The whole "just right level" thing really irks me. The assessments are not accurate if they even bother to give the kid the correct assessment. Our schools use Fountas and Pinnell and the Kindergarten teacher assessed DS at a level O, the first grade teacher assessed him at an L (disregarding my input that he was at a higher level a year earlier), the second grade teacher assessed him as an M or N, we finally moved schools mid-year and suddenly he was V! Above level testing on the computer also put him at 99th percentile for reading but you would never know it based on being stuck at basically the same level for a few years. I send DS's own books in with him to school and tell him to put them in his book box. No one has ever argued with me about it. He is currently reading an encyclopedia of world wars. Whenever he reads it at home he gets really excited and blurts out things like "Hey! Did you know General XXX did Y during Z war!?" I hope he is not doing that in class (although it would be funny in a way, since he's 8, and i don't think they truly have a grasp of what he is capable of understanding and likes to read, despite them finally assessing him at a high level). He used to bring home silly books in "book bags" but we never took them out of his backpack. DS would gripe in school about being forced to read "baby books" and during free reading time, at least, I think the teachers thought it was better to let him read what he want than have him run around the class griping about the "baby books".
