Literacy milestones
In this section you’ll get an overview of the reading and writing skills that are typical for 7-year-olds. Remember that kids develop at different rates, so don’t be worried if your child isn’t doing some of these things yet. If you do have concerns, talk to your pediatrician, your child’s teacher, or the reading specialist at school.
If you’re concerned …
Browse the resources in our Helping All Readers section to learn more about why some children have difficulties learning to read.
You may also want to read the article Clues to Dyslexia from Second Grade On.
Reading
- Identifies an increasing number of words by sight.
- Uses letter-sound knowledge to sound out unknown words.
- Accurately decodes multisyllable words that sound like they are spelled (“orthographically regular”) such as capital or Kalamazoo. Can also sound out orthographically regular nonsense words.
- Accurately reads many irregularly spelled words.
- Reads with greater fluency
- Uses word identification strategies with greater facility to unlock unknown words
- Notices when a text doesn’t make sense, and begins to use strategies such as rereading, predicting, and questioning to understand it.
- Interprets information from diagrams, charts, and graphs.
- Recalls facts and details of texts.
- Poses possible answers to how, why, and what-if questions.
- Discusses similarities in characters and events across stories.
- Reads and comprehends both fiction and nonfiction.
- Reads independently for entertainment and to learn something new.
- Can act out a story.
Writing
- Can write about a range of topics with the audience in mind.
- Produces a variety of types of compositions, including stories, reports, and letters.
- Writes legibly, using capitalization and punctuation correctly (most of the time!), and moving from invented spelling to more accurate spelling.
- Is learning how to revise own writing and offer meaningful feedback to peers about their writing.
- Organizes writing to include a beginning, middle, and end.
- Can write a simple essay with a title and introductory sentence, provide examples and details that support their main concept, and write a concluding sentence.
- Makes reasonable judgments about important details to include in writing.
- Attends to spelling, mechanics, and presentation.
- Concentrates more on the content of their writing than on the mechanics of handwriting.
Looking at Writing
See examples of real writing from second graders in our interactive resource, Looking at Writing.
What does second grade writing look like?
More resources
- Reading Tips for Parents of Second Graders (In English and 12 other languages)
- Second Grade Parents’ Guide to Student Success (PTA)
- Second Grade Parents’ Guide to Student Success in Spanish (PTA)
- Shining Stars: Second and Third Graders Learn to Read (National Institute for Literacy)
- Clues to Dyslexia from Second Grade On