Readability formulas have varied uses. In education they are used to match children's reading ability to the difficulty level of material, select stories and books for classroom use and for individual students' particular needs, select textbooks and other reading materials, aid educational research, and check reading materials of newly literate…

This paper discusses methods of teaching reading in the content areas at the middle school, junior high school, and secondary school levels. If a textbook is to be used, teachers should examine it by administering a readability formula and by checking the book's vocabulary, sentence patterns, and introduction of abstract concepts. To find how well…

The purpose of this paper is to make classroom teachers on all educational levels aware of the limitations of readability formulas and the factors affecting readability that are not accounted for by the readability formulas. delineated in discussions of readability formula assumptions, problems, and limitations. Some of the specific factors that…

Written as an aid for writers of Army narrative training literature, this guidebook emphasizes performance-oriented writing (preparation of literature intended to help someone learn and perform job related tasks). The eight chapters contain extensive examples and illustrations. An introductory chapter discusses why and how the guidebook was…

To aid in the construction of effective task analysis inventories, this technical report discusses: (1) an optimum questionnaire length that adequately covers Marine tasks without unduly fatiguing respondents; (2) procedures for the phrasing of task statements to avoid ambiguities and be understandable to as broad a range of Marines as is…

The objectives of this study were to develop a method for scoring the level of abstraction (LOA) of science reading material and explore its relationship with other methods for assessing curriculum materials. LOA is defined as the ratio of the nonconcrete concepts to the total number of concepts in a written passage expressed as a percent.…

Defining readability in both the narrow sense of formula use and refinement and the broader sense of the processing and comprehension of language, this paper argues for the need for more research focusing on readability as a way of improving the match between reader and text. Following a brief introduction, the paper reviews current readability…

Using two original children's books and adaptations of these books created by basal reader publishers, a study investigated (1) whether children prefer original, unadapted stories that may have longer sentences and more vocabulary items than are permitted by readability formulas for their grade level, or the adaptations of those stories, which…

A three-part correlational study examined the explanatory power of the Lexile theory of reading comprehension, which was based on the semantic and syntactic components of prose. Correlations were performed between the item difficulties of nine nationally normed reading comprehension tests and computer generated difficulties which were reported in…

Two readability formulas were applied to two math and two reading series textbooks at the fourth, fifth, and sixth grade levels to see whether the publishers' suggested reading levels were accurate. Five samples were taken from each text and compared to the publishers' suggested usage according to grade level. Results showed that although formulas…

The reading abilities of low achieving high school students at two schools were compared to the readability levels of the magazines in which they showed interest. The median tested reading ability of these students was reported as third/fourth grade by their reading teachers. The reading specialist at one high school reported that boys had an…

Discussion of programs for analyzing the writing of students using word processors focuses on six categories of available software that can help to improve students' writing skills: error checkers, reformatters, audience awareness programs (including reader's needs and readability formulas), student conferencing utilities, grading utilities, and…

Offers suggestions on how to ask questions in a teacher/student reading conference, promote professional growth through the use of reading journals, produce a newspaper as a final examination, use modern music to teach reading and writing, and use content area textbooks to teach reading skills. (FL)

Describes a study that examined the readability of papers "College and Research Libraries" accepted, rejected, and published for 1990 and 1991. Results showing a statistically significant difference for the text of papers but not for abstracts are reported, and topics for further research are suggested. (Contains six references.) (EAM)

Some techniques or strategies and principles of organization can make the teacher's task of modifying or writing curriculum materials easier. This monograph provides a step-by-step guide for writing curriculum materials, whether approaching the problem from scratch or modifying that which already exists. Chapter 1 provides the rationale, and…