What level do ORT go to before free reading

[snottynoses]

???

I loathe blasted ORT (and was v. fed up ds's old teacher in reception left him on one level for months even though he's reading EVERYTHING he can get his hands on and has no problems with comprehension at all).

But try to restrain myself as I'm aware some of this is my hang-up. Can still taste the frustration of being a small child and forced to go through the flipping tedious reading scheme at the start of every school year before I could get onto real books. I had a reading age of about 15 when I was 7, FFS, I HATED having to skim through sodding Peter and Jane!

(Am not boasting, it largely levels out, plenty of other adults can read just as well as me, I'm not going to win any Nobel prizes!)

Edam, I echo your hatred. What kind of names are "Biff", "Chip" and "Kipper" anyway. It amazes me that the dcs know who is who.

Dd is in reception and has just started ORT. Her first book contains "The treasure" and "The pirates" - why, what is the point? Dd cannot reliably tell you what sound "t" makes never mind read "the" and "treasure" (which I understand she is not supposed to be able to read) had her heading for the hills. Last year the school did not start on these until Jan when they had given the children a good start in all of the necessary phonics - this year it has changed to just pushing them through the levels regardless of comprehension. What a waste of time.

I don't understand why people hate ORT - they make the best use they can of a limited vocabulary to produce quite good, often funny stories. And they are real stories about real situations..I think they are the best reading scheme books available.

Surely it doesn't matter much what they read in school, you can always get more interesting books in the town library?

Seeker, in truth, DS loved them!

It was the repetitive format that did my head in - but that's the nature of schemes, and the process...I just felt that the magic key could drive me to the edge of sanity.....

I quite enjoyed the ORT- when reading them with a 5 yo. The simple narrative seemed quite interesting at that stage and as Seeker says I really felt they made the best of it. (much better than the primer I had when I was at school in Sweden). But the thought of reading them with a 10 yo, a child who had already reached puberty, a child with whom I was discussing my research- no, just cringeworthy! At that age, a simple vocabulary is the last thing they need: this is the time when they've got the energy and the flexibility to take new concepts in, before teenage inertia sets in.

I don't mind ORT. They are find. But I do dislike them when some schools only use ORT. As said, they have limited vocab, are very repetitive in style and genre, and don;t offer than many different types of written word IME.

So, I think they are fine so long as sued along side lots of other scheme books.

And once a child can read well - ditch them and move onto free choice books.

Taht's the point of ORT - it is a reading scheme designed to get a learner to fluency as soon as possible and then be ditched. Complaining about their simplicity and repetitiveness is a bit like complaining that you have to keep on practicing reversing round corners when you're taking driving lessons and wouldn"t it be better to be going at 70 down the motorway!

ORT is fine for teaching children to read (although phonics proponents would say the early stages aren't the best), though I think a mixture of schemes in graded boxes works best. Both my children loved ORT and DS2 spent the last few weeks of Reception in the book corner reading every ORT book he had missed. But it's the idea of schools keeping children on these books when they're fluent readers that I think is odd.

I agree - but until the last couple of days I hadn't heard of a school that does!

I know - I'm always learning something new on Mumsnet!

Which Biff and Kipper book would be covering this area, Esther?

I think possibly I have posted on the wrong thread. I have no idea why this has happened and pass on my apologies.

I have a new laptop and very little idea which buttons I am pressing.