🇺🇸 📖 United States · 1st Grade
Find out in 12 minutes. Free.
This free 1st Grade reading test takes about 12 minutes. Your child reads four short stories and articles written for children, answering questions after each one. The texts adapt as they go, and you get an estimated reading level and reading age, plus their strengths across four reading skills, matched to Texas TEKS and the Common Core.
In 1st Grade, children read simple stories and facts on their own, sounding out new words, and answer questions about what happened and who was in it.
Finding facts and details the text states.
Curriculum: Common Core RL.1.1
Try at home: After reading together, ask your child “who, what, where, when?” questions and let them find the answer in the text.
Working out what words mean from the words around them.
Curriculum: Common Core RL.1.1
Try at home: When your child meets a new word, ask them to guess its meaning from the sentence before you look it up.
Working out what the writer suggests but does not say.
Curriculum: Common Core RL.1.1
Try at home: Ask “how do you think they feel?” and “how do you know?” as you read, so your child links clues in the text.
The main idea, the message and why the text was written.
Curriculum: Common Core RL.1.1
Try at home: At the end of a chapter or article, ask your child to sum it up in one sentence.
This is one of the texts at this level, with some of its questions. The check picks texts that suit your child as they go.
Story
Kai found a pink shell at the beach. He put it in his pocket.
Later, he wanted to show Gran, but the shell was gone! Kai looked in the sand. He looked in his bucket.
Then Gran laughed and pointed. The shell was stuck to the bottom of his wet shoe.
Where was the shell at the end?
Stuck to his shoe. It was stuck to the bottom of his wet shoe.
In the story, “pointed” means Gran…
showed where with her finger. Gran pointed to show Kai where the shell was.
Why did Gran laugh?
She saw the shell on Kai’s shoe. She laughed and pointed at the shell on his shoe.
Start the free 1st Grade check →
A reading age compares the texts a child can read and understand with what is typical at each age. This check estimates it from the hardest text your child read well. It is a guide, not a formal, standardised score.
Four skills: finding information in a text, working out word meanings, reading between the lines, and understanding the main idea and the writer’s purpose.
Yes. The test and the full report are free, and there is no sign-up to start.
Let them read on their own so the result shows what they can do now. Younger children can have the text read aloud, but then the result is a guide to listening comprehension rather than reading.
Read every day, talk about what you read, and ask questions that go beyond the words on the page, like “why do you think she did that?”. Our report suggests one thing to try for each skill.
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