There's no date for it. A child is ready to move off fully decodable readers when they read decodables accurately and fairly fluently across most of the code you've taught, and when they work through an unfamiliar or long word instead of guessing it from the first letter or the picture. Children get there at different times, so expect to move them on at different times too. Even then, the decodables stay in the book bag for a few weeks after the first chapter book comes home.
What makes a book decodable for your class, and why that's different from a level, is covered in Decodable or levelled readers: which book does which job. This piece picks up where that one stops.
Why there's no set date
The guidance ties the move to what the child can do. The NSW Department of Education calls decodables "a short-term strategy for that very specific purpose of practicing letter sounds", and says "once that is within a student's control, then we can be moving them on to reading a wide variety of different texts". It gives no timeframe. Five from Five says "The pace at which students work through decodable books will vary". It adds that children at risk of reading difficulties benefit from extra practice with simple texts until they reach automaticity and fluency.
The curriculum points the same way. Version 9 asks Foundation and Year 1 students to "read decodable and authentic texts", which means both kinds of book. The Year 2 reading descriptor doesn't mention decodables at all. It asks students to read "with phrasing and fluency" and to monitor meaning "by re-reading and self-correcting".
"We've finished the series" doesn't work as a signal either. Some phonics programmes come with a long series of their own readers and others come with none, so the box in the corner can't tell you anything. Watch the child read, and measure what you hear against your school's sequence.
Four signs a child is ready
SPELD NSW sets the bar at "accurate and automatic word reading with the basic AND the extended code", along with some comprehension and fluency. In the classroom, that looks like this:
- Decodables feel easy across most of what you've taught, older sounds as well as this week's. The child reads last month's books smoothly and with some expression, and slows down only at the newest patterns.
- Their eyes go to the word first. When they hit a word they don't know, they look at the letters and start sounding out. They don't look at the picture, and they don't look at you.
- They break long words up. They find the vowels (every syllable has a vowel sound) and try a chunk. If what comes out isn't a word, they try the vowel another way, and they spot endings like
-ingand-ed. These are the strategies Devin Kearns points to in his syllable research, as summarised by DyslexiaHelp at the University of Michigan. In Kearns' data, two-syllable words with one consonant between two vowels, like tulip and camel, followed the commonly taught rule of a long first vowel only about 47% of the time. - They can tell you what happened. Accurate reading that leaves no meaning behind doesn't count as ready yet.
Then check with a book. Tami Reis-Frankfort, writing for a UK decodable publisher, puts it plainly: "The only way to know is to observe the child's reading of an age-appropriate authentic text." And: "If the child can work out new words, make few errors and comprehend the text, they are ready to fly."
Choose a short uncontrolled book the child would actually want to read. Listen to a page or two and count the errors. At about 95% accuracy or better, try the book with you beside them. Below that, the book has come too early. The levelled readers piece explains the bands: about 95 to 97% for teaching something new, and 98% and up for fluency practice.
Signs the move came too early
The clearest sign is guessing. The child gives the first sound, then says a word that fits the picture, such as "horse" for "house". Queensland's Department of Education warns about predictable and levelled books: "The use of predictable or levelled texts promotes guessing based on content and pictures rather than application of decoding skills." An uncontrolled book can do the same to a child whose code isn't secure yet. They meet too many words they can't decode, and the picture is the nearest help.
Other signs are skipped words, so many errors that the meaning falls apart, and a child who suddenly wants to do anything but read. When that happens, the book is usually the problem.
The fix doesn't need any drama. Go back to decodables for a few more weeks, then try again. Phonics lessons carry on either way.
One thing isn't a warning sign: a dip. SPELD NSW says that as children come off decodables, "you might observe a 'dip' in fluency for some students. This is to be expected." Their condition is "As long as the student is not reverting to inefficient strategies like guessing". A child who reads more slowly but is still sounding out is fine. A child who reads fast and makes words up is not.
The first fortnight, both books in the bag
SPELD NSW describes a child from mid-Year One "reading two types of books": "One for consolidation and practice (the decodable) and one for application (a non-decodable)." Plan the first fortnight around that.
| The decodable | The new book | |
|---|---|---|
| Its job | Practise the newest code, re-read for fluency | Use everything they know on words nobody controlled |
| Who's there | Alone or with a partner | An adult listening, at least at first |
| When it's hard | Drop back a book | Help at the word and keep going |
Keep the decodable half going. Five from Five's advice is that students read "several decodable texts each week" whenever possible.
Choosing the first books
SPELD's advice: "Selecting these books should focus on topic and interest." Look for short chapters, clear print, and pictures that sit beside the text instead of carrying it. Avoid patterned, repetitive books for this job. A seven- or eight-year-old who finds decodables babyish will usually do better with a short book written for their age, with less text on each page, than with a picture book.
At a spelling they haven't been taught
This will happen on most pages. Let the child sound the word out with the code they have. If it comes out close but wrong, ask "Is that a word you know?" and let them fix it. SPELD NSW says to "encourage students to listen to what they are reading and adjust their pronunciation, self-correct or clarify." There's research behind this move. Dyson, Best, Solity and Hulme (2017) taught five- to seven-year-olds to correct mispronounced spoken words, along with what the words meant, and the gains carried over to a similar set of words they hadn't been taught. If the child still can't get it, tell them the word, point to the part that did something new, and keep the story moving.
Telling them every word would be quicker, but it costs them something. David Share's self-teaching hypothesis holds that children learn the spellings of new words by sounding them out themselves. A 2022 review of the experiments found that sounding out consistently supports that learning, and that when children sound out less, they learn less. A guess, or a word handed over, skips that step.
Keep re-reading
Re-reading carries on with the new books. SPELD's list for this stage is "lots of repeated reading, clarifying vocabulary and engaging in summarising and discussing the text." The fluency research points to three or four reads of the same text, with an adult correcting along the way. That routine is laid out in the slow-reader article, and familiar decodables work well for it.
Before the long holidays
Kim and Quinn's meta-analysis of 41 summer reading programmes, run in classrooms and at home from kindergarten to Grade 8, found a modest lift in reading overall (d = .10). Children from low-income families gained more. The authors describe how some home programmes added support: a lesson from the teacher just before the break, books matched to each child's independent reading level, and parents brought in. They call for more of that link between school and home.
What to put in the holiday pack:
- Still on decodables: familiar decodables to re-read, plus a couple of new ones just inside the code they know.
- In the overlap: familiar decodables, plus two or three first uncontrolled books they've already read with you at school, so reading at home stays easy.
- Everyone: a story read aloud to them every day.
- A one-line note for the adult: "Listen to them read. If a word comes out wrong, point to it and let them have another go before you help."
What to pass on to next year's teacher
A level number tells the next teacher very little. A few lines per child tell them much more:
- Where the child is secure in your sequence, and the two or three graphemes still wobbling.
- Which books they read: decodables only, both, or uncontrolled books only.
- Accuracy and pace on a familiar text and on an unfamiliar one, with a word about expression.
- What they do at a word they don't know: sound it out, or guess.
If your Year 1s have sat a Phonics Check, you already have their item-level results. Read those by sound before you write the note. A pass doesn't mean the child reads fluently, though. The check marks each word right or wrong and doesn't record how long it took, so put fluency notes beside the score.
Keeping the decodable half of the bag stocked
For a child in the overlap, the decodable needs to sit right at the edge of the code they know. Phonicspal's Stories creates decodable stories from the sounds your class has been taught so far. For a strong reader, it can stretch a story with harder words built from the same sounds.
Decodable-text guidance above is published by the NSW Department of Education, the Queensland Department of Education, SPELD NSW and Five from Five, and the curriculum wording by ACARA. Each quote links to the page it comes from.
