The Pet Detective faces a special challenge when Kara’s pet tortoise, Rocket, goes missing. Has the tortoise been squashed on a motorway? Eaten by a hungry goat? Chewed up by a dog? The Pet Detective follows the clues to find out what’s happened.


* Purple/ Band 8 books offer developing readers literary language, with some challenging vocabulary.

What different objects can children use during play? Find out in this photographic non-fiction book.


* Pink/1A – A simple non-fiction book.


* Text type: Non-fiction.

Some boys are playing with a ball when a dog comes along and steals the ball from them. They don’t have another ball to play with. Then they come up with the idea of making their own balls with plastic bags. They get bags from their home and from the local spaza shop. They make several balls, so when the dog comes along again and tries to steal their ball, they are not worried because they have other balls to play with.

Space workers is about the people who have lived and worked in space and who still do. The reader will find many fun and interesting facts about space travel from its earliest days to modern times. Read about astronauts’ lives in space on space stations or while travelling in spacecraft. Meet some of the famous men and women who’ve travelled in space and find out about useful products that were first made for astronauts, and are now used by everyone.

This fascinating book gives an introduction to some of the oldest, boldest and coldest sculptures ever made! From the sphinx and the Statue of Liberty, to works by Henry Moore, Rachel White read and Meret Oppenheimer, the sculptures are revealed in stunning photographs, alongside interesting and informative facts.

The Dancing Dog can do lots of dances – but can he do all of them? Follow the Dancing Dog as he dances his way through a selection of dance styles, and shows that he doesn’t always get the moves right. Beautifully illustrated by Pat Murray, this poem was written by ten-year-old Collins Big Cat Competition winner Jasmin Glynne.

This story with a familiar setting is about Lenny’s family who go to the local park to fly his new kite. Lenny takes great care to hold on to his kite, but then Mum has a turn. She holds on tightly too, but trips over the dog, and falls into the pond. The other children try to help, so they all arrive home soaking wet and muddy!


* Yellow/Band 3 books offer varied sentence structure and natural language.


* Text Type – A story with a familiar setting.

A non-fiction, photographic picture book about the different parts of an oak tree and the creatures that live in its roots, trunk, bark, branches and leaves. The photographs and life-like illustrations answer the repeated question: ‘Who lives…?’


* Red B/Band 2B books offer simple but varied text with familiar objects and actions, combined with simple story development and a satisfying conclusion.


* Text type – A simple non-chronological report.

Build your child’s reading confidence at home with books at the right level
What’s it like to compete in the world’s largest sporting event? Find out all about the Olympic Games, when they began and how they have changed over time. Read about the different events and some of the amazing stories of how athletes have won their medals in this fascinating information book.


* Topaz/ Band 13 books offer longer and more demanding reads for children to investigate and evaluate.

Build your child’s reading confidence at home with books at the right level
Where can you see rockets blast into space? Which is the driest place on Earth? Which is the world’s highest mountain? Find out the answers and many more facts in this amazing book about the planet we live on.


* Sapphire/Band 16 books offer longer reads to develop children’s sustained engagement with texts and are more complex syntactically.


* A world map with all the places mentioned in the text highlighted on pages 54 and 55 helps children to recap the different places they’ve learnt about and where they all are in the world.


* Text type: An information book.


* The book is paired with The Golden Turlte and Other Tales, a selection of short stories from other cultures.


* Curriculum links: Geography: Passport to the world.

What things are thick? What things are thin? Find out in this non-fiction book.

This book gives situations in which a person needs to match the amount of one set of objects with the amount of another set of objects. For example, on the first page, a child has two shoes, but only one sock. The next page shows how each person solves the problem.

Build your child’s reading confidence at home with books at the right level
‘What Happened to the Dinosaurs’ investigates why these huge creatures disappeared. The important question, ‘How do we know they existed?’ is answered with a clear timeline of images. Various theories are suggested, which support knowledge and understanding of climate change, volcanoes, asteroids and evolution of the animals which did survive.


*Topaz/Band 13 books offer longer and more demanding reads for children to investigate and evaluate.

Mole sets out to see the wind. He asks every animal he meets if they see the wind and they all say no. The illustrations tell a different story: windswept trees, blowing leaves and litter show that the wind is actually blowing, though invisible to them.


* Red B level/ Band 2B texts offer emergent readers simple but varied text with familiar objects and actions, combined with simple story development and a satisfying conclusion.


* Text type – A story with predictable structure and patterned language.

Ziyanda dreams about escaping from her noisy home. She thinks it would be nice to fly away. Lying on the couch, she dreams and imagines how she could do this. She designs and draws a flying machine and then flies up into the sky.