Text Leveling System

Roxaboxen

RDQ:	755	Max Word/Sent	33	Total Words	840		Diff Words	336
Lex	690	Ave Word/.Sent	12	Hi Freq occurs	515	61.3%	Hi freq	121	36%
AR	3.2	Long Sentences	11.9	Low Freq occurs	35	4.2%	Low freq	27	8%

Marian called it Roxaboxen. 
(She always knew the name of everything.) 
There across the road it looked like any rocky hill- 
nothing but sand and rocks some old wooden boxes 
cactus and greasewood and thorny ocotillo - 
but it was a special place. ]]
The street between Roxaboxen and the house curved like a river 
So Marian named it the River Rhode.  
After that you had to ford a river to reach Roxaboxen. ]]
Of course all of Marian's sisters came: 
Anna May and Frances and Little Jean. 
Charles from next door even though he was twelve. 
Oh and Eleanor naturally 
and Jamie with his brother Paul. 
Later on there were others but these were the first. 
Well not really the first. 
Roxaboxen had always been there 
and must have belonged to others long before. ]]
When Marian dug up a tin box filled with round black pebbles 
everyone knew what it was: 
it was a buried treasure. 
Those pebbles were the money of Roxaboxen. 
You could still find others like them if you looked hard enough. 
So some days became treasure-hunting days with everybody trying to 
find that special kind. 
And then on other days you might just find one without even looking. ]]
A town of Roxaboxen began to grow traced in lines of stone: 
Main Street first edged with the whitest ones 
and then the houses. 
Charles made his of the biggest stones. 
After all he was the oldest. 
At first the houses were very plain but soon they all began to 
add more rooms. 
The old wooden boxes could be shelves or tables or anything you wanted. 
You could find pieces of pottery for dishes. 
Round pieces were best. ]]
Later on there was a town hall. 
Marian was mayor of course; 
that was just the way she was. 
Nobody minded. ]]
After a while they added other streets. 
Frances moved to one of them and built herself a new house outlined 
in desert glass 
bits of amber amethyst and sea-green: 
a house of jewels. ]]
And because everybody had plenty of money 
there were plenty of shops. 
Jean helped Anna May in the bakery - 
pies and cakes and bread baked warm in the sun. 
There were two ice cream parlors. 
Was Paul's ice cream the best or Eleanor's? 
Everybody kept trying them both. 
(In Roxaboxen you can eat all the ice cream you want.) ]]
Everybody had a car. 
All you needed was something round for a 
steering wheel. 
Of course if you broke the speed limit you had to go to jail. 
The jail had cactus on the floor to make it uncomfortable 
and Jamie was the policeman. 
Anna May quiet little Anna May was always speeding - 
you'd think she liked to go to jail. ]]
But ah if you had a horse you could go as fast as the wind. 
There were no speed limits for horses 
and you didn't have to stay on the road. ]]
All you needed for a horse was a stick and some kind of bridle 
and you could gallop anywhere. ]]
Sometimes there were wars. 
Once there was a great war boys against girls. 
Charles and Marian were the generals. 
The girls had Fort Irene and they were all girl scouts. 
The boys made a fort at the other end of Roxaboxen and they were 
all bandits. ]]
Oh the raids were fierce loud with whooping and the stamping 
of horses! 
The whirling swords of ocotillo had sharp thorns - 
but when you reached your fort you were safe. ]]
Roxaboxen had a cemetery in case anyone died 
but the only grave in it was for a dead lizard. 
Each year when the cactus bloomed they decorated the grave 
with flowers. ]]
Sometimes in the winter when everybody was at school and the 
weather was bad 
no one went to Roxaboxen at all not for weeks and weeks. 
But it didn't matter; 
Roxaboxen was always waiting. 
Roxaboxen was always there. 
And spring came and the ocotillo blossomed 
and everybody sucked the honey from its flowers 
and everybody built new rooms and everybody decided to have 
jeweled windows. 
That summer there were three new houses on the east slope 
and two new shops on Main Street. 
And so it went. 
The seasons changed and the years went by. 
Roxaboxen was always there. ]]
The years went by and the seasons changed 
until at last the friends had all grown tall 
and one by one they moved away 
to other houses to other towns. 
So you might think that was the end of Roxaboxen - 
but oh no. 
Because none of them ever forgot Roxaboxen. 
Not one of them ever forgot. 
Years later Marian's children listened to stories of that place 
and fell asleep dreaming dreams of Roxaboxen. 
Gray-haired Charles picked up a black pebble on the beach 
and stood holding it 
remembering Roxaboxen. ]]
More than fifty years later Frances went back 
and Roxaboxen was still there. 
She could see the white stones bordering Main Street 
and there where she had built her house 
the desert glass still glowed - 
amethyst amber and sea-green.]]

Subjective Criteria

Illustrations: Some support

Vocabulary: More decoding/definition issues

Language: Many descriptive words

Sentences: Many Long Complex

Text structure: Story/Poem

Inferences: Some implications

Concepts: Abstract/Complex Social

Features

Integral Setting - Historical

Simple Plot

Topic

Innovation

Children

Deserts

Friendship

Houses

Imagination

Towns

*Family & Friends

Pretend

Low Frequency Words

amethyst	cemetery	curved	edged	eleanor
eleanor's	generals	greasewood	haired	jeweled
jewels	limits	minded	naturally	ocotillo
outlined	parlors	pottery	roxaboxen	seasons
shelves	stamping	swords	thorny	uncomfortable
whirling	whooping