Reading level help please?

[Claw3]

I have a meeting with parent partnership soon and would like to give them another example of the school's lack of understanding of ds.

EP has assessed that ds has the reading age of 10.6 year old, he is 7 years old.

School have given him a 2a for reading, what level would a 10.6 year old be on?

Not sure what happened there, giant spacing!

higher than that

but they may also go on the understanding of what he is reading??

Thanks Aniebear, thats the thing, EP states that he reads for understanding ie he compehends what he reads. School are also claiming that he understands what he reads. I dont think he does comprehend what he reads, but this is the point i want to take up with PP, they cant have it both ways.

So i would like to say to PP to prove my point, if he is understanding what he reads as school claim, then why havent they him a XX ie the level of a 10.6 year old, but i need to find out what that level is.

I would say that a 10 year olds level would be more 4something, certainly at least 3a.

Thank you very much mrsbaffled. School are trying to get away with not giving him help or answering questions. If they say he doesnt understand what he reads, it would = giving him help. If they say he is a 4 something it would = why is he 4 something in reading and nothing else and might even involve giving him some differiantiated work. So lets claim he is 2a and we dont have to do anything!

or even worse why is he underachieving, when school report he is making good progress!

Do you know what colour book band he is on? They directly correlate to NC levels. L2a should be white.

A L2A is the expected level for a child at the end of Y3. So his reading is appropriate for his age.

The trouble however with these 'reading age' scores, is they don't correlate to anything. And they certainly don't correlate to NC levels.

If he did half a dozen different reading age tests (Salford, Burt, NFER, RWI, SATS...) He would come out with a wildly different score in each one. So unfortunately you can't trust any reading age score.

(Which test did he do to get that score?)

I would trust a 2a more, and think he's doing fine.

I had them same argument regarding maths at school, he was given age 12 maths when he was 8 but had level somewhere in the 3 working just above expected. The issue was the school environment and my DS ability did not match due to the outside influence, noise, tests, work not stimulating so he switched off. I put the pressure on school that it is not about the average it is about my DS capabilities which the school were ignoring.

Indigo, he is a 'free reader' which means no more colour bands, he reads chapter books etc of his choice he has been doing this since year 2.

He has been tested 3 times, by 3 different EP's. They have used BAS11 in 2009 and same test again in Sept 2010 and from memory something begining with 'W' test most recent.

He can read just fine, im not at all concerned with his reading. I am concerned with him understanding what he reads, school claim he does understand what he reads, so my question to them is why is he only a 2a then, they cant have it both ways iyswim?

So he either has the reading age of a 10.6 year old or he doesnt, which is it.

Exactly Squidworth, he is either fulfilling his potential or he isnt. School want it both ways.

But a 2a does not correlate to any reading age at all.

If he is working at a 2a then his understanding is age appropriate (slightly above)

One of the ways they will have arrived at a 2a is via a SATS paper, where you have to read the text and answer questions about it. So his understanding is at a 2a level.

Basically - it's probably the 10.6 figure which is misleading you. That is probably just testing his reading skills - whereas the 2a is testing his reading and understanding skills.

An awful lot of kids in his class probably would have high reading ages and NC L2. It's not at all unusual.

"Understanding" what he reads is different from the level of comprehension needed in SATs. Some of the level 3 questions given to 7 year olds in the past have required quite a lot of thought and can on occasions confuse adults. I think the school mean he isn't just reading the words, but is capable of reading and enjoying the story. I had a similar thing with my DS who had a reading age of 15.6 at 11, but got level 4 in the SATs. He wasn'table to understand the deeper meaning required in comprehension excercises.

Claw3

Hyperlexia is the issue when children are able to decode text, but have little or no understanding of the meaning of the content that they have read. Hyperlexia tends to be asociated with ASD, and is becoming more of a problem in schools due to eh emphasis on phonics only teaching, as children are not encourage to understand the meaning of the words, or the context.
There are two processes involved with the task of reading lexical and sublexical. The sublexical process is primarily concerned with phonological decoding, and the lexical process the more concerned with comprehension.
Unfortunately not many teachers are sufficiently trained to understand these issues, and too many are only specific teaching program instructors with little understanding of the wider issues.

"If he is working at a 2a then his understanding is age appropriate (slightly above)

One of the ways they will have arrived at a 2a is via a SATS paper, where you have to read the text and answer questions about it. So his understanding is at a 2a level."

Surely all the SATS tell you is that his ability to articulate what he has understood in the written medium is at a level of 2a?

It doesn't tell you what he understands, or whether he can follow the story at a sufficient level to enjoy it.

It tells you at best, what he understands of the subject covered by the SATS paper, and at worst, what he is able to write down about what he understands.

Indigo, sorry i should have explained better, 10.6 is for his reading comprehension (he got a different score for his word reading, although roughly about in the same area without looking at the report) and EP comments that ds reads for meaning. So would you expect a child was has reading comprehension 3 1/2 years above his age to score higher than 2a in SATs for reading?

Sorry i should probably explain my angle here as well, i think its impossible for him to be able to understand what he reads even to a 2a, he has severe word finding difficulties and severe semantic links difficulties, vocab 3 years behind, 0.04 semantic links.

Claw - ok, I misunderstood you.

I think the easiest thing to do is buy some SATs papers fromWH Smiths and see what he scores on them.

I seriously think that school have plucked 2a from thin air, unless it is based on his word reading ability alone. He can read words brilliantly, he couldnt tell you what they mean though.

EP's and SALT obviously use different testing methods, as EP wrote the 10.6 and ds reading for meaning. SALT wrote "whilst he speaks at length, using complex sentence structures and can desribe pictures in detail, he struggled to grasp the underlying meaning. He spoke at length about irrelevant details and did not get the gist of the storyline. He could not understand the relationships of the characters or the emotions the characters were feeling. He did not demonstrate theory of mind"

This is what I found the most difficult it is what you want from school my DS was walking the line of SN and gifted. He would not of coped with the pressure so I had to learn what to push and what not to. He was given complicated work above others in his class above the levels of his nc grades. He even had some his academic lesson reduced to work on his weaker areas. What do you want from the school? SATS are great markers but the ability to put on paper what your son knows at the age of 7 can make a huge difference. My DS writing was alway 1 whole level and more below his reading, he could not write as quick as his brain worked.

Squid, i want school to follow the recommendations made by experts, which they are not doing, as school dont feel they need to. Ds might well have the 'potential to be a gifted learner' as EP wrote, he scores in the top 5% for IQ. All this is doing is hiding his diffculties.

Ive come to the point now where im thinking ok you think he is a 'gifted learner' then start treating him like one and lets all sit back and watch him fall flat on his face or recognise that he is not a 'gifted learner',he is potentially a bright kid with SN's who is struggling and needs you to follow the recommendations. But do one or the other.

Well then you need to find why he is not producing the work at school what is the missing link, which area is suppressing his scores, my DS it was he actually had trouble reading till he was 7/8 when this was addressed he flew in all areas accept handwriting which again suppressed his scores. Noise was also a big problem, it was that he hated loud noise he just could not filter it out. It is very hard I have had more sleepless night with my son in mainstream than my non verbal son in special school.

Squid exactly the missing link is all the areas that ds has difficult in, which school are not following the recommendations for.

For example SALT, EP, even the LA have recommended that ds needs 1:1 in the classroom to help him to understand what is expected of him, at home he needs extensive direction to get started, once he has understood what is supposed to be doing, he can do it, but he needs to understand first.

Like your ds, he struggles with handwriting too and again many recommendations for school to follow, but they dont. OT has assessed his difficulties with handwriting due to poor motor skills, hypermobility etc. SALT and every single observation has observed him producing far less work than everyone else. But school insist he doesnt need the help.

Hi claw my dd is the same age andexactly the same! She's in year 3 and no longer has reading books, but they are querying if she understands what she reads. She seems to understand non-fiction like books on space, dinosaurs etc but can read a whole fiction story book and not tell me a thing about the story! So far school are givin her 1-1 reading with a TA to help with her comprehension

Hi Chundle, ds likes non-fiction and finds concrete facts easier to understand too. But he often puts his own slant on these facts or changes the facts to what he wants them to mean! If he cant remember the name of something or someone, he will make one up and then insist that is what it is called!

For example all the girls in his class for 2 years were all called 'Charlotte'. He also has an Auntie Strawberry and Uncle Susan (he is a man btw!) Jaffa cakes are called 'patios' and chips are called 'the skinny things'!

He cant tell you what a kettle is called, he will describe what it does, same with washing machine, light switch, iron etc, etc, etc.

1:1 reading comprehension is one of the at home 'targets' on ds's IEP. Strange seen as school claim he has no difficulties in this area!

Its all so conflicting.

My dd was also scored as 2a reading yet she can pick up and read any of my books at home. Did your ds learn to read from a young age? Dd could read at 3 or 4 simple words then in reception and nursery her reading took off but only recently has it been realised that she doesn't grasp what she reads- but she reads very quickly as well