Finding Word Counts and RenLearn/Accelerated Reader Website

MsJudy

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The Dolch word list is based on studies that count the frequency of words used. The list is the several hundred most-commonly used words in written English. And yep, many of them end up being the phonetically irregular words like Who and The.

So to answer the question: Early readers and Chapter books should use three kinds of words:
1) Words that are very easy to sound out. Phonetically regular words like cat, dog, popcorn, fishstick.
2) The Dolch words--first graders are expected to learn the first 100, or some variation of them
3) Key vocabulary words that may be more challenging but that kids can figure out easily from the context of the story. A few of these are fine, especially if they are nouns, because those are easy to include in the illustrations.

You don't have to think too hard about using the Dolch list, though. It's almost impossible to write an English sentence WITHOUT using them!
 

sissybaby

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ages and stages

I'm finding the comments in this thread very helpful, not just from a writer's stand, but also from a mother's.

I keep hearing that the MC's in a children's book should be at least a couple of years older than the target area. However, in reading some of the more popular children's books, like the Ramona series and the Captain Underpants series - which, to me, is just a bit on the odd side - it seems like the MC's are the same age as the target area. I know one of the third grade teachers at our school reads the third grade Ramona book aloud to her class. I think she also reads the Marvin Redpost books.

So would I write a book aimed at first graders from a first grade MC's perspective, or would the MC need to be a bit older?

Maybe I misunderstood the comments I've heard and read, and this only applies to the older set?

Any clarification would be helpful.

And one final question. Is gross still a fairly entertaining concept for kids in this 1st - 2nd grade level? I know it is in reality, but I'm not sure in the book category.
 

Trish

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Hi, Sissy. It can get so confusing. I go to quite a large library as well as a small one. In the school holidays the children sit and read whilst their parents shop. I sometimes sit there and listen to them talking about their books. The most popular ones for seven to nine seem to be the ones like Ramona by Beverly Cleary. Our library has many copies of all her books. The other popular one at the moment seems to be Matilda by Roald Dahl and all his books.

Some of the kids reading these books are boys. I couldn't believe it. They were actually fighting over stories with the MC being a girl. The other popular ones are Go Girl and some boy books about disgusting things that kids do.

Then there was ones that were reading the dragons and magic books. I sat there for an hour one day and read my book whilst I listened to them. Very educational.

I have been worried that my chapter books were getting too long, but there are many books much longer that mine. I'm happy about that because I don't seem to be able to write a chapter book much shorter than 13,000 words, no matter how much I tighten it up.

Back to your question, Sissy. I think you should just write whatever age group you want your MC to be. If the story is a good one, kids will read it. That's just my opinion, but some people will probably disagree.
 

MsJudy

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I agree with Trish. The character needs to be the age the character needs to be! And I don't think the younger kids care at all, as long as the character is funny. It's only the older kids who don't want to read about a younger kid, but there are definitely exceptions. Ender Wiggins (Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card) acts much, much older than his years. The book starts when he's six and ends when he's twelve, but I can't see many kids younger than 10 or 11 understanding the book at all. It's for teens and up. Junie B. Jones starts as a kindergartner, but the kids who read about her are mostly second and third graders. Part of the appeal, I think, is that they're old enough to know better but she isn't. They can laugh at her from their superior position of maturity.... And if a book doesn't have a realistic, contemporary or school setting, you don't even need to know for sure how old a character is.

Personally, I think it's the influence of the marketing people trying to predict demographics. If the story is engaging, it will find its audience. Kids are more flexible than we sometimes give them credit for.
 

guitarmom

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Book Word Count

I have a 7 year old son reading at a third grade level. He has a fear of reading longer books because he is afraid he wont remember the story. Is there a way to find a list of books available by word count? I know how to find a word count while looking at Renlearn, but wondering if there is a way to find books by word count. Thank you
 

AmyRB

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I realize this is an old thread, but since it is stickied, I wanted to add one resource for anyone who does want to check the readability of certain words. I write passages for reading assessments and I do have to make sure none of the words are over the grade level of the assignment unless it's a vobulary word. I use the EDL Core Vocabularies book. ISBN is 1-55855-811-X. I had to order it through the bookstore, but it's very handy. It's also, unfortunately, somewhat outdated, so there are words it'll list as one level that I know my students were comfortable with at a younger age, or words listed for younger ages that aren't in use as much anymore. Still-- it's a nice starting point if you are really uncertain about a word. There's an alphabetical section and there's a section by grade. It doesn't cover very esoteric words, but most of the words I've ever looked up have been in there.

One project I work for now uses The Children's Writer's Book of Words, but I have been unable to find a copy of myself and that book only goes through Grade 6. The EDL is PreK -13th. Either might be a useful resource for anyone writing early chapter books, in particular. Just thought I'd toss that out there, since I had never heard of either of these books until I started working for the assessment world.

Amy
 

MsJudy

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Thanks, AmyB. Welcome to AW and the kids' lit community!
 

TerpNsign

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Thrilled to see the discussion on the word count. I have written a children's book (with a series in mind). I imagined it to be a early chapter book but it seemed to be kind of long to me. However, the word count is just over 8,000.. so I'm on target. I am so thankful for absolute write and all of the talented contributors and those like me that are new to this who ask questions that I never thought to ask!
 

Plains Pen

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I finished a middle grade adventure. It's polished and I'm getting ready to query. Then someone pointed out the word count is unusually low. I'm at 22,000 for an upper middle grade.

I feel like the story is complete, though of course, I could always create some new subplots. My question is whether those of you out there with experience would hold on querying and buff the book up to the 30's, or go ahead and query if the project felt complete?
 

DanielaTorre

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I finished a middle grade adventure. It's polished and I'm getting ready to query. Then someone pointed out the word count is unusually low. I'm at 22,000 for an upper middle grade.

I feel like the story is complete, though of course, I could always create some new subplots. My question is whether those of you out there with experience would hold on querying and buff the book up to the 30's, or go ahead and query if the project felt complete?

Maybe you can post an excerpt on the Children's SYW when you reach 50 posts. You'll get an idea on depth, sentence variation, etc. You can also do with a beta reader if you want. A fresh pair of eyes can be very helpful. Right now the word count for MG is around 35-40K and Upper Middle Grade a bit more. But yeah, 22K seems unusually low. Maybe a little world building will do you good. :)
 

Smish

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Are you sure it's upper-MG? If you just call it MG, 22,000 is still a little low, but not as unusually so. It is certainly well below the norm for upper-MG, though. That doesn't necessarily mean the story isn't complete, but I suspect you could beef it up a bit and not only make the story longer, but better.
 

MsJudy

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Yeah, I would vote for making it longer. It isn't just about what agents and editors are looking for these days--though that matters a lot, of course, and upper MG needs to be over 35K. But the real issue is having a satisfying reading experience. If we really lover your characters and your world, we don't want to leave them behind too quickly. 22K just isn't enough time to really lose ourselves in that place. Give us more!

On a separate note...

48 of the 50 US states (everyone but Texas and Alaska) are transitioning to using the same set of academic standards for language arts and math K-12. One of the things that will become part of the common language is the Lexile system of leveling books. So writers who are interested in knowing what reading level their MS is at should start to get familiar with that system.

http://www.lexile.com/
 

Chris P

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Wow, AW is so big and amazing I just can't stand it most of the time! This is a great thread.

I really appreciate the discussion of word count. Some of you might remember the Duke and Eddie stories I wrote for the monthly writing prompts a couple years ago. Long story short, all together they come to just under 12K words, and I'm glad to see that word counts for that age range (early chapter book, 7 to 10 year olds) are about right. I thought I was going to have to come up with 30K words to have a queryable book! Better get those letters drafted. . . :)