Text Leveling System

Orange You Glad It's Halloween, Amber Brown?

RDQ:	585	Max Word/Sent	26	Total Words	1506		Diff Words	484
Lex	660	Ave Word/.Sent	6	Hi Freq occurs	960	63.7%	Hi freq	188	38.8%
AR	2.9	Long Sentences	0.9	Low Freq occurs	38	2.5%	Low freq	30	6.2%

Hi, Amber Brown, and ready for pumpkin day. So is my best friend, Justin Daniels. We are each taking a pumpkin to school. They are dressed as our favorite book characters. My parents are in the living room, having a talk. Something tells me it is not a happy talk. They have not been getting along lately. I hope that they make up before tonight. I, Amber Brown, will be wearing the best costume ever. It will be a sad Halloween if my parents are not getting along. Justin takes his pumpkin out of the bag. He lives it up over his head. The pumpkin has underpants To it. Capt. underpants to the rescue! He shouts. The underpants cover part of Justin's face. There is pumpkin juice on them. Are we going soon? Justin makes a face.i sigh. I hope so. I want to cry. Justin puts his pumpkin in front of his face. 
Knock, knock. Who's there? I ask. Banana. Banana who? I asked. Justin says banana again. Banana who? I ask again. That happens three more times. I, Amber Brown, am getting tired of bananas. Finally Justin yells, knock, knock! I glare. Who is there. You better tell me. Justin screams, orange. Orange who? I yelled back. Orange you glad it's Halloween, Amber Brown? 
I giggle and nod. I will be very glad that it's Halloween if my parents don't ruin it. That would be a bad trick, not a good treat. My dad rushes into the room. Hurry up kids or you're going to be late. That's not our fault, I think. 
My mom comes into the kitchen. She smiles at Justin and me. I can't tell if everything is okay or not. I wish I knew. She kisses me goodbye. Justin asks her to kiss Captain underpants goodbye. She does. And she kisses Justin. She doesn't kiss my dad. Dad picks up the cupcakes that mom and I baked last night. Justin, dad and I go out to the car. Justin and Capt. underpants and I sit in the backseat. My pumpkin, Lily, her purple plastic purse, and the cupcakes sit in the front with dad.
Amber, Justin asks, what are you going to be for Halloween?
It's a surprise, I say. I'm not telling anyone, not even you.
Justin sticks his tongue out at me.
Well I'm not going to tell you mine either, he says. You are probably going as a giant booger.
I giggle. But I don't tell him.
We get to the school and rushed inside. A pumpkin head is standing by the counter. It is wearing a sign. It's Mr. Robinson, our principal. He signs our late passes.
We hurry to class. Ms. light is already teaching.
Justin and I sit down at our desks. Dad puts the cupcakes on the work table and leaves.
Ms. light passes out papers. I look at mine. Five pumpkins are drawn on the page. We have to add eyes, noses, mouths and  teeth on each pumpkin. We also have to add one more thing. I give my pumpkins twenty freckles each.
Then Ms. light asks, how many noses are there altogether? How many eyes? How many mouths, teeth and other items?
She can't fool me. This is supposed to be fun, but it's really math.
I look over at Justin. He's already finished. I look at his paper. He has given his pumpkins pimples. I wonder what it would look like if a pumpkin had its pimple squeezed.
I tried counting everything again. Hannah Burton is sitting across from me. She whispers, 1, 2, 11, 15, 7, 62 and 3, over and over, just to mix me up. Hannah Burton is a pumpkin pimple.
Ms. light comes over. She looks at my paper. She knows I am having trouble. She shows me how to add it up. I put my head down on the desk. She rumbles my hair and says, don't worry. You'll be able to do this. After all, you are one of my bright lights.
Next, each of us stands up and tells about our pumpkin and the book it came from.
At lunch, Justin tries to make me tell what costume I will wear tonight. I, Amber Brown, will not tell him.
After lunch, Ms. light reads us space case by Edward and James Marshall. Everyone laughs. It's really funny. A real alien from outer space ghost trick or treating.
I think about tonight. What if my parents are in a bad mood? What if they don't do the things we always do on Halloween? All of a sudden, I feel sad. What if my parents get a divorce?
Then Ms. light says, time for pumpkin jokes.
Hannah raises her hand quickly. Ms. light calls on her. How can you fix a broken pumpkin? Hannah asks. Then she says, with a pumpkin patch.
I Amber Brown, raise my hand even higher than Hannah raised hers.
what's black and white and orange and waddles? I ask.
Nobody can guess.
A penguin with a pumpkin! I giggle.
Justin jumps up and down.
Why did the pumpkin cross the road? Before anyone can even answer, he yells because the chicken took the day off to trick-or-treat!
Everyone tells a joke.
Then it's pumpkin party time with pumpkin soup, cupcakes, cookies, bread and pies.
School ends. We line up to leave. Ms. light hands each of us a little bag of candy pumpkins and candy corn. Justin offers me pieces of candy if I tell him what my costume is. I won't tell him.
Justin's mom picks us up. We get into the back seat with his little brother, Danny. I think that Danny is going to be a dirty diaper for Halloween either that or he needs a change.
Justin and I think pumpkins songs all the way home. When we get to that Daniel's house, Justin and I use our candy corn as fangs. We pretend to be werewolves to scare Danny.
Danny grabs one of the candy corns out of Justin's mouth and eats it. I bet that there is Justin slobber on the corn!
The doorbell rings. It's my mom. We walk home. There's a package on our front porch steps. I ran up and take a look at it, we've been ghosted!
There's a plastic pumpkin filled with candy. There's a piece of paper on the present. A ghost is drawn on the page. There's a note on the ghost: your house has been visited by the friendly Halloween ghost. Put this picture of the ghost in your window and then secretly deliver treats and a copy of this note to two houses in your neighborhood. You must do this without being seen! Choose houses that do not have ghosts in there Windows! And then you can enjoy your treats. Happy Halloween!
I, Amber Brown, love ghosting. Mom and I get to treat bags ready. She and I sneak up to the Daniel's house. We put the package on their steps. We ring the doorbell and run away.
Then we sneak over to kelsea allin's house. kelsea is a real nice seventh grader. Sometimes she lets me walk her dog. We leave the second treat their and rushed back to our house.
We feel a large bowl with regular size candy. I'm glad that mom didn't buy fun size candy. What is fun about a little piece of candy? Big bars are best.
Mrs. swallow, on the next block, gives out raisins and toothbrushes. No one goes to her house anymore.
Dad comes home. He is wearing light up pumpkin boppers on his head.
He is also carrying flowers for mom.
I'm sorry, dad says.
Mom sighs, looks at me, and then smiles at dad. They hug. I, Amber Brown, am so happy.
We sit down for an early dinner. Macaroni and cheese, carrots, orange juice and an orange cupcake. Orange I glad it's Halloween dinner!
I eat quickly. I want to hurry up and get dressed in my new costume. But dinner is taking a long time because the doorbell rings a lot. Each time we all get up to look at the costumes and to give out treats.
Chuckie richetti is dressed as a baseball card. That is my second favorite costume. My first favorite will be my costume, once I put it on. My parents are smiling a lot. They are smiling at the trick-or-treaters, at me, at each other. I am very happy. I am very glad to get dressed for Halloween. Finally, dinner is finished.
Justin and his dad arrived. Justin is dressed as a chicken. He is wearing a big sign. Why did the chicken cross the street? To get his yummy Halloween treat!
I get it. Justin is a chicken joke!
I rushed upstairs. Mom helps me put on my costume. She made it for me. I go downstairs again and yell, surprise!
I Amber Brown, am eye, Amber Brown. This is going to be the most wonderful Halloween ever.

Subjective Criteria

Illustrations: Some support

Dialog: Two speakers

Dialog: Broken dialogue

Vocabulary: More decoding/definition issues

Language: Many descriptive words

Sentences: Multiple phrases

Text structure: Blend of written/oral

Inferences: Some implications

Concepts: Concrete/Simple Social

Features

Character traits

Simple Plot

First Person

Topic

Jokes

Costumes

*Family & Friends

*Holidays, Events, Cele

Halloween

Parents

Low Frequency Words

alien	booger	boppers	daniels	diaper
divorce	drawn	fault	freckles	ghosted
ghosting	glare	halloween	justin's	macaroni
marshall	neighborhood	penguin	pimple	pimples
purse	raises	raisins	robinson	seventh
slobber	swallow	waddles	werewolves	whispers