Are Book Levels Really So Bad?

As we get to know our new crop of students this school year, teachers gather all sorts of data, both hard and soft.  It’s so important to get a feel for who our students are and what they can do as readers and writers so we can begin thinking about what their next steps are.  We need to understand how to scaffold our instruction to honor what our students are ready for.  And unless we never want our students to read independently when they’re with us, we also want to provide texts that our students can happily and confidently read without hand-holding.  Which then immediately leads to the question of text levels.  Much like the proverbial angel and devil on our shoulder, we likely have conflicting thoughts:  “I should provide books my students love and can confidently read” but also “wait a minute–I’m hearing book levels are bad.” 

What’s a responsive teacher to do?

Let’s talk about book levels.  Are they really so bad?

First, let’s establish that levels were never meant to be shared with kids or parents. And they were never meant to be used to label classroom libraries or children.  Full stop.

Book leveling has actually been around since kids began going to school–at first these were primers like the McGuffey Readers.  As skills were taught, kids would get more and more advanced books as they moved up the grade levels.

Then of course Marie Clay came in with her idea of leveling books based on very discrete criteria.  Again, as students gained skills, the levels became increasingly more complex in order to push students further.  Keep in mind, her Reading Recovery program where these discrete levels were used was meant for very struggling first graders.  Again, full stop.

But book leveling really took off in the late 90’s when Fountas and Pinnell published their book Guided Reading.  This is where they really shared how much goes into what makes a book more or less complex.  From the very beginning, they cautioned teachers against sharing levels with kids and labeling their libraries.

Book levels were only ever meant to guide teachers in choosing books for instruction. That’s it.

But as you know, in reality this isn’t what happened. All across the country, teachers told kids what level they were and they labeled classroom library book bins with letter levels. Teachers Pay Teachers sellers provided thousands of cute and colorful leveled labeling systems matching any style of decor for teachers to purchase. Sadly, in many schools, teachers even limited kids to reading only very specific levels. And everywhere, unfortunately, parents were told their kids’ levels.  

So suddenly, wrongly, all over the country, kids were labeled as a level.  I will never forget sitting down to confer with a fourth grader in a new school when I moved to a new state.  When I asked her what kind of books she liked to read, her reply was “I’m an R.”  It was heartbreaking that this child had been trained to think she was a level and didn’t know herself as a reader. This is where leveling has gone bad. Very, very bad.  Only books can be labeled a level, not a child.

And even that’s very messy work. Book leveling is not at all an exact science. There are so many considerations: genre, text structure, word complexity (as in phonics skills needed), vocabulary, content maturity/complexity, sentence complexity, and language, just to name a few.

Different publishers will level books differently, too–which is why it’s always good to choose from a large variety of companies. 

Most importantly, though, level of complexity also completely depends on the child. 

For example, I’m a very strong reader who knows a lot about literacy, and can easily handle complex research reports about it. But give me anything at all about football, even at a pretty basic level, and I will completely struggle with it.  In the same way, my husband, also an excellent reader who loves football and was an award-winning high school quarterback, could easily read anything about football, no matter how complex, yet struggle to make a whole lot of sense of Reading Research Quarterly.  We all have a classroom full of kids who have a lot of background knowledge about some things and not much about others–a major factor when it comes to reading comprehension.

Which makes leveling is a loose guideline, not at all a hard and fast rule. 

Within any given group of kids, each one will need different things. This makes guided reading that’s driven by levels problematic–everyone’s getting the same thing despite their needs. This is why, after about mid-first grade, strategy instruction becomes much more helpful.

However, we do need to know what books are appropriate and supportive of our kids for small group instruction. We can’t just go to the school’s book room and grab anything. 

As I’ve said, the amount of text, the complexity of the vocabulary, sentences, and concepts all play a role. Complexity matters a lot.  Teachers need some kind of guidance in choosing books that will support kids the most in their next steps, depending on their needs and skill development. This is where levels are good.  They are guardrails, not rules.  Leveled texts are not “easy,” either.  They are a next step in complexity which still requires teacher support.  

But leveled texts are not all that kids should have.  There should be a mix.  

Younger students and students who are still learning to break the code need a heavier amount of decodable text.  Younger kids, kids who are learning English, and kids who need access to really complex text will likely need audiobooks.  And we cannot ignore the research that tells us kids need a heavy dose of grade-level texts.  (Note that “grade level” is still a level!).  Shanahan advises that “Text difficulty should vary; kids should move across a range of texts from easy to difficult.” 

In other words, students need texts they can read independently, texts they can read with some support, and texts that will need a great deal of support. 

Which is where book leveling isn’t bad at all–it’s actually a good guideline to help us (and kids) make these choices.

“Not only should texts vary in difficulty, but the amount of help, guidance, explanation, and scaffolding ought to vary, too. When kids are placed in frustration level texts they need greater support than when they are reading instructional level or independent level texts—just the opposite of what many of our instructional routines provide.”

Shanahan on Literacy, 6/26/2016

Yes. Research tells us that there is enormous benefit to using grade level texts and scaffolding those texts in different ways to help all kids access it.  Some kids will need very heavy support, of course, in the way of  repeated readings and close reading.  Joan Sedita, author of The Writing Rope, put out a free webinar a while back all about providing heavy close reading support. 

But let’s be real.  No teacher, no matter how seasoned, can constantly plan and provide this level of support.  There is just too much to juggle. 

And what about the kids who don’t need all that support?  Although so often left out of the reading conversations, these students also still need books that are supportive of their individual needs and interests.  

While planning for heavy support with grade level texts should be a part of our ongoing work with students,  like leveled texts, complex grade level texts also cannot be all kids experience. 

So let’s be very honest. Teachers don’t always have the time or mental bandwidth to plan these highly supported lessons.  There are some easier ways to make complex texts more accessible than always planning long close reading lessons.  But as Shanahan reminds us, kids also need independent level texts, too.  

Passion, curiosity, and knowledge are at least as important as reading levels in helping children find good things to read. This is especially true because we know that motivation and knowledge can increase effective reading levels, while, conversely, readers can enjoy and gain a lot from texts that interest them, even if they are “too easy.”

Psychology Today, 2/28/17

So continue to learn what your students can handle.   Learn what sort of support they need.  Absolutely learn what they’re interested in. Book levels aren’t good or bad.  Because at the end of the day, it’s all about balance.  Our students need to have books they can read independently with confidence and they need books they can read with some support and they need texts that challenge them but can access with greater support.  In order to grow and to know themselves as readers, they need–and deserve–a mix. 

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Want to know how to ensure your kids are truly engaged and getting the most from their independent reading with the books that will support them as readers?  Access my FREE webinar, where I explain over a dozen reasons kids become disengaged.  

Who is Coach from the Couch??  I’m Michelle, a 25-year veteran educator, currently a K-5 literacy coach.  I continue to learn alongside teachers in classrooms each and every day, and it’s my mission to support as many teachers as I can.  Because no one can do this work alone. I’m available to you, too, through virtual coaching calls! 

Or, consider joining my Facebook community–a safe, supportive environment (really!)  where you can ask questions, learn ideas, and share your thoughts among other literacy-loving educators!