Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy DRA Reading Level in Public School

At my first parent teacher conference in the fall, my son's 2nd grade teacher gave me a sheet summarizing how he was doing in various subjects. She listed his DRA reading level as a 28. This didn't really mean anything to me because I couldn't put it into context. But he is a phenomenal reader, so it wasn't something that I thought much about. After my recent spring conference, DS8 still had a reading level of 28. When I questioned the teacher on how he could have shown no reading progress all year, she said that 28 is the highest grade level score, so that's where she stopped. She had no interest in seeing how high of a score he could achieve because she feels her job is to get everyone in the class to a 28 by the end of the year. Is this a typical public school attitude? I was upset, but she claimed that she isn't even allowed to test any higher. I just can't believe that is true. It is still upsetting me.

I'm new here and still looking for advice, but unfortunately this has been my experience as well. We read whatever we want at home. And the school is now focusing on reading response and writing well about what he can read.

Yes. Seems to be in NZ too.

That was our experience. It was part of the reason we moved to a private school, as it was very demoralizing for my son to watch all of his friends change levels while he didn't. It might not have mattered so much, but at our local public school, all of the in-class reading and at-home reading that was logged was required to be from books brought home from school at the "students level" and my sons hated reading those books that were so far below their reading ability.

I hear that it happens in many places, but it is not our own experience. I don't believe my kids in the early grades were tested as far as possible, considering DD was given a Guided Reading (F&P) level of P spring of 1st grade and the same P in fall of 2nd, but then was S by winter of 2nd (a chart I am looking at says that P correlates with a 38 in DRA, end of 3rd grade level, 28 being comparable to M, end of 2nd grade level, S as end of 4th). They were at least consistently rated above-grade level by two years (DS was a Z+ by 4th grade), and marked accordingly on their report cards as 'exceeding standards' for reading level.

I still had to advocate for showing demonstrable growth (same level for 7 months, when she really grew a lot over summer?). Perhaps the approach you can take with advocacy is that you would like a full assessment of reading due to insufficient demonstration of growth, under the guise of there could be a problem if there has been no growth, and then you can establish a more appropriate instruction level? In our schools, reading 2+ grades above elicits some differentiation, top cluster reads higher level books and a little more depth. They don't send kids to into above-level classrooms for SSA or anything.

Our experience, as well. "And in this grade, we score up to K so the books in the classroom only go to K. Besides, it's hard to find books at your child's level that are suitable for children." Fortunately, they could read anything they wanted, they weren't limited to the classroom offerings.

Both my DYS DS7 and non-DYS DS9 are advanced readers. In our public school, I don't think they have restrictions on what level books they can read. They go to the school library every week and pick out whatever book they are interested in reading. DS9 started having reading logs in 2nd grade and he can read whatever book he wants (mostly books from the local public library) and put it on the log. Although my DS9 did not quite make it to the gifted program for LA, he is in a group of kids who are advanced readers who get pull out of the regular class and do reading and writing together every day. I think it really depends on the school.

Ugh. It just seems like reading would be the easiest subject to allow kids to do more at their own level. Obviously, at home, DS reads what he wants to. But at school, my understanding is that the choices are very limited. Also, while I can understand that a 2nd grade teacher wouldn't want kids reading "Dear Dumb Diary," I think that it would be easy to let kids read more advanced nonfiction books without worrying that they are 'suitable for children.'

I think that my biggest frustration with the testing policy is that I would think that teachers would want to know what the kids are capable of at the beginning of the year. It might help them be more understanding if a problem came up. And I say this because the teacher has made comments at both conferences, such as, "DS is often distracted... or doesn't pay attention... or is gazing out the window." And I'm sitting there thinking, "Give him an interesting book and he'll be quietly occupied for hours."

My DS6 is in first grade and the first grades at his school regroup for reading instruction. This means he is with the top 5-6 kids in the grade level being instructed on a level between K-M. I have my masters in reading and taught kindergarten before having my kids. While I do think my son can read above a K-M level, he has learned a lot this year. He has learned how to write a composed paragraph, with an opening sentence, supporting details and conclusion. He has developed a much better understanding of conflict, resolution, understanding the author's message, learned how to cite the text to support his answers and inferencing skills. Now that his writing is coming along, I am getting ready to go to his teachers and say, "I see he is currently being instructed on level ___. At home I see him reading more difficult texts with solid oral comprehension. Can you tell me what skills he needs to master before moving to the next level of text?"

I had kindergarteners who could read Harry Potter, but couldn't write 2 sentences about the main character. (Which of course is fine for kindergarten, but no the child should not go to 4th grade for reading!) Or when asked about the "setting", they were not familiar with the vocabulary we teach at the more basic reading levels to answer the question. An advanced reader I would expect to move quickly through these skills, but not necessarily skip them.

My children's reading levels have never been reported or disclosed to me. I am in the regular public school system. In K and 1, my son was given books way above grade level because his teachers knew he was reading at that level. Now he is in a GT magnet and all the kids read the same books, which are about 2-3 grades above level.

The only person who has ever attempted to restrict book choices, ironically, is the school librarian, who is draconian about "Kindergarteners read this" and "kids in second grade read that." (She recently sent him home with A to Z Mysteries, which he was reading in pre-K.) I have had to intervene multiple times with her.