reading skills by grade level

Reading Skills by Grade Level and What Parents Can Do to Support Their Kids

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Some people think that reading is a straightforward process. In reality, it’s a complex one. According to the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), 34 percent of students in the fourth grade and about 27 percent of students in eighth grade are below basic reading level.

There are various reading skills by grade level that parents should be aware of to align their expectations.

That’s why today, we’ll talk about the progression of reading skills according to grade level and what parents and guardians can do to support their children. We’ll also introduce you to the experts-recommended Brain Retrain Program that can help your child significantly improve their learning and reading skills.

Reading Skills by Grade Level

Like many developmental milestones, children will vary in what age they start to learn and master reading. However, they are generally expected to achieve different reading skills at certain levels. Below are critical pieces of information you need to learn about.

Kindergartners (Age 5 Years)

Age five is a critical year for supporting a child’s reading skills. At this age, kids begin to identify letters and match letters to sounds.

While five-year-olds still enjoy being read to, they may start telling their favorite story on their own and have identified that words in a book are read from left to right and top to bottom.

Below are the key developmental reading skills expected from kindergartners:

  • Identification of beginning, middle, and ending sounds in spoken words
  • Matching words they hear to what they see on the page
  • Sight-reading some words
  • Retelling a story through words or pictures
  • Reciting the alphabet
  • Making rhymes
  • Corresponding some or all letters to their correct sound
  • Echoing simple words that are read to them
  • Reading their name

Second Grade (Ages 6 to 7)

Kids at this age are expected to learn a range of reading skills, including phonics and comprehension, that help them read more confidently and fluently.

At this age, children usually start to increase their knowledge of complex words through phonics. Phonics focuses on building words from sounds and how to put them together to read words.

They will also continue to develop their word-reading skills and increase their fluency. Once they have learned all the sounds and letter combinations, kids will be able to read some unfamiliar words.

Other skills that children ages 6 to 7 learn are:

  • Blending and recognizing alternative sounds
  • Reading uncommon or tricky words
  • Reading words that use common suffixes like adding “ness” to the word “sad” to make “sadness” or “ment” to “enjoy” to make “enjoyment”
  • Reading most words quickly and accurately
  • Understanding books they have listened to
  • Talking about books and poems
  • Connecting what they are reading to their personal experiences or to other books they have listened to in the past
  • Going back and re-reading a word that they don’t understand (self-monitoring)

Third Grade (Ages 8 to 10 Years)

Year three is very important for a child’s reading and comprehension development because it’s when they learn to use reading in every aspect of learning.

At this stage, reading becomes integral to any subject, whether they are learning science or math. Teachers expect third graders to read lessons on their own and be ready to discuss them in class.

Students in the third grade are expected to have the following reading skills:

  • Determining unknown words in context
  • Communicating in written form
  • Reading with understanding and fluency
  • Using a larger sight vocabulary
  • Learning about prefixes, suffixes, and root words
  • Describing the setting, character, and plot of a story
  • Identifying and summarizing the events that happened in a story
  • Reading between the lines (inferences)
  • Understanding basic figures of speech like metaphors and similes
  • Reading for both learning and enjoyment
  • Identifying meanings of compounds words
  • Identifying the meaning or ideas of passages

Fourth Grade (Ages 9 to 10)

At this level, a child’s reading skills will leap forward. It’s a more challenging year as kids will be asked to read and comprehend more fiction and non-fiction books.

At this point, children should be able to read longer chapters and texts of varying genres. They will also likely use the internet to access and research information.

Below are the reading skills that fourth graders should be able to master:

  • Synthesizing information from two texts
  • Summarizing information
  • Interpreting information from charts, videos, images, timelines, and diagrams
  • Comparing and contrasting information read
  • Using advanced reading and comprehension strategies to understand texts
  • Understanding the basic parts of speech
  • Using punctuation like commas, apostrophes, and quotation marks
  • Writing descriptions and persuasive texts
  • Putting together compound words
  • Reading with enough accuracy to understand the material
what are the reading skills by grade level

Fifth Grade (Ages 10 to 11)

Under common standards, fifth graders will undergo a reading revolution as they are asked to read more complex texts, learn challenging vocabulary, and refine their research and analyzing skills.

At this level, children would have grown their decoding and fluency skills dramatically. Decoding is the ability to figure out words and decipher their sounds. Fluency is the ability to read quickly and accurately.

  • Fifth graders will also explore more fiction and non-fiction books without much help
  • Using direct quotes from texts to explain or prove ideas
  • Reading a variety of genres, including poetry and drama
  • Interpreting and understanding metaphors and comparisons in a text
  • Identifying the author’s or narrator’s point of view
  • Using context to determine the meaning of unknown words
  • Gathering information from multiple sources.

Sixth Grade (Ages 11 to 12)

In sixth grade, students are expected to read increasingly complex texts to prepare them for high school and college. At this level, there is more emphasis on non-fiction texts as students prepare to read, write and research across subjects. 

Furthermore, they are asked to read more complex texts and analyze them in deeper ways to strengthen their knowledge of all subjects.

Here are the reading skills that sixth graders will have come to master:

  • Reading and comparing different texts on the same topics
  • Using a variety of media and formats, including audio and video, to enhance their knowledge of the topic
  • Participating in class-wide discussions to express their learnings from reading a text
  • Practicing a variety of vocabulary skills
  • Determining the meaning of words
  • Recognizing the roots of words
  • Using digital and physical reference materials like dictionaries, glossaries, and thesauruses
  • Understanding figurative language in a text

Seventh Grade (Ages 12 to 13)

Seventh graders focus more on growing the skills they learned from sixth grade. Students are expected to read more complex and longer texts and essays and deepen their ability to develop ideas, analyze texts, and make inferences.

In seventh grade, students are likely to have the following skills:

  • Analyzing texts and using them as evidence to support analysis
  • Making inferences about texts
  • Understanding the message or ideas in a text
  • Understanding and summarizing the main idea of a text
  • Comparing and contrasting the different perspectives or points of view in a text
  • Comparing multiple texts written by different authors

Eighth Grade (Ages 13 to 14)

The eighth grade is a year of transition and massive reading skills progression whereby students push their analyses of texts. In this grade, students also tackle more demanding writing assignments, so their reading skills are focused more on narrative, expository, and descriptive texts.

The skills they would have mastered are:

  • Evaluating the evidence in texts
  • Determining the main idea or theme of a text
  • Understanding or summarizing specific dialogue and events that impact the characters in the story
  • Comparing and contrasting the different structures of texts
  • Analyzing the pros and cons of using different forms of text
  • Analyzing texts, including conflicting information on the same topic
  • Using evidence from the text to support analysis of the text
  • Identifying imagery and symbolism in the text
  • Understanding complex figures of speech like irony, sarcasm, satire, and understatement

Reading Words per Minute Grade Level

The chart below indicates the average words per minute by grade level:

GradeWords per Minute (WPM)
First Grade53 to 111
2nd Grade89 to 149 
3rd Grade107 to 162 
4rth Grade123 to 180
5th Grade139 to 194
6th to 8th Grade 150 to 204

Ways To Improve a Child’s Reading Skills

Reading comprehension can be a challenge for some kids. However, it’s important to remember that children learn in their own time and style.

A parent or a teacher could not expect all children of the same age to learn in the same way. Fortunately, for children struggling with reading comprehension, there are many ways that parents, guardians, and teachers can provide support.

Develop Phonological Awareness

Most children will pick up the broad phonological awareness skill by being exposed to books, songs, and rhymes. Additionally, kids can be taught phonics through specific instruction and practice. Activities like word games and nursery rhyme singing can greatly help too.

Build Fluency

The best way to build fluency is through practice reading books. However, parents and teachers should pick out books that are appropriate for the child’s reading level.

Other ways to enhance fluency are paired reading (reading aloud together), read-aloud activities, and echo reading. The use of audiobooks helps too.

Enhance Vocabulary

The more words a child is exposed to, the better is their vocabulary. Parents and guardians can help their kids build vocabulary by having frequent conversations on varying topics. Through this activity, parents can introduce new words and ideas.

Reading together is also important. When reading aloud, parents can stop at new words and introduce them to the child. Additionally, playing word games will make learning new words more fun and interesting.

Encourage Reasoning

Part of comprehension is being able to “read between the lines” or pull out the meaning of a word or phrase based on a given context. Reading, conversations, and other interactive activities can improve reasoning and background knowledge.

Asking open-ended questions can help a child make connections between what they learned from the past and the present topic.

Improve Working Memory and Attention

There are many ways parents can improve their child’s working memory. Word games are one of them. To help boost their attention, parents or guardians can look for reading materials that are interesting or motivating.

For example, some kids prefer graphic novels or particular topics like geography or science. Encouraging the child to stop and re-read when something isn’t clear ensures that they can understand what they are reading.

Other ways to improve reading comprehension in children are:

  • Re-read confusing parts. Ensuring that the child gets a complete picture of what he or she is learning is a very important skill.
  • Write down words that they find unfamiliar. Encouraging kids to look up these words in a dictionary will greatly boost their working memory and vocabulary.
  • Use different formats. Students learn in varying ways. They learn better when they see, hear, or write about things. Finding a format that works better for a struggling reader is important.

The Role of Reading Intervention Programs

Problems in reading can affect a child’s performance across all subjects. Fortunately, research shows that interventions for struggling readers can greatly help and promote significant gains over the long run.

Brain Retrain

One effective intervention program for reading and comprehension is Brain Retrain. This program is a comprehensive selection of synergistic and therapeutic programs designed for struggling learners, particularly those with autism and other brain or behavioral learning disorders.

The program works by teaching the brain to operate in an “automatic learning mode.” It involves natural, non-invasive retraining techniques focused on reading, comprehension, and literacy skills.

Brain Retrain is suitable for children of any age and can be done at home, with parents’ guidance.

Practice Makes Perfect

The best way to learn a new skill is through frequent practice. While children may be able to learn with little intervention, offering the right support is essential to their success in school.

Luckily, there are easy and effective ways to boost reading skills, particularly vocabulary, phonological awareness, reasoning, and attention. Most of these techniques need very few resources and a little more creativity.For struggling students, programs like Brain Retain can greatly help improve concentration and focus, which are crucial in learning.

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