What Are Decodable Readers? Books for Dyslexia Explained

Decodable readers are short books written so that almost every word can be sounded out using the letters and sounds a child has already been taught. A child with dyslexia who is still learning to decode should practise on decodable books matched to their lessons, and get richer stories by ear until their own reading catches up.

That is two kinds of reading with two different jobs, and this guide covers both. It sits within the wider plan on the dyslexia support page.

What are decodable readers?

Decodable readers, also called decodable books or decodable texts, are practice books for phonics. Each one uses only the letter and sound patterns taught so far, plus a small number of common words that have been taught by sight, such as “the” and “said”.

The books come in a series that follows a teaching order. The first few might use only words like “sat”, “pin” and “mud”. Later ones add “ship”, then “rain”, then longer words, as each new pattern is taught.

A book is decodable for a particular child, not in general. Speech pathologist Alison Clarke puts it this way: decodability describes how well a book matches its reader’s decoding skills. The same book can be a perfect fit for one child and a guessing exercise for another.

Why do decodable books matter for a child with dyslexia?

Dyslexia makes decoding hard, and decoding only improves with practice a child can get right. A decodable book gives a child a full page where the skill they have just been taught works on nearly every word.

The alternative is guessing. Give a child a book full of patterns they have not been taught and they will lean on the picture, the first letter or their memory of the story. Five from Five, an Australian literacy project, notes that this habit is a particular problem for weak and at risk readers. A child who guesses well can look like a reader for a year or two, until the pictures go.

The research on the books themselves is thinner than their popularity suggests. A 2022 University of Newcastle review found only 19 studies good enough to include out of 1,865 articles, with small effects and little difference between decodable and levelled books. Jennifer Buckingham of Five from Five disputed how that review compared its studies. What is not in dispute is the case for teaching phonics explicitly and in order, and decodable books are simply the practice that matches that teaching. How that teaching runs is on the reading help page.

How do you match a decodable book to the sounds your child has been taught?

Match the book to the lesson, not to your child’s age or school year. Four steps do it:

Ask what has been taught. Ask the teacher, tutor or speech pathologist which phonics sequence your child is following and which patterns they have reached. Ask for it in writing.
Find a series in the same order. Each series follows its own sequence, and most print the patterns a book covers on the back cover or inside the front. SPELD NSW publishes free Decodable Book Selectors that line up different series against each other.
Try one page. Your child should read about 95 words in 100 correctly alone (on a short page, about one slip in twenty words), or about 90 in 100 if you are sitting beside them to help. More errors than that and the book is ahead of the teaching.
Read it again. A second and third reading of the same book is where accuracy turns into speed. It is not a sign the book is too easy.

If your child sighs, slows down and starts looking at the picture before the word, go back a book. What to say when they stall on a word is in the guide to helping at home.

What is the difference between decodable readers and levelled readers?

Decodable readers are ordered by the phonics patterns in the words. Levelled readers are ordered by an overall difficulty score, and their early levels rely on repeated sentences and pictures.

Feature	Decodable readers	Levelled readers
How the words are chosen	From the letter and sound patterns taught so far	By sentence length, repetition and overall difficulty
How a child works out a new word	Sounds it out	Often from the picture, the pattern of the sentence or a guess
What the level or number tells you	Which patterns the book practises	A general difficulty band, which varies between publishers
Where each fits	While a child is learning to decode	Once a child can decode most words they meet

Labels are not reliable. The Newcastle review found that books sold under either name often contained features of both, so run the one page test whatever the cover says.

If school sends home a levelled reader your child cannot decode, do not make them struggle through it. Read it to them, or take turns and supply the words they have not been taught. Then ask the teacher for decodable books at the right point in the sequence.

Where can you find free decodable readers in Australia?

Free decodable books exist, and they are good enough to start with. SPELD SA, a not-for-profit, gives away 80 decodable readers in eight sets as printable files, written to follow the Sounds-Write sequence, with a further set that follows Jolly Phonics. Check which sequence your child is on before printing.

Ask the school and your public library as well. Many schools lend decodable sets, and a teacher would sooner lend the right book than hear that a child is guessing at home.

Are there decodable readers for older students?

Yes. Decodable readers for older students carry the same controlled patterns inside stories written for their age: adventure, mystery, graphic novel formats and non-fiction. A ten year old or a teenager should not be handed a book about a cat on a mat, and does not have to be.

SPELD NSW lists catch-up series written for ages 8 to 14 and a phonics library for teenagers and adults. The matching rule is the same at any age: the book follows the teaching.

When can a child move on from decodable readers?

A child can move on once they reliably sound out unfamiliar words on their own, without being prompted. That is the test Five from Five gives, and it is a test of skill, not of age or time. Some children get there quickly. Children with dyslexia usually need more practice at each step, and there is nothing gained by rushing it.

Decodable books are a stage. The aim is always ordinary books, chosen by the child.

What should a child with dyslexia read for pleasure?

A child with dyslexia should have stories well beyond their decoding level, delivered another way. Reading practice and the love of books do not have to come from the same book.

Being read to. Keep reading aloud for as long as your child will let you, including after they can read alone.
Audiobooks. A child with dyslexia can join the Vision Australia Library free, because dyslexia counts as a print disability, with a referrer from Vision Australia’s list certifying it. Devices and settings are in the guide to assistive technology.
Dyslexia friendly books. These are ordinary stories printed to be easier on the eye: larger type, more space between letters and lines, off-white paper, text aligned to the left and short chapters. Dyslexia Scotland’s guidance is that spacing matters more than typeface, and that special fonts show no consistent advantage (more in the guide to dyslexia fonts). The layout helps. It does not make an untaught word decodable.
Graphic novels and anything they choose. Interest carries a child through hard text better than any level does.
Books about dyslexia. A story with a character who has dyslexia can open a conversation a child will not start. The guide to talking to your child about dyslexia covers how to have it.