Reading is an essential life skill that sets students up to be lifelong learners. Not only can we learn to read, but we can read to learn for the rest of our lives. Reading is a graded subject in the Abeka curriculum. The majority of the grade comes from the student’s oral ability to read. 

Video Manual Resources

Your video manual provides ample information and helpful resources on oral reading.

Subject Descriptions and Grading

Flip to the subject descriptions and grading area at the beginning of your video manual. There is a specific section titled, “Oral Reading Grades.” Several lessons include sample grades, which benefit you and serve as a benchmark to measure your child’s progress. 

Children should read at least a medium-sized paragraph of new material daily. If your kids had reading homework the night before, they can not be graded on this content. Children need to be graded on fresh, new material that they have not previously read. This concept is referred to as cold reading.

Grade on days where lessons contain ample new reading material. The video manual provides reading qualities that you will want to look for to evaluate your child’s reading, including accuracy, annunciation, smoothness, etc. 

There is a chart that lists the criteria necessary for a child to receive an A, B, C, or D on their oral reading. Students who score a C on oral reading demonstrate average ability and need to improve on several specific reading qualities. 

Take caution to grade your child accurately and not score them too high. This gives your child the opportunity to improve throughout the year. 

Daily Guides

One grade needs to be taken for oral reading each week over new material. This reminder is embedded in lessons that end in eight and three, which would fall on a Wednesday if you are on a Monday to Friday schedule. However, you have the freedom to grade any day of the week or a different reading assignment. 

The first lesson in your video manual that calls for graded oral reading has corresponding videos of children reading and the grades they received. You can follow along in your student’s book, listen to the students read on the video, see the grade that they received, and have a good baseline for grading your child.

Appendixes

Flip to the appendixes at the back of your video manual and find the section titled “Home Teacher Materials.” In the reading section, you are reminded that the reading grade is based on the samples of your child’s oral reading. You need to submit this to Abeka for our instructors to grade. 

Even though the video manual will prompt you to grade reading weekly, only a few of those weekly grades are averaged together to develop your child’s average for the grading period in the accredited program. The video manual will instruct you on which readings need to be submitted to Abeka Academy. 

Submitting Oral Reading

Oral Reading Graded by Abeka

In the appendixes of your video manual, flip to the first grading period progress report, “Oral Reading Graded by Abeka Academy.” As a homeschool teacher, it walks you through the process step by step. 

The oral reading grade is based on the reading submitted to Abeka Academy. You can call our number, listed in the video manual, and have your child read the lessons listed here. 

There are separate lessons that you can grade, which are not submitted to Abeka. This serves as a starting point and practice for your child. The first recorded grade that counts toward the official average reading grade is a separate lesson after the initial lesson you grade. 

The specific page numbers that your child needs to read from are listed. There is a range of pages for students to read from, but they only need to read for a few minutes for Abeka’s grading purposes. 

Call-in Your Reading

When you call in to Abeka, provide your account number, your child’s student ID, and the lesson number that you are calling in that reading for. Then, let your child read through the phone. A chime will sound when your child needs to start reading and when he or she is finished.

There is no one on the other end of the line to alleviate pressure. Your call is being recorded for Abeka’s reading team to evaluate later. 

You do not have to let your children know that the grade is being recorded if this makes them anxious. Some children need to know in order to do their best. Decide what is best for your child. 

If you are unable to call the phone number to record the reading, there is an option to email a recording to the email address listed on the progress report. The process is expedited when you call into the reading line. 

On the progress report, check off that you called the readings in. Additionally, there is an oral reading graded by the homeschool teacher that is recorded on the progress report. At the end of the grading period, Abeka’s accredited program will average all three scores and issue an official report card at the end of the grading period.