Reading level 26: what does this mean?

[StiffyByng]

Help. My son is in Yr 3 and has significant SEN issues. He hasn’t engaged much in learning but his home school book says he’s been benchmarked for reading at level 26. I have googled and can see at least two systems - I don’t know which his school is using I’m afraid. There’s no mention of any colour band. Can anyone say whether this is age appropriate? He won’t read at home and I’m just curious to know what skills he has.

It is the alien words - the real words he is fine with. It was a couple of months ago he failed it (internal assessment). They were giving them another one about now. I've not heard the result. Teacher said that kids with his reading level were scoring about 38. He scored 22. I was not surprised.

The alien words are the most useful for identifying those children who have difficulties accurately reading unfamiliar words. They are the same children who will later struggle as they meet more and more curriculum specific vocabulary they have never met before. You cannot guess a pseudo word so ineffective multi cueing strategies don't help. This is why they are used by Ed Psychs and in Dyslexia screening assessments.

@Oilyvoir

Reading recovery was very effective at getting non readers reading. I'm really not sure what the hang up with using multiple cues are? Synthetic phonics teaches children to decode. Ultimately reading is about understanding. We digress but my Y1 grandson (I parent him) is very young in the year, hates phonics, scored low on a phonics assessment yet can read turquoise book band and therefore has a reading age approximately one year above his chronological age. He reads for meaning and has a huge sight vocabulary. Is he a high functioning dyslexic? Maybe, but does it really matter how he learnt to read, the fact is he can bloody read and he's not yet 6. But that is not really the point of the OP's question.

DS was very much like this, read for understanding. Phonics did click for him at around his sixth birthday, but he was already in the top reading group as one of the youngest in his year at the time. He is still an avid reader at 15.

@Norestformrz

The alien words are the most useful for identifying those children who have difficulties accurately reading unfamiliar words. They are the same children who will later struggle as they meet more and more curriculum specific vocabulary they have never met before. You cannot guess a pseudo word so ineffective multi cueing strategies don't help. This is why they are used by Ed Psychs and in Dyslexia screening assessments.

I'm assuming that he will do what he has always done which is to learn and understand the vocabulary orally and then when he sees it written down, he will recognise it. A friend of mine, who has a background in literacy education, talks about how she loves reading historical novels and often comes across the word 'brough'. She has no idea how it is pronounced but knows it means 'carriage' because she has worked out it's meaning from the context.

Don't get me wrong, I generally agree with everything you have said but know in education that 'all or nothing' views are often unhelpful because the brain is a hugely complex thing and children seldom fit neatly into a box.

@Oilyvoir

well it has been pretty effective for him so far...

Mixed methods give an illusion of reading that is revealed by the child's inability to accurately tackle simple unfamiliar words. I wouldn't call that serving anyone well.

I hope for his sake he does however the human brain has limits to the number of words it can memorise and still limits him as he lacks the tools to tackle unfamiliar words when he meets them. In our wider reading we never know when we are going to encounter new vocabulary and can't predict in order to pre learn. It's a flawed theory.

I learnt phonics when DS did. I was a self taught reader at three. I hadn't memorized just whole words though, you can break words down to syllables without going all the way down to blending.

@Norestformrz

I hope for his sake he does however the human brain has limits to the number of words it can memorise and still limits him as he lacks the tools to tackle unfamiliar words when he meets them. In our wider reading we never know when we are going to encounter new vocabulary and can't predict in order to pre learn. It's a flawed theory.

Sorry OP for hijacking your post...

The thing is he successfully tackles unfamiliar multi syllable words everyday in his reading, so either he is internalised phonics better than his phonics assessment and my observation of him would suggest OR he is using basic phonics to give him the first clue and then is reading for meaning. I suspect it is the latter. Either way it is not the case that he can't tackle unfamiliar words. I know this is anecdotal because I am basing this on one not quite 6 year old who has always had excellent speech and language and is probably innately quite bright, but focussing entirely on phonics as the only way to teach reading will, in the end, also prove to be flawed.

Who focuses entirely on phonics but phonics is the most efficient way to accurately read and spell words and without that accuracy meaning will be compromised.

A child with good verbal language skills will have an advantage with the comprehension element of reading but this advantage will be diluted unless they also have the skills and knowledge to accurately read the words.

Reading Recovery and programmes promoting multi cueing are based on a theory that never had any foundations in evidence. It's frightening that decades of children have been failed by a theory.

@kowari

I learnt phonics when DS did. I was a self taught reader at three. I hadn't memorized just whole words though, you can break words down to syllables without going all the way down to blending.

So he can't read simple pseudo words such as bron / ven / lect/ bric/ jor but can read major, fabric, adventure, brontosaurus

The literacy rate in this country is 99%. Not many have been failed.

I'm not sure if your last comment was aimed at me but yes that is effectively what I am saying. Of course he can decode simple cvc words and has been taught vowel sound combinations pretty well but struggles with 3 consecutive consonants. But yes anything that he can't find a real word from would cause him problems. Brontosaurus would not be a problem in a story, individually not sure. Adventure is a sight word for him (thanks to the magic key in ORT). Major and fabric would cause him no problems in context could probably also do them out of context by sounding first 3 letters and then finishing it with a word he knows of about the right length I suspect.

1 in 6 adults in England, 7.1 million people, have very low literacy skills as defined by the UK National Literacy Trust. That’s 16.4% of the population. 1 in 4 adults in Scotland, 1 in 8 in Wales and 1 in 5 in Northern Ireland, experience challenges because of low literacy.
Level 1 literacy is a reading age of below a 7 year old.

The average reading age of the UK population is 9 years – that is, they have achieved the reading ability normally expected of a 9-year-old. It means they can read the Sun but not the Times or Guardian.

If he's failed the phonics screening check it suggests he can't read lect/bron/ jor/ ven

I have given him individual word lists that give a reading age and he comes out at about 7 years 2 months. He's currently 5 years 11 months.

Yep you are right - he would have failed some of those.

Yet he can't read simple unfamiliar words in the school phonics check ...doesn't that make you wonder what the problem is? I'd certainly be asking why

@Oilyvoir

Yep you are right - he would have failed some of those.

and they are all syllables of polysyllabic words

Which goes back to my point that the brain is a complex machine and everyone learns differently. I am pretty confident he will get greater depth for his reading if they do KS1 SATS next year because his understanding and inference is excellent.

And as I have already said, his dad is (probably) a very bright dyslexic and I have ramped up the insisting he breaks down words he doesn't know and read them phonetically. He is currently reading turquoise books at 99% accuracy so the opportunity to do this with him is limited.

@Oilyvoir

Which goes back to my point that the brain is a complex machine and everyone learns differently. I am pretty confident he will get greater depth for his reading if they do KS1 SATS next year because his understanding and inference is excellent.

Actually neuroscience shows you're wrong

Study carried out on brain waves shows how different teaching methods affect reading development. Beginning readers who focus on letter-sound relationships, or phonics, instead of trying to learn whole words, increase activity in the area of their brains best wired for reading. In other words, to develop reading skills, teaching students to sound out “C-A-T” sparks more optimal brain circuitry than instructing them to memorize the word “cat.” And, the study found, these teaching-induced differences show up even on future encounters with the word.

@Oilyvoir

And as I have already said, his dad is (probably) a very bright dyslexic and I have ramped up the insisting he breaks down words he doesn't know and read them phonetically. He is currently reading turquoise books at 99% accuracy so the opportunity to do this with him is limited.

When phonics clicked for DS at six I bought a heap of Dr Seuss books (they had hardback ones for 50p), some are quite tricky, and he read his way through those. Regular books presented very limited opportunities as he could already read the words.

From the charity shop I mean.

This is how he was taught and certainly how I introduced reading to him. He could read cvc words in his nursery year at 3.5 years old. I think what has happened is that because he has a good memory and can recognise words quickly, he has taken the easy route of memorising words rather than using phonics strategies. Books sent home have always been slightly too easy for him meaning he has had alot of practise at memorising and not much practise at having to rely on phonics.