Breakthrough Levels in Moving Students
From Level A Through Level Q in Leveled Text
The purpose of this document is to share our current thinking about “big jumps” in text difficulty as a student moves from Level A to Level Q books (Fountas & Pinnell,
2006). We have notice that some students plateau at certain levels that they can read independently (96-98% accuracy with adequate comprehension). But, making the jump to the next level takes forever, and teachers hold them there with many questions about what they should do to help students over the next hurdle.
This document is organized in this way. First the breakthrough level will be identified (for example a boxed heading “Moving from Level B to Level C”). Then the characteristics of the breakthrough level text difficult for many students are noted as 1, 2, and 3, … under each section of Meaning Changes, Structure Changes and Visual
Changes. These are the hurdles students must jump to get to the next level, and become teaching points that, when mastered, will enable your students to breakthrough to the next level.
Because the text at level C continues to be very patterned and predictable and the content deals with topics familiar to students—home, school, and family life—this is a relatively minor jump with only a few new characteristics that must be mastered. But we have heard many kindergarten and first grade teachers express concern that their students are not able to make the jump from level B to level C. The major factors that make this a roadblock for some children follow are listed below.
Meaning Changes
There is very little change in this area, but students who are not attending to meaning in Level A/B books will bring this “word only attention” to Level C. Even though more meaning is communicated by the text, requiring them to attend to meaning contained in the words they are reading with support from the illustrations is critical.
The major meaning changes in Level C books follow:
1.
All concepts are supported by the illustrations, but the illustrations become more involved. The fact that text patterns begin to change at least once in Level C books, requires that students “comprehend” what is going on in the illustrations to deal with the pattern switch.
2.
Dialogue statements by characters are introduced in Level C books. The character’s statement is assigned with the word “said.” (“Help!” said Marco.
“My cat can’t get down.” )
3.
Language patterns repeat as they did in Level A and Level B books, but sentences are longer. A wise teacher would choose shared reading books with Level C type sentences. She could also help students generate Level C type sentences for interactive writing. During the shared reading or interactive writing session a discussion of how these longer sentence structures work. For example, He went to see the rabbit. Teach students that The mice go down , tells that the mice went somewhere, and to the ice tells where the mice went.
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Structure Changes
Sentence structure, or syntactic patterns in sentences, becomes a critical issue in mastering Level C books. Sentences are longer and prepositional phrases are introduced.
The new characteristics introduced at Level C follow.
1.
A new syntactic characteristic in Level C books is that prepositional phrases are introduced in longer sentences. ( He went to see the rabbit.
) ( The mice go down to the ice.
)
2.
Multiple lines of text are common in Level C books, but the text is often formatted to support students in reading in phrases. (I am looking//for a home.)
3.
A range of punctuation is introduced, and students must be taught the function of these new punctuation marks. Periods were common in A/B books, but words in bold text, commas, quotation marks, exclamation points, ellipsis, apostrophe marks in possessive forms of words or contractions, and question marks are routinely used in Level C text.
Visual Changes
Level C books require that students have all the high frequency words in Level A/B under control (I, am, is, see, the…), and they should be developing a known set of a higher range of high frequency words, many of which are not decodable (here, was, went, have…). In addition, students entering Level C should have mastered all their letter sound relationships for consonant letters and they should be beginning to learn to attach sounds to consonant blends and digraphs (bl-, cr-, sh-, and so forth). A more specific look at changes in visual characteristics in Level C text follows:
1.
Level C books require students to have a wider range of high frequency words under control. They should be able to read these words instantly with automaticity.
2.
Students must know the meaning and/or function of all high frequency and how this creates meaning or determines how the words are used in the sentence structure (i.e. When a students see the word “the,” they should understand sentence structure enough to know the next word would be the name of something. “The” could precede an adjective for a noun, but adjectives are not common in Level C books.
3.
Contractions (can’t, don’t…) and possessive forms of words (Ben’s) are introduced at Level C.
4.
Level C books require students to use the first letter to read the words that are in the book. In the Celebrations Press book Snow Cover , the first page reads, “It covered the house.” The illustration shows a house with snow on the roof, but the ground is also covered. Thus students need to notice the first letter “h,” say it’s sound and study the picture to read “house.”
A Final Note on Moving from Level B to Level C
There is a span of difficulty within books at any level. Some are easier and only have a few of the new characteristics of the level. Some, like the Rigby Literacy book Help , are more difficult because they have more characteristics of the level. When a teacher feels
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she has a student that cannot move from Level B to Level C, she must ask herself, “Am I assuring that my students are making the transition into Level C with the easier Level C books, or am I expecting this student to read the more difficult Level C books like Help!
”
Specifically Help is one of the harder Level C books because it has the following: o dialogue statements assigned by “said.” o split dialogue—the same character continues speaking after his/her first statement is assigned by “said.” (“Look,” said Marco. “My cat can get down.”). o contractions (can’t). o several pattern changes, but the student is supported because the pattern change begins with high frequency words. In Help, the pattern begins to change on page 8, and there are pattern changes on every page to the end of the book. Notice how each sentence begins with high frequency words (I can help…) (I can get the…) (Cat, come here…) (I can help you.) (“Look,” said Marco. “My cat can get…) o a wider range of high frequency words (said, get, down, help, can, come, here). These go beyond the beginning words on List A of the
TCRWP High Frequency Word assessment, and some are not decodable (come, here, said), because they contain more difficult spelling features and exceptions to normal letter sound relationships.
Moving from Level D to Level E is a difficult jump because many new characteristics are added in all areas of meaning, structure and visual. Stories are more complex, and content is often outside the reader’s background of experience. Illustrations are less and less supportive requiring students to glean meaning from what is being said in the text. Sentences are longer with more complex syntactic patterns. Even though a student who belongs at Level E has many high frequency words under control, he/she can no longer rely on checking first or last letters to read tricky words. To read Level E books students must begin to attend to internal word parts while thinking about what is going on in the story. The major factors that make this jump a roadblock for some children follow are listed below.
Meaning Changes
If students have mastered the act of reading for meaning as detailed in Levels A-D, they will be comfortable doing the following: o Setting up for reading the book by identifying the general gist of the story by examining the title and paging through the book without reading. o As they read individual pages, students will use the illustrations to assist them in understanding what is happening in this page of the story. o As they read the text, students will attend to the meaning communicated by the words, not just reading words correctly.
If these things are in place it will make it easier for students to deal with the Meaning
Changes at Level E that often make this level a roadblock for some students. The meaning changes at this level are the following:
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1.
Content extends beyond the experiences students have in their own home, neighborhood, or school. For example, a students who have lived in an apartment for their entire life, may have experienced painting the walls inside the apartment, but in the Creative Teaching Press book Mr. Noisy Paints His House they read about Mr. Noisy painting the outside of house multicolored.
2.
Stories become more complex with a clear beginning, a series of events and an ending. In the Rigby PM book The New Baby , Tom comes home from school to find grandpa waiting for him. Grandpa tells him that his mother, grandmother and father are at the hospital waiting for the baby to arrive. Grandpa gives him a snack. Later he and grandpa cook dinner. They go to sleep. The phone rings and
Dad tells them the baby is born. Tom and Grandpa go to the hospital, and Tom tells his mother that he will help take care of baby Emma.
3.
Illustrations become more complex with many things happening in the picture.
Students must select the important content that will assist them in comprehending the story and word-solving.
4.
Longer stretches of dialogue, often split dialogue, is common. (“Mom is at the hospital,” said Grandpa. “The baby is coming. Dad is with Mom. Grandma is with Mom, too. I am staying here with you.”
) Students must synthesize all those statements together with what happened on the previous page and infer the idea that Tom came home and found out that everyone but grandpa was at the hospital waiting for the new baby to be born. Someone had to stay home and take care of
Tom.
5.
At Level E dialogue statements begin to be assigned with words other than said
(cried, shouted).
This requires students to think about what is going on in the story and infer a character’s feelings to assist with decoding the word. ( Grandpa shouted, “A girl! The baby is a girl! Baby Emma is here.”)
6.
Since Level E books have a series of episodes, students must recall the important, big events, ruling out minor details. In a retelling it is important for the student to describe the second episode in the story as Grandpa and Tom cooked dinner. But, it is not necessary for the student to retell that Grandpa cooks the fish and potatoes and Tom makes a salad with tomatoes. It is often difficult for some children to sort out the important details from those that are minor details. Shared reading is an excellent venue to teach identifying big events vs. minor details.
Structure Changes
Structure, or syntax, changes at this level must be mastered for students to comprehend at the sentence level. Previously, sentences were in a subject, verb, and direct object patterns. Some imbedded prepositional phrases were introduced, but at
Level E the syntax of the sentence becomes even more complex. Teachers should teach these new sentence structures during writing workshop, shared reading, and interactive writing. The Structure Changes that occur in Level E books follow:
1.
At this level sentences become longer with 10+ words, and a sentence often covers two or three lines of print. The sentences often contain multiple embedded phrases ( Grandpa and Tom went to the hospital to see Mom and Emma.
) and some dependent clauses that may be in any order. ( This is what happens when you fight .)
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2.
Sentences often extend over two pages requiring the student to feedback mentally to what he read on the previous page when he finishes reading the second part of the sentence. In the Wright Group TWIG book The Best Thing About Food this sentence stretches across three pages (the / marks show what appears on each page). Food helps us grow,/ keeps us well,/ and gives us energy.
3.
A new structural change at Level E is sentences in which the verb precedes the subject ( Ring, Ring went the phone .). Sentences written in a question format are very common ( Can I play with you?
)
4.
Commas are introduced at this level in dialogue statements, placing items or statements in a series, and parenthetical statements. (Yes, I would!) ( Food looks good, food smells good, and food tastes good.) (The tree blocks, or stops, light.)
Visual Changes
At Level E, students are required to be more sophisticated at word solving. They begin to look at internal parts of words, but going across the whole word is not developed yet. So, looking beyond the first letter at the first part of the word is a natural starting place. After the student uses their phonics skills to say the first part of the word (Visual), they integrate this with thinking about what is happening in the story (Meaning) and what type of word might fit the context of the sentence (Structure). Then, students check the rest of the word to see if it has the right letters in the last part of the word. Integrating all three sources of information (M, S, and V) this way will groom students to be word solvers at the point of error in higher level text, an extremely important behavior that enables them to become fluent readers. A more explicit listing of the Structure Changes that occur in
Level E books follows:
1.
Words in Level E books have easy, predictable letter sound relationships and spelling patterns, but using the first letter(s) is not enough. When Mr. Noisy is painting his kitchen red, the illustration shows his paintbrush by the clock on the wall. The clock is being painted red too. A student reading the sentence (I will paint my kitchen red.) might say the sound of the first letter /k/ in kitchen, and predict the word “clock.” This is an acceptable miscue in Level C, but in Level E we expect looking beyond the first letter to say /kit/ and predict kitchen.
2.
Word in Level E books are easily decodable with minimal irregular phonic patterns allowing students look the beginning part of the word, rather than across the word. We’ve had success with teaching students to attend to the consonant letter(s) at the beginning of the word plus the next two letters. In The New Baby,
Tom comes home from school to find his Grandpa alone waiting for him. He asks where his mother, father and grandmother went. Grandpa answers,
“Mom is at the hospital.”
If a student blocks on hospital, you would prompt the student to check the consonants plus the next two letters ( h+os ). Make sure the student is thinking about what kind of word it might be. ( So the student should be thinking,“the” comes before the word, so this word must be the name of something .) In addition, the student should recall that this story is about a family getting a new baby. ( Oh, many people have babies in the /hos/, hospital! I’m going to check the end of the word to see if it has the right letters.
)
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3.
Compound words are introduced at Level E. In the PM Reader Blackberries,
Baby Bear gets lost while picking blackberries with his parents. When they find him, Father Bear notices his basket is empty. He asks Baby Bear, “ Where are your blackberries?”
Baby Bear answers,
“In here. Inside me.”
If a student blocks on the word inside, we must teach her to say the first word ( in) then say the beginning sound of the second word thinking about what would make sense and fit in the context of the sentence.
4.
This is also a good time to introduce what Pat Cunningham calls mediated word recognition , or using a word or part of a word you know to problem-solve an unknown word. ( You know the word “ride.” Use ride to help you read “side.”)
5.
Text in previous books was always located in the same place. In Level E books text is formatted in different places on the page. This requires students to scan the whole page looking for text.
6.
Many words have inflectional endings (-ed, -ing, -s). In attempting to read past tense words, some students will over emphasize this new visual feature, saying
“looked+did” for looked. These students need to be taught that –ed has the sound of /d/, /id/, or /t/ at the end of the word.
A Final Note on Moving from Level D to Level E
Level E is a critical level because it sets the foundation for dealing with the text characteristics of the next several levels (F, G, and H). There are just a few new characteristics added at these levels such as more longer stories and structures many nonrepetitive episodes, and less and less high frequency words requiring students to have word solving strategies that they can use quickly and efficiently.
In order to make the jump to Level I books students must be very efficient at wordsolving and corrections should be made at the point of error. This requires that student self-monitor to assure that words they read sound like it would in a book, make sense, and look right. Self-monitoring comprehension to know when meaning fits with story events or noting that meaning has broken down is also critical, because stories become longer and more complex. Some people call putting all these things together to monitor one’s reading self-regulation. Characters are no longer one-dimensional or flat. In addition, success at this level forms a foundation for moving on to books at Level J where we groom our readers for the next big jump to K/L books.
The Wright Group book Quack, Quack, Quack contains all of the Meaning Changes that are characteristic of this level. A father likes to tease his children, and one rainy day while driving his children to school, he tells them,
“Good day for ducks. Quack, Quack,
Quack.” The children are in the car with him and they frown. But, when he walks them to the school gate in front of their friends chanting the same Quack, Quack, Quack mantra, the children are truly embarrassed. After school they tell mom they don’t want to go to school with dad because he embarrasses them. Mom calls Dad from the shower,
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and tries to have a talk with him. All he is wearing is a towel. When he finds out that the children complained about his teasing, he says,
“If I want to make duck noises I’ll make duck noises.” He runs out the house in his towel, yelling, “Quack, quack, quack.
” Mom and the children decide to lock all the doors in the house so Dad couldn’t get back in. He bangs on the door. Mom comes to the window, and says,
“No more duck noises.”
“Alright,” says Dad. “No more duck noises.” The next day is rainy again, and Dad takes the children to school. He doesn’t make duck noises, but he does have a new mantra,
“Good day for frogs. Croak, Croak, Croak.”
Now that you have the plot of this book, we will use it to describe the Meaning Changes,
Structure Changes and Visual Changes that make Level I books a roadblock for some students.
Meaning Changes
As noted above, Books at Level I have more complex stories, structures and more complex literary language is added. Specific meaning changing characteristics follow.
1.
The books are longer11-24 pages with some illustrated chapter books of 40-60 pages. Students must be taught to accumulate information across these longer stories. o When using Quack, Quack, Quack with students having difficulty accumulating information across an entire story, clip the book at the end of the first episode (Dad embarrasses the kids at school). o Then ask students to tell what happened, and ask them to predict what will happen next. Clip to the end of the next episode (The kids tell Mom they don’t want to go to school with Dad). o Then ask the students what happened, and have them predict what will happen next. Continue in this way through the entire story. o We have been having great success using this method to teach engagement with text, improved retelling ability, and improved comprehension.
2.
Episodes in earlier books were patterned in a way, because the same episode repeated with different characters or events that were very similar. (Think of the repetition in The Little Red Hen.) Level I books have different episodes, as in
Quack, Quack, Quack , and the episodes are more elaborate.
3.
Level I text contains some new ideas that students may not know about, and sometimes abstract ideas that are supported by the illustrations and words.
Comprehension beyond the literal level in this story requires the student to get the idea that even though Dad promised not to make duck noises , he continues to tease making frog noises . In order to make the inference that locking him out of the house did not teach Dad a lesson about teasing, students must be able recall the story episodes and relate the events to each other.
4.
Text contains a variety of dialogue, often between two or more characters (split dialogue, dialogue assigned with a series of words— We said to Mom , and very infrequently unassigned dialogue.) This requires students to comprehend the interaction between characters and the character’s feelings if they are to read dialogue statements with fluency (prosody, or intonation and expression). Think how the children would sound when they are telling Mom about Dad. Think how
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Dad would sound when he says,
“What did I do now?”
Mom replied,
“You made duck noises.”
Then, Dad said,
“If I want to make duck noises, I’ll make duck noises.” He went out the door and ran around the house yelling, “Quack, quack, quack.”
This and other books lend themselves to teaching for fluency, and how students must always have the meaning of the story up and running in their mind.
5.
The variety of words used to assign dialogue widens. (Some call these fancy words for “said.” A few words that might be used are replied, shouted, yelled, laughed, whispered.) Many times adverbs are used to describe the dialogue
(quietly, loudly).
“Well…” said Sarah, slowly. “I do like the trees.”
6.
At this level, stories become more complex by including storylines that contain more than one point of view. Dad feels it is fine to tease his children in Quack,
Quack, Quack. The children have a totally different point of view about his teasing. Notice how students must decide which point of view Mom favors.
7.
Because character descriptions are more complex, students must infer character traits. Often the illustrations support them in doing this. When Dad is crossing the street making duck noises in Quack, Quack, Quack, the illustrations show some of the children’s school mates looking at Dad with awed expressions. The daughter is red faced with embarrassment and frowning. The son is holding his head. Dad has a big grin and seems to really be enjoying himself. Yet the text just reads, He walked like a duck and made duck noises.
8.
Content words are explained in the text or illustrated in the pictures. In this story the first sentence on page 8 is Dad came in from the shower. The word shower might be tricky for some readers, but water is dripping from Dad’s head in the illustration and all he is wearing is a towel. A non-fiction text reads: This soft skin is called a husk.
In the illustration an ear of sweet corn is pictured without being opened. On the next page the husk is peeled back to show the corn inside.
9.
Some literary language (similes, metaphors, etc.) begin to appear. In the book
Coconut Lunches, the Wendy’s teacher encouraged her to learn to play the piano.
To allow the reader to understand Wendy’s reaction to the teacher’s suggestion the author used the following metaphor, “ Wendy could hardly wait to learn to play the piano. The keys looked like a big mouth with lots of huge white teeth.”
10.
More and more children’s books can be found in the library are available at Level
I. Happy Birthday, Sam (Pat Hutchins), Who Took the Farmer’s Hat? (Joan
Nodset), Henny Penny (Paul Galdone), Hattie and the Fox (Mem Fox) to mention a few .
Structure Changes
Sentence structure becomes more complex at Level I and more literary language features are introduced. Quack, Quack, Quack begins the story with One wet day,
Dad took us to school in the car. This beginning is not quite Once upon a time… , but it does exemplify the use of literary language. Teachers should study the list of structure changes below and begin teaching how they work in interactive writing, shared reading and writing workshop before students are asked to jump to Level I.
1.
Many compound sentences are common. Students must use a concept from the reading literature called “feed-back and feed-forward.” The Wright Group
Sunshine book Coconut Lunches is an illustrated chapter book (24 pages). It is
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about a young girl who moved to a new home and school because her father got a new job. After a period of adjustment as the new girl in school, she decides to try out for the volleyball team. This compound sentence describes her desire. She wanted so much to be part of a team—just like she used to be at her old school.
A student reading the sentence must read the first part, notice the dash and “feedforward” to read the entire sentence. After reading the second part they must mentally “feed-back” to realize what Wendy used to be at her old school was part of a team.
2.
Many sentences with embedded clauses and phrases occur in Level I books.
Sentences in earlier books mainly contained one embedded prepositional phrase, and little or no clauses were used. Books at this level can have multiple phrases in the same sentence. He stood in his towel in the rain. That morning we went to school in the car. In the morning, a boy from Wendy’s school sat next to her on the bus. Students must use the feed-forward/feed-back strategy described in #1 above to comprehend sentences with attached clauses. We ran through the house, locking all the doors. (Student thinks—They locked all the doors in the house so
Dad couldn’t get back in.)
If I want to make duck noises, I’ll make duck noises.
(Student thinks—Dad is thinking he will make duck noises any time he wants to even if the kids don’t like it.)
I ran to it, but away it went. (Student thinks—When the mouse saw the farmer’s hat, he thought was a mouse hole. he ran to it, but the wind blew the farmer’s hat away.)
3.
Sentences are more complex in Level I books because there is a variation in placement of the subject, verb, adjectives and adverbs. A farmer’s favorite hat flies away. Up, up, up, it went. A non-fiction book about measuring contains this sentence. Find the right measuring tool. These sentences were used in a description of how members of a hockey team learned to stop on the ice. At first, for stopping we used the wall. Now, we don’t.
4.
Sentences in Level I books contain words in a series—nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs, divided by commas. We use tools for measuring length, weight, and volume. When Termites (a hockey team) skate we wear sweat shirts, sweat pants, thick socks, gloves, helmets, knee pads, elbow pads, and hockey skates. In a nonfiction book about the rainforest this sentence appears. The have no electricity, no refrigerators, no televisions, and no cars. Adjectives in a series appear in a book about a cat looking for a new home— Ginger. She saw a nice, sunny spot.
5.
Some sentences use commas to set words apart. Qualifiers—Ginger didn’t like dogs.
Dogs didn’t like Ginger, either.
Qualifier— You probably would get wet, too. Addressee in dialogue— Squirrel, did you see my old brown hat?
Explanations of a concept word— They might hunt small animals, such as monkeys, to eat.
6.
Questions are very common in Level I narrative books. Most often they are contained in dialogue statements.
We said to Mom, “Will you take us to school?
We don’t want to go with Dad. He embarrasses us.”
Question then answer format is one of the organizational patterns in non-fiction. This hard skin is called a shell. We can’t eat this hard shell. What’s inside this shell? (Next page.)
There is a walnut inside. A walnut is crunchy. We can eat walnuts.
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Visual Changes
Most of the visual characteristics of Level I books remain the same as in previous levels, so most of the difficulty students have in moving from Level H to I resides in the changes in meaning and structure. One new characteristic in the area of word work is that there are many 2-3 syllable words. When comparing a Level E book ( The New Baby
— highlighted in the jump to Level E section) with three books (one Level G and Two Level
I’s), we found that the Level E book had 3 two syllable words and one three syllable word. The G and I books averaged 11 two syllable words and 2 three syllable words. So this visual change is going to require that students have a firm understanding of all three parts of the alphabetic principle if they are going to be able to do the word work necessary with longer words.
1.
The first part of the alphabetic principle is letters have sounds associated with them. Students coming into Level I must know long and short sounds of individual letters. See this link: http://www.mes-english.com/phonics/az.php
In addition, they need to know the sounds of consonant blends (two letter blends—
/cr/ and three letter blends--/str/) and consonant digraphs (sh, ph, ch…). See http://www.mes-english.com/phonics/blends.php
and http://www.mesenglish.com/phonics/digraphs.php
2.
Second, there is not a one-to-one correspondence between the letters that you see and the sounds that you hear. Words such as rain and boat have 4 letters but you only hear three sounds when you say the word. Think of how this part of the alphabetic principle applies to words such as night and know.
3.
Third, letters and letter clusters change sounds. The letter c in cent /s/ and can /k/.
The letter g in gym /j/ and got /g/. The changes in vowel sounds such as the letter a in ape /long a/, can /short a/, car /r-controlled ar/, heard /no sound of a/, and across /schwa sound/. The diphthong /ow/ changes sounds in now and show. For more examples of this part of the alphabetic principle go to these links: http://www.phonicsontheweb.com/irregular-vowels.php
http://www.ehow.com/video_4767706_teach-irregular-vowel-sounds.html
http://www.funnix.co.nz/phonics/index.html
http://www.mes-english.com/phonics/rcontrolled.php
4.
The amount of print on the pages of a book is another change at Level I. Most books have ten lines of print. This can cause tracking problems for some children. Rather than letting them use their finger or a card, draw a line with a permanent marker on a piece of clear acetate (overhead projection film or scraps of laminating plastic). The student places the line on the acetate sheet between the lines to help them track, and they are able to back and look ahead if necessary because the acetate is clear.
5.
Books, especially short, illustrated chapter books and non-fiction books, have a table of contents, a glossary, and 2 or more graphics on a page.
A Final Note on Moving from Level H to Level I
Students successful movement through Levels F, G, H, into I is a critical step toward becoming a life long reader. After working with thousands of readers, many of whom were struggling to learn to read, we found that if a student can make the climb up the
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Level A to Level I side of the reading mountain to the peak, or watershed, with accurate reading and meaningful comprehension, they will move from Level J through Z if they receive good comprehension instruction and are taught strategies to deal with polysyllabic words and new vocabulary they encounter. Students can become life long readers, because they will be skilled enough not to get bogged down and frustrated as they read. The changes at Level J a minimal—sentence structures get more complex and many words with complex letter sound relationships. Therefore, students can continue to refine and master dealing with the meaning, structure and visual changes identified at
Level I, preparing themselves for the next breakthrough Levels K/L.
The jump to Levels K and L is roadblock for many students because there is a dramatic increase in complexity of story content requiring higher level comprehension, longer stories and chapters in chapter books requiring accumulation of information across an entire story. Sentences are longer and contain complex language structures, while the number of polysyllabic words increases dramatically, requiring readers to read across the word letter by chunk using parts of words they know to figure out the difficult words.
This makes heavy demands on students’ skills and strategies they have developed. New characteristics of these levels follow.
Meaning Changes
1.
Chapter books begin to dominate the type of narrative text available at this level.
2.
Stories are still relatively simple, presented in short chapters, but there is definitely more text for the reader to process in previous levels with more text to read on each page. .
3.
Shorter texts are included at this level because they have more difficulty vocabulary, heavy concept loads, or more complex themes.
4.
Another characteristic that causes this to be a breakthrough level is that the types of genre increases over previous levels. Realistic fiction, fantasy, and non-fiction with the addition of some historical fiction that does not require extensive background knowledge to understand. Some fables and legends may be added.
5.
Since the control of sentence and story complexity increases, many different authors write these books. Thus, the texts readers encounter contain a greater variety of writing styles.
6.
Some stories cover new places, space, and time differences (e.g. historical fiction and non-fiction) allowing readers to use text as a way to expand their understanding of other times and new cultures.
7.
Themes in narrative stories require readers to understand concepts well outside their own experience.
8.
Dialogue statements that are unassigned are more common.
9.
Dialogue continues to carry a large part of the story, mood or tone, and character development. Often the dialogue statements are unassigned, requiring the reader to maintain an understanding of the verbal interactions among several characters
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on one page (e.g. When Arthur isn’t sure he wants to give up his “honey bear,” dialogue between Arthur and Violet communicates his reluctance to sell the bear.
10.
“ You didn’t put a tag on Honey Bear,” said Violet.
11.
“He is in very good shape,” said Arthur. “He only has one eye missing.”
12.
“Maybe I should sell him for a lot of money.”
13.
“Maybe I should sell him for 31 cents,” said Arthur.
14.
“His ear is raggedy,” said Violet.
15.
“Well,” said Arthur, “I have not made up my mind yet.”
16.
He moved Honey Bear all the way behind Baby King Kong.
17.
Recognizing humor, absurdities, and innuendo is introduced and analyzing character traits is critical to understanding the story (e.g. A robber who breaks into a house and finds a Barrel of Gold exclaims, “ I’m a rich man .” When a dog rips out the seat of his pants and chases him out of the house without the gold, he wails “
What a poor man I am.
”) OR (A young girl goes to sleep at night upset because her new shoes were too big. The author writes: The next morning she put on her red shoes again. Perhaps she had grown during the night .)
18.
Stories contain multiple episodes related to a single plot that may occur over a longer period of time than one day, requiring much more to remember.
19.
Non-fiction contains more technical language with clear explanations in text and supportive illustrations.
20.
Non-fiction begins to use boldface headings, dividing the information into sections.
21.
Non-fiction topics are concrete—animals, plants, and other phenomena familiar to the reader.
22.
Non-fiction texts are shorter because of the difficult content and concepts placed on different pages or different sections.
23.
The variety of vocabulary continues to expand, exposing children to more and more words they do not use in their spoken language. Therefore, this difference contributes to the fact that this is a breakthrough level. Children must deal with the connotation of words, realizing that words have multiple meanings ( e.g. Then
Boulas took a turn leading the camel… Leading means to be first in line or the winner in a race, but it also means to “show someone or something the way.”
Grandma Sal says, “Dip time.” Dip means “to put an object in a semi-liquid to coat it;” in the context of this story, it means “to take a swim.”).
24.
Simple similes and metaphors are added ( e.g.”last one in is a rotten egg”)
.
25.
Informational (non-fiction) books contain technical language and harder vocabulary words. The amount of support given to deal with this increased number of hard words determines the difference between J and K.
26.
One page of a K book requires the reader to quickly process these more difficult words: drapes, mischievous, bouncing, pounce, bright, chase. . In Grandmas at the Lake , Pip and Ski row into the lake on a rowboat. They get caught in a current and drift away from the land. The author uses the sentence
, “Pip and Ski saw
Grandma Nan get smaller and smaller.
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Structure Changes
1.
Sentences become even longer (15+ words) and more complex, requiring the reader to relate information back and forward within and across sentences (e.g. “If a running try did not work, and a running and waving try did not work, and a running, waving, and jumping did not work, I knew that a running, waving, jumping, and shouting just had to work.”)
2.
Many sentences have introductory clauses, lists of nouns, verbs or adjectives.
( Slowly, slowly, Alison leaned over. Carefully, she peeked inside. And from deep, dark inside the box a tiny voice said…”Meow!”)
Visual Changes
1.
The number of multi-syllable words increases even more. These words tend to be more challenging to take apart and contain complex letter-sound relationships. In a sixteen page, illustrated book at Level K there are 26 two-syllable words, 8 threesyllable words, and 2 four-syllable words. Earlier in this document we showed that a
Level E book had 3 two-syllable words and one three-syllable word. The G and I books averaged 11 two-syllable words and 2 three-syllable words. A Level J book of the same length had 15 two syllable words and 4 three syllable words. The word count in each of the three books was not significantly different. Notice the number of multi-syllable words more than doubled in the jump from I to K, with Level J books falling somewhere in between.
2.
Font decreases in size, even in 16-24 page illustrated books with paper covers. There is a range of lines of print on the page 5 lines in illustrated books to as many as 24 lines of print in chapter books with minimal illustrations. In Level L, most books are chapter books with 70-80 pages with chapters ranging from 5 to 15 pages.
3.
Text layout is more difficult. Sentences end at the middle of lines and continue from one line to the next.
4.
The font is generally smaller and there is more print on the page.
5.
Many conventions of text are used, including ellipses, italics, use of all capital letters, indentations, and bold letters.
6.
Some unusual formats, such as letters within texts, may be used.
7.
In Level K books illustrations are common, but they merely support interpretation, enhance enjoyment, or set mood, but they are not essential to meaning. They merely present a backdrop for the story, and most of the meaning is communicated in the text.
8.
In Level L books, there is long stretches of text without illustrations, requiring readers to envision what is going on in the story.
9.
In non-fiction, illustrations include a variety of pictures with captions, charts and graphs, Question/Answer boxes, legends, call-out explaining essential information.
A Final Note on Moving from Level J to Level K/L
If students successful master the difficulties encountered in these levels they should not have much difficulty with Level M books. Thus, a new band of text difficulty K, L, M is created. This would lead them to the next breakthrough level—Level N.
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Meaning Changes
Books at Level N continue to become more complex by including more sophisticated themes and longer chapters organized in a variety of ways. These books go well beyond the reader’s personal experience. Readers at this level are beginning to use books to gain the vicarious experiences that will help them to understand their world. Level N also includes more picture books found in libraries and shorter texts that provide opportunity to interpret these texts and go beyond them. Specific characteristics that often cause students hit a road block at this level follow.
1.
Books at this level include all genres in more complex format. Books with topics of mystery and suspense become more common.
2.
Biographies longer and focus on subjects that are less well known to students.
They are expected to learn about these subjects through reading. For example,
Sidewalk Story is about a young girl, Lilly Etta, who is distressed that her friend
Tanya and her mother and six siblings are being put out of their apartment because they can’t pay the rent. She is concerned that someone will steal the furniture and things that are being stacked in the street. Lilly Etta can’t understand why her mother will not help Tanya’s mother, because she is her friend. Lilly Etta’s mother explains that they have very little income she has to take care of Lilly Etta, her two brothers and herself first, and that Tanya’s mother understands that. Then she tries to explain you can still be friends even though you can’t help in a situation like this. This interaction occurs over several pages with much dialogue between the two.
3.
Picture books may be used to illustrate themes, character interpretation, or analysis of text structure, although these books are more appropriate for read aloud and literature discussions rather than for guided reading.
4.
Characters are more complex and well developed; therefore they are more memorable.
5.
Most books have one main plot in episodes that occur over longer periods of time.
6.
Topics and settings require readers to vicariously experience new things and places.
7.
These books offer an opportunity to feel empathy for characters and to experience suspense.
8.
Characters are revealed through what they say, think, and do, as well as through what others say about them.
9.
Readers need a variety of strategies to understand the more complex plot and theme of these books, for example immigration, death, and slavery.
10.
Story episodes are longer and take place over longer periods of time (and chapters in the book).
11.
Many books require knowledge of the world, or cultural or historic context for interpretation of story. In Gloria Whelan’s Next Spring an Oriole students must use their knowledge of farming, colonial times and westward movement to interpret this part of chapter 4. On the way to our land we passed five or six cabins. Some of the families hurried to greet us, asking where we had come from and where we were headed. They were friendly and eager to give advice and
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offer help. Around those cabins there was no clearing for planting of crops. We took those men for trappers. A common occupation during these times was trapping animals. A person who worked as a trapper would not also farm his land.
12.
Authors use devices such as irony and whimsy to create interest.
13.
Many other literary devices (simile, metaphor, etc.) become more common, requiring readers to use their understanding of these devices to comprehend vocabulary, themes and ideas.
14.
Since vocabulary representing unfamiliar themes, objects, events, and ideas are included, readers must use complex vocabulary recognition strategies. New vocabulary words are specific to context, requiring the reader to “look in and look around” new vocabulary words. [As they “look in” the word, they use their phonics skills to decode and look in their background of experience to see if they have ever seen the word before (e.g. The word whopper at Burger King). When they “look around” the word, they check the mood and flow of the story to get the meaning of the word (i.e. ominous means something bad is going to happen) as well as the context of the sentence to determine what kind of word it might be (i.e. noun, verb, adverb).]
15.
Many require an understanding of character development and more complex and expanded plots.
Structure Changes
1.
The author’s use of complex language structures requires more complex sentences. (In Sidewalk Story the following sentence exemplifies the increasing complexity of sentence structure in Level N books— She jumped the last two steps, yanked open the front door, plunked herself down on the wide brownstone steps, and leaned against the heavy-looking black metal railing. Notice the actions in a series, hyphenated word, and a series of adjectives for the railing.
2.
Dialogue statements are unassigned. This requires students to understand that learn that every time a new person speaks text is formatted to the beginning of the next line. Students must be able to keep in mind which character is speaking by using the line changes from the last assigned dialogue statement.
1.
Many words with 3+ syllables.
Visual Changes
2.
Some words divided (hyphenated) across lines.
3.
Some multi-syllable proper nouns are difficult to decode.
4.
Some words with simple prefixes. Affixes should be taught as sight words along with their meanings.
5.
Students must use mediated word recognition (using parts of words they know as they go across the word letter by chunk).
6.
Chapter books of 100 pages and sometimes more. Chapters are still short ranging from 5-15 pages.
7.
Illustrations are less frequent in narrative text.
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A Final Note on Moving from Level M to Level N
Notice that the Structure Changes and Visual Changes are minimal in comparison to the
Meaning Changes at Level N. This could explain why so many students move from
Level M, because they have mastered that level, but get bogged down and stuck at Level
N. Narrative text has gotten much more complex as does non-fiction texts. We must teach with rigor and support to help students master the Meaning Changes at Level N.
This teaching can continue through Level O, because there are literally no characteristics that are new in Level O except for more challenging themes such as war and environmental change and more complex character development.
Books at Level P include the total span of fiction genres. These books provide opportunities for readers to learn how different texts are organized and how to gain information from these varied text structures. Continued and more explicit instruction in the format and structure of each genre is necessary since these books are more complex.
Many texts are long, requiring readers to sustain interest and meaning over many days.
Meaning Changes
1.
Chapter books explore the topics of pre-adolescence and early-adolescence that will interest more advanced third-grade readers.
2.
In general, books have more text and more complex ideas requiring real or vicarious experiences through reading.
3.
Texts contain many longer descriptive narratives, typically one or two paragraphs long.
4.
Rather than length, complexity of text structure is determined by the sophistication of the theme, and the amount of background experience required to understand the text. For example, the setting becomes a very important part of the story requiring students to have knowledge of content (history, geography, etc.).
5.
More complex literary language than ever before is used in these books; figurative language, plays on words and irony is quite common.
6.
Metaphor, simile are used, but most often are explained within the text. In
Sachar’s Wayside School Gets a Little Stranger, the main characters reluctantly go to school to meet the substitute teacher who replaced their regular teacher when she was out on maternity leave. When the school day starts, the principal talks to them on the intercom, and they begin working because Mr. Gorf , their teacher isn’t there. They assume he is watching from somewhere or hiding in the closet, so they do math, reading, social studies and spelling work. After recess they return. Still no Mr. Gorf. The students begin to revolt and talk about the substitute teacher. When one of them decides to look in the closet, Mr. Gorf comes out of the closet to a shocked group of students.
My name is Mr. Gorf,” said the man who walked out of the closet. And, surprising as it may seem, the children weren’t afraid. It was his voice. His voice was full of comfort and wisdom, like an old leather chair in a dusty library. It didn’t matter what he said.
It felt good just to listen to him. Notice how a parenthetical statement (surprising
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as it may seem) and a simile is used to document the characters’ feelings about
Mr. Gorf.
7.
More detailed descriptions of setting are common, and these descriptions play an integral part in interpreting the story.
8.
Often texts must be read on a literal and figurative level to truly understand them.
9.
Vocabulary is extremely sophisticated requiring readers to have many vocabulary interpreting strategies in place. In Judy Blume’s Superfudge, the family is taking their dog Turtle to the vet.
Turtle always shakes when he goes to the vet’s. I don’t know how he knows he’s going to get his shots, but he does. I tried talking to him softly, telling him it would only hurt for a second, but he whined and cowered in the corner anyway. This passage is a good example of how students who have the vocabulary strategy of “looking in” and “looking around” the word can figure out the meaning of unknown vocabulary words. “Cowered” is very decodable if students use the /ow/ in now when they “look in” the word. A student who “looks in” whined may say whin+ed, if they are not flexible enough to try the long i sound or use part of “shine” to predict whined. When students “look around” the words, the mood and flow of the passage tells them that this is about a dog who does not like shots and is scared. The context of the sentence tells them these words are verbs telling what the dog is doing. Therefore, whined and cowered are words that tell what someone does when they are scared. Whined is a sound the dog made. Cowered means he huddled in the corner of the room.
Structure Changes
1.
Longer and more complex sentences (15+ words) and paragraphs of more complex sentences require readers to retain and recall information to support ongoing comprehension of text. The sentences from Superfudge above are examples of the mental gymnastics that must go on for a student to discover that
Fudge was trying to console the dog.
2.
Long sections of text contain dialogue statements that are unassigned.
Visual Changes
1.
Many complex multi-syllable words that are challenging to take apart.
2.
Many words with affixes (prefixes and suffixes)
3.
Some words are introduced that are seldom used in oral language and are difficult to decode.
4.
Most books have a minimum of 200 pages, but length is not as important in determining the difficulty of the text.
5.
Print size decreases even more causing the reader to deal with more words on the page.
6.
Varied punctuation including colons, semicolons, ellipsis, and dashes used (and their function understood) to gain meaning. In Louis Sachar’s
There’s a Boy in the Girls Bathroom, Bradely was beaten up by some bullies on his way home from school. He takes a bath to wash off the mud, and he begins to fantasize that
Ronnie the Rabbit is being attacked by the King of Diamonds and company—the bad guys.
“Help,” called Ronnie. She ran to the edge of the bed—the cliff. She was trapped. The floor was a thousand feet below.
Notice how the “dash” is used
17

to move the setting from the bedroom scene to the Bradley’s fantasy setting of a fight at the edge of a cliff.
Beyond Level Q books at different levels become very difficult to explain using the characteristics we have discussed so far. First, if students have mastered the hurdles they must jump moving from levels A through Q, reading the words in higher level books should provide few problems, allowing them to focus on the more difficult problems they encounter comprehending things such as symbolism, more mature issues and the problems of society, making alternative interpretations of events or character behavior, and dealing with content that is very different then those in their current life and so forth.
Second, one chapter in a Level R-Z book may exemplify a certain characteristic, but the next chapter is written in a much simpler style that is easy for the student to master.
Therefore, the new characteristics are not consistent throughout the text as they are in lower level texts.
We are recommending grouping all the characteristic of Level R through Z in one band, listing out the new characteristics students should accomplish as they move through these levels.
Reference
Fountas, I. C. & Pinnell, G. S. (2006). Leveled books K-8: Matching test to readers for effective teaching.
Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.
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