Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment why do the lexile levels I find online vary so?

Two problems I've found with Lexile. On Lexile.com, one title will have several different lexile scores. Some are attributable to it being abridged or edited, but not all - why? Second, Lexile doesn't seem to take into account older language or older sentence style. For example, Pride and Prejudice comes in at 770, but Harry Potter is 880-1080. Never mind the content or if it would be interesting to a child, you hand those two books to a kid, have them read a couple pages and ask them which is easier to understand. Which do you think is the easier read (if you've read both). My DS11 was gloating about his good reading (1490L) so I gave him Jane Austen and said, "Read this". He struggled through a few pages and I reminded him one can always get better at reading.

When Ds was 8 in 3rd grade - 965...I was just looking at this the other day, you can start building your chart
He's tested MG, Verbal.

It 'looked' to fall around 8th grade, but I figured this was perhaps an exaggeration since that did not seem MG to me...

From Hoagies: All about reading levels

Another link:
http://www.lexile.com/about-lexile/grade-equivalent/grade-equivalent-chart/

Hi Dottie, 6th grade makes more sense, and I was just about to inquire about the charts, but I see OhG has posted them - thanks!

Ok, these look the same as I was reading earlier...maybe my logic is off?

Grade Reader Measures Text Measures
1 Up to 300L 200L to 400L
2 140L to 500L 300L to 500L
3 330L to 700L 500L to 700L
4 445L to 810L 650L to 850L
5 565L to 910L 750L to 950L
6 665L to 1000L 850L to 1050L
7 735L to 1065L 950L to 1075L
8 805L to 1100L 1000L to 1100L
9 855L to 1165L 1050L to 1150L
10 905L to 1195L 1100L to 1200L
11 and 12 940L to 1210L 1100L to 1300L

Here's how I came up with 8th grade from 965


Grade Reader level
6th 665L to 1000L > reader level with range of 335 points,
divided 335 by 2, get 167.5, add that back to 665, get about 832.
Since this was lower than 965, I figured I'd do the same until
the 'middle' of the range was closest to 965.

7th - the middle of the range is 900
8th - the middle of the range is 952 <--
9th - the middle of the range is 1010

Dottie et al, I am sure my 'statistics' comprehension is likely inadequate, so please let me know what I might be doing wrong on this..thanks!
(also my computation could be suspect, too, lol!)

Here's what's great about Lexile levels--you can combine it with other reading level measures, like the ones on the Scholastic site, and come up with books appropriate for younger kids but that have more complex language. For example, a book that has a reading level of 3.9 but a Lexile level of 900 is going to be more challenging to an advanced reader than one with the same reading level but with a Lexile level of 400.