| My child is in 3rd grade. Where can I find her reading level? Her report card just said ON. |
| You ask the teacher… |
My child is also 3rd grade so I looked into this a few months back. Do you have a MAP score? There is a way to get Lexile from the MAP reading score and then you Lexile score can be used to determine potential books that would be on his level. With the MAP score you can get and idea of where your kids is in terms of ranges in various grade levels: https://masterygenius.com/blog/nwea-map-scores/#3rd-grade |
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Write the teacher a polite email asking your student’s MAP score and report. It’s an “educational record” so by law the school must provide it (it is in the Parent MCPS account usually so check that first).
The MAP report breaks skills down into sub strands and also provides an associated Lexile score range which you can put into the lexile.com website and get all kinds of information and suggestions about books and grade levels. You can also ask your teacher if she has done a “Benchmark Assessment, and if so, what level. MCPS used to use Fountas Pinell for this. Not sure if that is still the case. |
I did this when my kid was in 3rd grade and saw there was a big disconnect between their map score and their reading level. I brought it up with the teacher and the following week, they had moved them to the appropriate group. |
I also don't put a lot of stock in the teacher-given reading assessments. They're often pressed to evaluate a lot of kids in a short period of time so some things inevitably slip through the cracks. Also, there's a tendency for this to be a bit of a conveyor belt i.e. last years teacher said you were at level X so this fall you're at X+1 even if you read 15 books over the summer. |
| MAP reports are in ParentVue under Documents (same place as report cards, which are sometimes not under Report Cards [!]). Lexile levels are at the bottom of the MAP report. I'd take both with a grain of salt: to my mind, DC's MAP is too low and Lexile too high. The real question is whether your child can remember what they read; recall plot, facts, and details; understand the path or the supporting details of an argument; think about the motivations of a character; and provide a credible summary of a text they have in front of them. At our school (YMMV) that real work towards that starts in grade 3 and is exercised and expanded in grades 4 and (to a lesser extent) 5. By mid-5 they are interpreting poetry. Lots of learning goes on in these 3 years |
My first grader was only tested at 1 level passed her K level. She was a early reader and I do not think her K teacher really gave her much thought. Then he saw her reading a book brought from home and said something like...Hey can you read that book? He retested her and she was a full grade level higher. |
| MCPS doesn't use Fountas and Pinnell "reading levels" any more now that they've embraced decades of research known as the science of reading. PP are correct in that certain reports will give your children's Lexile level if you're looking for more of a grade-level range. |
| I asked my first grader’s teacher about reading level this year. Was told they “don’t do that anymore” - but that she was above level. Her K teacher last year told us the Lexile and we could use that to figure out grade level, but we haven’t been able to get that out of this teacher. |
I got a Dibels level for the fall and the winter. The Dibels report breaks down the skills and where your child needs work. My winter report also said what the grade expectations were so you can tell if you child is at, under or above grade level. No reading level or lexile reported though. |
| So they don’t use reading levels anymore? When we were in K-2, the report card listed a specific letter level. I liked it because I could look up books that fell at or below that level for my kid. Do you get any feedback at all on what books kids should be reading in their own? |