Graded readers: a short history, and what makes a good one

A graded reader is a book written for language learners at a particular level. Its vocabulary, grammar and length are controlled so that a learner at that level can read it with ease. Many are retellings of famous novels; some are original stories. If you learned English at school, you may well have read one: a slim paperback of Sherlock Holmes or Treasure Island with a level number on the spine.

They’re one of the quiet successes of language teaching. This article covers how they work, where they came from, what separates a good one from a dull one, and why classic novels make some of the best stories to grade.

How grading works

A graded reader controls several things at once.

Vocabulary. Each level allows a set number of headwords, base words counted once with their forms. Oxford Bookworms, for example, runs from a Starter level of 250 headwords through six stages, with 400 headwords at Stage 1 and 2,500 at Stage 6.

Grammar. Low levels stick to the present and simple past. Perfect tenses, the passive, conditionals and reported speech arrive at higher levels.

Sentences. Short and single-claused at first, longer and more varied later.

Length. A low-level reader might be several thousand words long; higher levels get longer.

Support. Glossaries, notes and audio recordings help readers past the occasional difficulty.

Here’s what that looks like in practice. Robert Louis Stevenson introduced his old sailor, Billy Bones, in Treasure Island (1883) with a single, magnificent sentence:

I remember him as if it were yesterday, as he came plodding to the inn door, his sea-chest following behind him in a hand-barrow—a tall, strong, heavy, nut-brown man, his tarry pigtail falling over the shoulder of his soiled blue coat, his hands ragged and scarred, with black, broken nails, and the sabre cut across one cheek, a dirty, livid white.

Here’s the same moment at two levels, in versions we wrote for this article:

A2: I remember the day he came to our inn. He was a tall, strong old sailor in a dirty blue coat. He had a long white scar on one cheek. A man pushed his big sea chest behind him in a cart.

B1: I remember him as if it were yesterday. He walked slowly up to the inn door, and a man followed him with his sea chest in a small cart. He was tall, strong and brown from the sun, with a dirty blue coat, scarred hands and a white sword cut across one cheek.

The A2 version breaks one sentence of more than sixty words into four short ones, keeps only the details a reader needs to picture the man, and replaces rare words: plodding, hand-barrow, tarry, soiled, livid. The B1 version keeps Stevenson’s memorable opening clause and more of the description, and joins ideas with and and with. Neither is Stevenson. Both let a learner meet Billy Bones and want to know what’s in that sea chest.

A short history

Michael West in Bengal

The modern graded reader has a good claim to start with Michael West, an English educator who was posted to Bengal in 1912 and spent the next two decades there, much of it at the Teachers’ Training College in Dacca. His New Method Readers, published by Longmans, Green in 1926 and 1927, limited vocabulary stage by stage, printed new words in bold and deliberately brought them back again and again.

West also produced supplementary readers: stories retold using only the words a learner had met so far, beginning with Robinson Crusoe. He may not have been the first to simplify a story for learners, but he appears to have been the first to tie simplified stories systematically to vocabulary stages. That idea, a story you can read with the words you know, is still the heart of every graded reader.

Harold Palmer in Tokyo

At the same time, Harold Palmer was working on the same problems in Japan. He arrived in Tokyo in 1922 and the next year founded the Institute for Research in English Teaching, which he directed until 1936. Palmer worked extensively on which words learners should meet first, and is credited with coining the term headword. In 1934 he published The Grading and Simplifying of Literary Material.

A shared list

In 1934 and 1935, West, Palmer, Lawrence Faucett and the American psychologist Edward Thorndike met in New York and London to agree on a common vocabulary for learners of English. Their Interim Report on Vocabulary Selection for the Teaching of English as a Foreign Language appeared in 1936. West later revised it into A General Service List of English Words (1953), about 2,000 headwords that became an influential reference for simplified English.

A different road: Basic English

Around the same time, C. K. Ogden presented Basic English (1930): an 850-word core vocabulary meant to work as a complete, simplified language in its own right. It’s a useful contrast. Basic English tried to be a destination. Graded readers are steps toward the full language.

Simplified classics and modern series

Longmans went on publishing simplified classics in West’s line for decades, from Lorna Doone in 1948 to Stories from Shakespeare in 1966. Retelling great books for less experienced readers was older still: Charles and Mary Lamb’s Tales from Shakespeare (1807) retold the plays for young readers.

Today’s best-known English series include Oxford Bookworms, Penguin Readers and Cambridge English Readers. They differ in approach. In interviews with series editors, Claridge (2012, “Graded readers: How the publishers make the grade”) found that Cambridge English Readers commissions only original stories, while the other series she studied also adapt classics and other well-known books. She also found that level labels vary widely between publishers: the top level in one series was 3,800 headwords, in another 2,200. A “level 4” in one series is not a “level 4” in another.

Since 2004, the Extensive Reading Foundation has given an annual Language Learner Literature Award for new graded readers in English, a sign of how seriously the field takes good writing for learners.

What makes a good graded reader

Controlled language is the easy part. The hard part is keeping a story alive inside the limits. A good graded reader has:

A story worth finishing. Learners read graded readers to read a lot, and they only read a lot if they want to know what happens next.

Natural language, within the limits. Compare two A2 versions of the same opening:

Jim lives in an inn. The inn is by the sea. A man comes to the inn. The man is old. The man is a sailor. He has a scar.

Jim’s family has an inn by the sea. One cold morning, an old sailor comes to the door. He has a long white scar on his face, and he wants a room.

Both use simple words and grammar. The first is a list of facts. The second is the beginning of a story.

A level that holds. A good reader doesn’t suddenly spike in difficulty on page 40. Consistency is what lets you read without stopping.

The right length. Long enough to build momentum, short enough to finish. Finishing is part of the reward.

Respect for the reader. Adult learners are adults. Simple language doesn’t require a childish story.

Support where it’s needed. Audio, a note on a cultural detail, a gloss for a word the story can’t do without.

Adapted, abridged, original

Editions for learners come in a few forms:

• Abridged: shortened, mainly by cutting, with much of the original language kept. Suited to advanced learners.
• Adapted or retold: rewritten in simpler language to fit a level. The classic graded reader.
• Original graded fiction: new stories written for learners at a level, as in Cambridge English Readers.

Each has its place. Adaptations of classics have one special advantage: the story has already proved itself.

Why classics are the stories worth grading

Graded reader series have long leaned on classics, and for good reasons.

Their plots survive retelling. Strip The Count of Monte Cristo to A2 and it still grips:

Edmond Dantès is a young sailor. He is happy, because he is going to marry Mercédès. But two jealous men send a letter to the police, and Edmond goes to prison on an island. He stays there for fourteen years. In prison, an old man tells him about a great treasure.

Few readers can stop there.

Readers often know them already. Familiar stories are easier to follow, which frees attention for the language. There’s more on this in why classic novels are great for learning a language.

They’re free to adapt. Public-domain books can be retold by anyone, which is one reason they fill so many series.

The limits of graded readers

Graded readers written and edited by experienced authors are excellent, and if your language has a good series at your level, use it. But they have practical limits:

• Choice depends on the language. English has a deep catalog across many levels. Spanish, French and German have good selections. For many other languages the choice is much smaller, and for some there’s almost nothing.
• One book, one level. A given title usually exists at a single level in a series. If it’s slightly too hard or too easy, there’s no other version.
• Levels don’t match across series, as Claridge found, so you have to test each series yourself.

How Lexo helps

Lexo is an iPhone and iPad app that takes the graded reader idea and removes some of those limits. Each of its roughly 100 classic novels, from Treasure Island and Journey to the Center of the Earth to The Count of Monte Cristo, is available at five CEFR levels: A2, B1 and B2, rewritten for learners; C1, close to the original and lightly condensed; and C2, the complete novel. Each edition is written in the language you’re learning, in about 80 languages, and you choose the level per book. If a level doesn’t fit, you can add another level of a book you own.

Most editions don’t exist until someone asks for one. If you’re the first reader of a book in your language at your level, Lexo writes it for you: chapter 1 is ready in a few minutes, the rest follows while you read, and you keep a dated “First edition” mark.

To be straightforward about how that’s possible: Lexo’s adaptations, glosses, translations and narration are produced with AI models, guided by the CEFR level descriptors, with automatic checks. That’s what lets it offer any of its books at five levels in so many languages. If you spot a mistake in an edition, tell us.

Every book is narrated, with the text highlighted as it’s read, and any word can be tapped to see its meaning in that sentence. At planned launch pricing, a book is $4.99 and another level of a book you own is $1.99. Lexo is in beta and launching on the App Store soon. Get notified at launch.