Help
The questions parents ask, answered in plain words. If yours is not here, the last answer says how to reach a person.
Getting started
Who is StratoReading for?
Reading comprehension for Kindergarten to College, and for English second language learners of any age, adults included.
An adult learning English signs up the same way a parent does and adds themself as the reader. The pricing page's adult column is the same product at the same monthly price.
What does it cost to try?
Nothing. Every child gets 7 passages and 1 test, with no credit card. Your child reads, writes real answers and gets them marked, and you see the marking before you decide anything.
What does a subscription cost?
$10 a month for one child, or $96 for the year, which is 20% less. Every child you add takes a dollar off the monthly price for all of them, down to a floor of $6 each. United States, in US dollars.
Nothing is being charged today. When there is a price, it is on the pricing page before you are asked to pay it, and you are told before anything is taken.
How do I sign in?
With the email address and the password you chose. If you would rather not keep a password, ask for a sign in link on the sign in page. The link works once and lasts fifteen minutes. You can also sign in with your Google account.
How the reading works
How do you know my child's reading level?
We measure it rather than assume it from their school year. Their level is measured in the first three passages and moves as they do, so the reading is always just hard enough. A child ahead of their grade is not bored, and a child behind it is not drowning.
A level is a reading range rather than a school year, so two children in the same grade can be reading at different levels, and both are reading the right thing.
Where do the passages come from?
Your child picks the subjects they actually care about, and every passage they are given comes from those. Every passage is a real thing that really happened, and every number in it is checked against the source it came from.
What is a custom topic, and how many do we get?
A subject we do not have yet, which your child asks for by typing it in. We research it and write passages for it within 48 hours, at your child's own reading level.
Custom topics are part of a paid plan. Each child on a paid plan gets one a month, on the annual plan as well as the monthly one.
What happens when my child taps a word?
Every single word is tappable, not just the hard ones, because nobody can guess which word a particular child does not know. Tapping a word shows what it means and how to say it, and reads it aloud. For most words it also shows similar words, opposite words, and the word used in sentences.
What can the chat bot answer?
Anything about the passage in front of your child, and nothing else. It is the question they were too shy to put up their hand for, and every answer comes back written at their reading level rather than an adult's.
Tests and marking
How is my child's writing marked?
The way a teacher marks. The marking is calibrated against thousands of real answers marked by trained scorers with a published two point rubric. Your child sees the score and, more importantly, exactly what was missing, with a written reason under each of three headings: Content and analysis, Command of evidence, and Conventions.
Then they see two full answers. One is their own words with the smallest possible changes, so they can see how close they were. The other is written from scratch.
What is a Test?
A sitting your child does on their own, marked the same way as their passages, with a report you read on your family page. The free passages include 1 test. A paid plan includes ten a grade.
Your family's data
What do you store about my child?
The least we can and still teach your child to read: a first name or a nickname, the month and the year your child was born, the grade you tell us they are in, and the writing they do in the app along with how it was marked.
We do not sell anything about your family to anybody. We do not run advertising. We do not load analytics, trackers or social buttons. The privacy page sets out who else sees any of it, and what we know and do not know about each of them.
Can I get a copy of it, or have it all deleted?
Yes to both, at any time, without giving a reason. Ask us and we send you everything we hold about your child, in a form you can open and read. Ask us and we delete it: the writing, the marks, the reasons, the words your child looked up, and the profile itself, with nothing kept back.
Closing your account deletes the children on it. We say so clearly before you do it.
My child signed up without me. What happens now?
A child can start here without a parent, and some do. We ask the child for your email address and use it for one thing: to tell you that your child is here, and to tell you when they move up a reading level while they are still on the free passages.
If you did not expect that message, write to us. We remove the connection, or we delete the account outright, whichever you ask. Until you say the child is yours, the account is not billed for anything.
Canceling
How do I cancel?
You can cancel without writing to anybody. You can also close your account whenever you like, and closing it deletes your children's data, which we say clearly before you do it.
Reaching us
How do I reach a person?
Email us directly at info@stratoreading.com from your own email, or use the box on the contact page. We read both at the same time. Put your real email address in the box so we can reply to you, and you can answer us from your email. A person answers within one business day.