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| Readers' Advisory: Advising readers in their book choices |
Teachers, tutors, and librarian engage in readers’ advisory when matching readers to books. It is important to note that readers’ advisory does not end when a child walks out with books in hand. After the book is read, follow up in the form of questions and discussion are imperative. The follow up should reveal the student's understanding of the content and which titles the student enjoyed (or didn’t).
That process is often different from the hunt for “just right” books in classrooms and collections in which books are organized by reading level. Rather than having a conversation about interests, children in leveled classrooms and school libraries are often directed to color-coded bins or shelves labeled by level.
In classrooms across the country, reading instruction, assessment, and labeling of material have impacted how people search for and engage with books, sometimes resulting in restricted reading choices—even for independent reading. That, as (*1)Betty Carter, professor emerita of children’s and young adult literature at Texas Woman’s University, noted in a July 2000 SLJ article, is a “formula for failure.”
WHAT’S WRONG WITH “JUST RIGHT” BOOKS?
The move toward leveled or “just right” books stems from research showing that children’s reading comprehension improves when they read texts at—or slightly above—their reading level. What that level is, how it’s determined, and how reading instruction is implemented varies from school to school, district to district, and state to state. Two of the most common methods for leveling books are (*2) Lexile and the “A to Z” gradient found in (*3) Fountas and Pinnell’s Guided Reading system.
“Research says that students should spend most of their time in ‘just right’ or ‘at their level’ books, but that research does not say to limit students and what they would like to read,” says (*4) Pernille Ripp, creator of the Global Read Aloud and author of Passionate Learners: How to Engage and Empower Your Students (Routledge, 2015).
Most educators and researchers agree that student choice is a huge part of reading motivation. Does restricting kids to a prescribed level do more harm than good? Yes, according to Ripp. “Those levels, to quote Fountas and Pinnell, are ‘a teacher’s tool, not a child’s label.’ But that’s exactly what levels have become—labels that restrict our readers and tell them that their reading identity needs to be based on an outside influence—the teacher—and not their own intuition,” she says.
(*5) Donalyn Miller, author of Reading in the Wild: The Book Whisperer’s Keys to Cultivating Lifelong Reading Habits (Jossey-Bass, 2013), has called leveling “educational malpractice.” Schools have gone too far, she believes. “There is a lack of fundamental understanding by many educators about the limitations of leveling systems and their role in children’s reading development,” she says. “Matching children with books solely by reading level removes the teacher’s responsibility for knowing much about children’s literature or teaching children meaningful strategies for self-selecting books beyond level.”
Helping youth develop the skills needed to find interesting, appropriate reading material, without leveling, was the focus of (*6) Linda Wedwick Haling’s doctoral research and led her and coauthor Jessica Ann Wutz to write Bookmatch: How to Scaffold Student Book Selection for Independent Reading (IRA, 2008). Now an assistant professor at the Center for Reading and Literacy at the College of Education at Illinois State University, Haling believes that “the readability formulas have some usefulness. But ultimately, they never account for…what the reader brings to the experience. A reader’s ‘match’ to a book is going to change with what prior knowledge the individual brings to that specific topic. What’s most important is teaching kids how to match themselves to ‘just right’ books. In the real world, books are not leveled.”
Bookmatch focuses on teaching children nine key criteria—collectively forming the acronym BOOKMATCH—to consider when selecting a title for independent reading:
book length
ordinary language
organization
knowledge prior to book
manageable text
appeal to genre
topic appropriateness
connection
high interest
It’s a process that involves asking questions, interacting with the text, considering personal preferences, and allowing room for trial and error as kids strengthen their skills.
Carter agrees that more attention is needed on teaching children how to find books rather than relying on prescriptive reading systems. “If we are trying to help kids become independent learners, then they need to develop skills for finding their own books,” she says.
LEVELING THE BOOKS, OR THE CHILD?
In a 2012 article for Reading.org, “Guided Reading: the Romance and the Reality”, Fountas and Pinnell cautioned that they “never recommended that the school library or classroom libraries be leveled or that levels be reported to parents.” If levels are noted -- do not adhere to those delineation. Instead, encourage readers to look for books that interest them across the "levels." Using leveled texts in classrooms following the “A to Z” matrix, Lexile, or other systems, however, seems to contradict this advice, as educators report that more schools are leveling, with some districts mandating it. Teachers often discuss individual reading levels with their students, and some let students know one another’s levels.
Miller says that this can be very damaging. “While children are learning the skills of reading, they must also develop a positive reading identity or they will not become lifelong readers,” she says. “Removing, defining, limiting, or rejecting children’s reading choices disempowers them and creates negative attitudes toward reading—and most likely, school.”
Ripp agrees. “I think a few kids will be empowered by it, mostly if they are above grade level,” she says. However, those with lower levels “would not be motivated,” feeling so behind that they might never catch up.
Fountas and Pinnell advise against making reading levels known to individual students: “We level books, not children.” Still, many lament leveling’s overuse, to the detriment of literacy and considering the whole child. “Painting kids into a level can…break their desire to read,” says (*7) Eric Neuman, a school librarian in New York City. “I have witnessed kids with low reading levels working their way through difficult texts because of how interested they are in the subject matter. I’ve also witnessed proficient readers mess up on passages that they’re not interested in.”
Supporters, however, view leveling as a motivator. It provides clear goals for improvement that can offer encouragement and structure. “[L]evels were instrumental in helping my eight-year-old overcome her reading struggles,” says (*8) Jacqueline Miller of Darien, CT. “She could not read the [higher level] books that her friends were reading, and that was far more shame-inducing than knowing what level books were her ‘just right’ books,” Miller says. “The leveled books didn’t matter as much for my non-struggling reader. And they both read a huge variety of non-leveled books outside of school.”
AT THE SCHOOL LIBRARY
Many school librarians have leveled collections to support curriculum and in response to mandates from district literacy specialists. (*9) Michael Bento, a school librarian in Burien, WA, labeled his books according to Fountas and Pinnell’s “A to Z” gradient. It’s a slow, time-consuming process, Bento notes, but he is pleased with the results. “Students and teachers now refer to this leveling system when looking for appropriate [material],” he says. “It makes it easier for us to help them if we are on board as well.”
Neuman says that several years ago, he felt pressure from teachers to level the school library. He resisted and presented a compromise solution. Neuman installed Level It Books, an app for iOS that allows users to scan an ISBN and look up Lexile numbers for most texts. “If a student absolutely had to read something on their specific level, I could make that happen,” he says. The New York City Department of Education also provides Follett’s Destiny to school libraries to manage circulation, and Destiny includes reading levels for most titles, he adds. “So when kids check books in and out, I can see a level.”
The American Association of School Librarians (AASL), a division of the American Library Association (ALA), strongly discourages school librarians from labeling, according to the ALA Position Statement on Labeling Books with Reading Levels. “It is the responsibility of school librarians to promote free access for students and not to aid in restricting their library materials,” reads the statement. It also notes that labeling by level can compromise student privacy and First Amendment rights as well as negatively affect browsing and motivational reading.
An ALA document clarifying the Library Bill of Rights states “While some parents and teachers may find housing books by grade or reading levels helpful in guiding developing young readers, a library should not use such labels as a classification system, or to promote any restrictive or prejudicial practice.”
Public librarians have also reported requests from parents and teachers to adapt their collections to match classroom reading systems. (*10) Amy Martin, a children’s librarian at Oakland (CA) Public Library, notes a scenario in which “a teacher brings [in] a class of 25 students, tells me a number or letter range for each one, and asks me to help each find one book at their level...in the space of a 30-minute class visit,” she says. “This would not be difficult in a leveled collection….But in a public library, where books are categorized by type (picture book, easy reader, etc.), it’s extremely difficult.”
WHAT’S A LIBRARIAN TO DO?
Martin focuses on creating a teachable moment—even for teachers—and doing her best to have her patrons leave satisfied. “When a parent or teacher asks me for books at a certain level, I start by explaining a little about how the public library organizes books and say something along the lines of ‘Your school library may organize books by reading level; at this library, we organize them by book type,’ and then give them a quick tour of the collection,” she says. “I ask what kind of books they like, what other books they’ve read lately, and show them a couple samples and ask if they look too hard/too easy/just right. I get them to focus on one or two books, and then say, ‘OK, let’s see what level those are.’ ”
Haling says that it comes down to investing time in helping kids develop skills to select books independently. “We should trust kids when it comes to selecting their own books,” she says. “They do have opinions and preferences, even if they’re in first grade. They are capable of learning to match themselves to ‘just right’ books—without the teacher directing them to a labeled bin.”
The key is more choice, not less, Carter believes. “Let them take out a lot of books so that somewhere in that pile they find something that satisfies them,” she says. “But we have to keep that process going….When they come into the library the next time, talk about their choices: what worked; what didn’t. They have to learn their own processes for selecting books, and if we keep narrowing the choices by artificial constraints, we aren’t giving them that chance.”
(*11) Pat Scales, past president of the Association for Library Service to Children (ALSC) and author of SLJ’s “Scales on Censorship” column, denounced labeling library books by reading level in a March 2015 interview on the ALSC Blog. She advises public librarians to communicate with their school counterparts about reading lists, selection, and student privacy issues.
It’s essential, Ripp adds, that librarians and educators step up as advocates for the freedom to read—even if that choice extends below or above a student’s reading level. “If a child wants to check out a book, let them . . . Students are telling us in droves they don’t like to read anymore because of these rules. So as school communities, we need to start listening to the students and let them read the books they want to read.”
List of quote sources:
(*1) Betty Carter:
• professor emerita of children’s and young adult literature at Texas Woman’s University
(*2) Lexile
(*4) Pernille Ripp:
• creator of the Global Read Aloud
• author of Passionate Learners: How to Engage and Empower Your Students
(*5) Donalyn Miller:
• author of Reading in the Wild: The Book Whisperer’s Keys to Cultivating Lifelong Reading Habits
(*6) Linda Wedlock Haling:
• assistant professor at the Center for Reading and Literacy at the College of Education at Illinois State University
• coauthor with Jessica Ann Wutz of Bookmatch: How to Scaffold Student Book Selection for Independent Reading
(*7) Eric Neuman:
• school librarian in New York City
(*8) Jacqueline Miller of Darien, CT:
• mother of an 8 year old - personal testimony
(*9) Michael Bento
• school librarian in Burien, WA
(*10) Amy Martin:
• children’s librarian at Oakland (CA) Public Library
(*11) Pat Scales:
• past president of the Association for Library Service to Children (ALSC)
original article: by Kiera Parrott
Aug 28, 2017 | Filed in News & Features
https://www.slj.com/?detailStory=thinking-outside-the-bin-why-labeling-books-by-reading-level-disempowers-young-readers
edited: by Soutenus
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