I understand what you mean Bath. In NSW we do the same thing with the readers - they bring them home and you fill in the book when they have read them. I think it's a bit of a stretch to put him in the Reading Recovery though - I always thought that it was reserved for only those students having real difficulty with reading and they usually have associated learning problems as well, but not for what your DS is doing. However I have noticed over the years that more is expected of them now than what it was when my first child went to school. When he was in Kindergarten (your prep), he only got to a level 7 by the end of the year - mainly because it wasn't communicated very well that we were supposed to write down the books they had read to get new ones - there was no reading book to write it in for a start and it was only when I commented to the teacher that he wasn't bringing new books home that she realised the error. But when I asked about him being behind because of it, she said that they are only expected to get to level 7 by the end of kindergarten, so he met that outcome well enough. Fast forward 5 years though with DD2 in Kindergarten and now they are expected to get to Level 15! Luckily DD is a good reader but I still can't see her getting to level 15 by the end of the year - she is only on a 9 atm. and we aren't very strict with it either - by the time they get home at 4.30pm she is often too tired to read very well and I let the teachers know that and they are fine with it, so we aren't pushing her as much as we probably should be, but I reckon in their first year of school it should be more relaxed anyway in regards to homework. I would try to negotiate with them on the amount of homework he needs to do for it and try to find out exactly where his problem areas are (if there are any) so you can concentrate on those and maybe get him out of reading recovery sooner.