A guest blog from Timothy Shanahan, Ph. D., University of Illinois at Chicago

In my new book, Leveled Reading, Leveled Lives, I challenge the widely adopted practice of teaching reading at students’ so-called “reading levels.” Much of the argument has to do with the effectiveness of the practice in terms of improving reading ability – the studies say it doesn’t help, and with issues of assessment (can we accurately and reliably identify kids’ reading levels?), readability and text leveling (the same question with regard to the books), and small group homogeneous instruction (is it so effective that it outweighs the reduction in instruction that usually ensues?).

However, when I get complaints from teachers about my conclusions in this matter, their focus is less on the pedagogical effectiveness than whether I’m undermining motivation and love of reading. They take that “frustration level” label literally – fearing that placing kids in such texts will be, well, frustrating. They believe that kids taught with books they cannot already read reasonably well will act out in class and become discipline problems and undermine their attitudes towards reading. I get letters from these teachers wondering how I could be so mean.

To be fair, their concerns seem justified by some studies. For instance, middle school students say that when texts are difficult, their interest declines (Wade, 2001). Correlations among reading comprehension and affective variables like motivation tend to be significant and positive. Some studies report more off task behavior with frustration level texts, though usually with no detriment to learning Durik & Matarazzo, 2009). When reading these studies, it’s hard to remember that the instructional level idea is for guided or directed reading – not independent work.

But just as there are studies suggesting a link between text level and motivation, other evidence is contrary. For example, a study conducted by Linda Gambrell and her colleagues, found through observations that the students placed in frustration level texts were more likely to be off task and to present behavior problems (Gambrell, Wilson, & Gantt, 1981). That part of the study is often cited. However, the researchers did something interesting that is usually ignored. They shifted these students into instructional level texts to generate the desired behavioral improvements. To their surprise, the new text placements had no impact on behavior. Lower-performing students were most likely to be placed in challenging texts and to exhibit discipline problems, but those were not causally related. Another study concluded that teachers often failed to distinguish low reading ability from behavioral problems (Learned, 2016). Low readers were thought to pose disciplinary challenges for teachers whether there was misbehavior or not. This researcher concluded that the students’ overly easy text and task placements were causing students’ low enthusiasm and misbehavior rather than reducing it. Boy, talk about seeing a problem in a different light.

I think what teachers may miss is that engagement is more than a text level phenomenon. Researchers have come to see affective variables as being more situational or event-driven than generalized or person-centered (Hidi & Renninger, 2006). Text difficulty may exert an effect, but so does text content, the novelty of the lesson, and other instructional variables, and these interact – dominating in some cases and compensating in others. Students may be negatively influenced by text difficulty in one instance (e.g., generating feelings of incompetence), and positively influenced by it in another (e.g., feelings of challenge and worthwhile accomplishment).

Let’s face it. Motivation is complicated. Students in a reading lesson may be driven by a desire to please parents, to identify with a teacher, to connect with peers, to seek competence, or to pursue interesting information from a text. These desires not only may reinforce or cancel each other out, but they may stimulate complex responses. Difficulty can lead to both withdrawal and intensification of effort. Motivation can vary minute to minute – students who are motivated early in a text may be less engaged by the end.

One problem with instructional level theory is that it treats motivation simplistically. It assumes that difficulty alone matters and that if instruction is arranged so that students will find texts easy, then they will want to read and want to learn to read. Students may want to avoid difficulty, but they also prefer to work with text better aligned with their maturity levels (Lupo, Tortorelli, Invernizzi, Ryoo, & Strong, 2019). Assigning a fourth grader to a second-grade book is more likely to discourage than support positive motivation. The embarrassment inherent in low group assignment has disheartened more than a few children. A steady diet of such instruction may do more to discourage personal reading than would working with grade level texts. Sadly, in far too many classrooms, students are not even allowed to try to read books on their own if they are not at “just the right” level (Glasswell & Ford, 2011; Hoffman, 2017), enforcing a sense that you are low reader and there is nothing you can do to overcome the limits that imposes.

Another serious motivational problem inherent in the instructional level is that the reading improvement that it fosters is so gradual as to be imperceptible to most readers. Because the distance between text level and student level are so small, any gains that are made are necessarily tiny. This may be why so many students express dissatisfaction with their reading instruction. Unlike in other subjects, it is difficult to recognize improvement.

Instead of avoiding challenge, I think it better to introduce it intentionally, placing students in books that they cannot already read well. Rather than reducing the demands of the curriculum, teachers should offer pedagogical and emotional supports toward mitigating the difficulty and encouraging persistence in its face. Let students know what you are up to and scaffold their success as well as their awareness of improvement. Be positive and encouraging and focus these lessons on texts worth reading. Finally, don’t overdo it. Not every text need be especially demanding.

To learn more about these issues and more, check out  Leveled Readers, Leveled Lives by Timothy Shanahan.

References

Durik, A. M., & Matarazzo, K. L. (2009). Revved up or turned off? How domain knowledge changes the relationship between perceived task complexity and task interest. Learning and Individual Differences, 19(1), 155-159. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.lindif.2008.08.005

Gambrell, L. B., Wilson, R. M., & Gantt, W. N. (1981). Classroom observations of task-attending behaviors of good and poor readers. Journal of Educational Research, 74(6), 400–404.       

https://doi.org/10.1080/00220671.1981.10885339

Glasswell, K., & Ford, M. (2011). Let’s start leveling about leveling. Language Arts, 88(3), 208-216.

Hidi, S., & Renninger, K. A. (2006). The four-phase model of interest development. Educational Psychologist, 41(2), 111-127. https://doi.org/10.1207/s15326985ep4102_4

Hoffman, J. V. (2017). What if “just right” is just wrong? The unintended consequences of leveling readers. The Reading Teacher 71(3), 265-273. https://doi.org/10.1002/trtr.1611

Learned, J. E. (2016). ‘The behavior kids’: Examining the conflation of youth reading difficulty and behavior problem positioning among school institutional contexts. American Educational Research Journal, 53(5), 1271-1309.

Lupo, S. M., Tortorelli, L., Invernizzi, M., Ryoo, J. H., & Strong, J. Z. (2019). An exploration of text difficulty and knowledge support on adolescents’ comprehension. Reading Research Quarterly 54(4), 457-479. https://doi.org/10.1002/rrq.247

Shanahan, T. (2025). Leveled Reading, Leveled Lives. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Education Press.

Wade. S. E. (2001). Research on importance and interest: Implications for curriculum development and future research. Educational Psychology Review 13(3), 243–261.