND the old sparrows branch stories that's an awful lot of books. 36 to be exact for level 4 alone. Which at current rates of book changing means they won't get anywhere near completing even one whole level in a year.

This is on top of them deciding to put all the kids back a level from where they were at the end of last summer term (which were already easier than the ones he could read before he started reception) on the assumption that their reading would have gone downhill over the summer. Which it didn't - we read with him every day. So it looks like they're expecting overall reading progress this year to be negative.

Am not happy - but don't know if this is normal or whether I should be kicking up a fuss about it.

Hi Lunar Scream

I help out in children school and change the books for yr1/2 and the teacher has the following guidelines for us parent helpers to follow:

a) book bag must be in the book box so that book can be changed, we are not allowed to get the bag from the childs tray. So if the child does not place it in the box it does not get changed, a bit harsh in my opinion but shes the teacher.

b) Each child has a reading folder and the parents must write in it 3 times for each book so that the teacher knows the parents have listened to them. So if it is not written in then again we don't change it.

So guess what i'm trying to say is does your school have these guidelines or do the chidlren just help themselves like ours do when they get to yr 3, in which case some will never get done again.

I'm a year 2 teacher. The books are changed twice a week. It takes pretty much all of my lunch and break time to do this. (I have no LSA)

dd (year 1) gets hers changed Mon, Wed, Fri - three books each time

mumwhereareyou - it's not just ds1 who's not getting his book changed (although it's compunded by the "girls a-z, then boys a-z and leave out the ones at the end if you run out of time" approach), it seems to be the whole class according to the other parents. Nobody has had more than two changes in the last 7 weeks!

And according to the parent helpers, who were the only ones reading with them anyway, they've not been asked to go in and help this term. So it looks like that's pretty much it for this year as far as reading in school goes.

That sound terrible Lunar. I would definitely be taking it up with the head. No wonder children leave school not able to read.

DS is in Yr 2 now but it has been the same system since reception - they bring their book bag in every day and the teaching assistant checks that the parent has signed that the child read the book - then it is changed. So it can be changed every day. Some weeks we manage this and some we don't depends on what else is going on. The teacher would only mention it if it wasn't read for over a week.

Message withdrawn

LunarSea

Well in that case i would be having a word with the teacher and ifno joy then with the headteacher.

Hope you get it settled soon, as i know how annoying it is.

Well ds1 has finally had his book changed for the first time since before half term (only 4 books since Easter!). And it's at totally the wrong level for him. At home he's reading things like the Young Corgi books - the one he's bought home from school contains a grand total of 160 mostly monsyllabic words (it took me longer to count them than it did him to read them). Grrr.

How frustrating lunar!

We've pretty much given up on school when it comes to reading and ds1. He's kept on a level way too easy for him as it makes the reading groups easier to manage. He's bored rigid.

Instead we're giving him as much as we can at home. We've just discovered the Superpowers series by Alex Cliff. Great fun and involves Greek mythology too.

Does anyone know how these end of term statistics work (that someone referred to earlier)?

daily after they have read

weblette - have just had a look at some excerpts from those Superpowers books on the Amazon site, and the look about ds1's level. Might try to get hold of some of those for him to read over the summer.

dd books changed once every 2 weeks or so....

Also look at the Beast Quest series - they seem to be a boy alternative to the evil of Rainbow Magic. All about dragons. Ds detests Horrid Henry or anything to do with muck/dirt/snot which seems to rule out quite a lot these days! If I come across anything else I'll let you know