Concludes that test results are essentially the same for both the Flesch and Gunning reading indices. (RB)

The Fry Readability Formula was used to investigate the readability levels of stories contained in basal readers of the 1979 edition of the "Open Court" series for grades one through six. The average readability levels of the stories were then compared to those found in the 1976 edition of the same series. The purposes of the study were…

Reveals that the Rauding Scale of Prose Difficulty provides results closer to Spache and Dale-Chall values than does the Singer Eyeball Estimate of Readability (SEER) technique. (FL)

Compared the grade level difficulty obtained from seven readability formulas to student reading levels from two national standardized tests to determine which formulas best determined the readability of computer-based text. Found that the Flesch-Kincaid, FOG, and ARI formulas provided the best estimate of reading grade level of computer-based text…

The passage comprehensibility of three diagnostic reading tests--the Stanford Diagnostic Reading Test, the Spache Diagnostic Reading Scales, and the Durrell Analysis of Reading Difficulty--was evaluated using the following text variables: content familiarity, vocabulary, the number of idea units in the text, the number of text-based inferences…

Fry's Readability Graph was used to determine the readability levels of the 1981 Scott, Foresman and Co. basal textbook series for grades one through six. The readability levels were then compared to those established for the 1978 edition. In the 1981 edition, all stories were handscored. Poems, skill lessons, and plays were not examined in order…

The distinguishing characteristics and relationships found among the "Analytical Reading Inventory," the "Durrell Analysis of Reading Difficulty," and the Spache "Diagnostic Reading Scales" in terms of readability levels, oral and silent reading results, and independent and instructional reading levels were examined in a study involving 117 first,…

Investigates whether reading ability improves when students read relatively easy library books. Compares reading achievement of students in grades three, four, and five who read books at either above or below their reading level. Finds no evidence that either group gained in reading ability. Notes that later empirical evidence indicated no actual…

This study examined the McCall-Crabbs Standard Test Lessons in Reading to determine whether selections of passages covered a sufficiently wide range of difficulty to warrant their use in developing readability formulas. The results, which find several readability formulas suspect, are discussed. (Author/MT)

Readability formulas estimate how difficult text is to read. The resulting "readability level" helps teachers and school librarians match students to appropriate books. Guiding students to appropriate-level books is now easier and more accurate with the ATOS (Advantage-TASA Open Standard) Readability Formula for Books, the new…

Results of a study involving approximately 500 sixth and seventh graders suggest that a two-column layout with traditional paragraphing denotation is more readable than a single-column layout, but that an extreme line length does not place an undue strain on the reader. (Examples of the two formats are included.) (GT)

A study of physical and pedagogical characteristics, determination of basal difficulty, and story contents in West German and United States reading texts shows that basal readers are more often similar than dissimilar, perhaps having undergone similar developmental changes across cultures. (JM)

Examines the readability levels of two current children's periodicals and two nineteenth-century periodicals. Finds the language skills used by children writing poetry and letters to the editor have not declined over the last century. Finds nonfiction and recreational fiction articles to be more difficult in the nineteenth century. (RS)

Compares three online databases designed for elementary school use for searching periodicals. Highlights include limiting the ability to surf the Web; print capabilities; available resources included in the database, including full text versus abstracts; user-support materials; reading levels; and ease of interface use. (LRW)