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![]() ![]() Saturday, March 21, 2009 – Permalink – Readability EvaluationWhat grade are you?Word has a built in tool to determine the level of reading difficulty of a document. To see the statistics:
![]() Each readability score bases its rating on the average number of syllables per word and words per sentence.Readability Measuring the reading age of books and other reading matter. Everything you ever wanted know about readability tests but were afraid to ask. Wikipedia.com: Flesch-Kincaid Readability Test Support.Microsoft.com: Frequently Asked Questions About Proofing Grammar I am working on a law review article dealing with readability. We have found a problem with Microsoft Word's Flesch-Kincaid formula - it does not appear to be accurate. We took a sample text of slightly over 100 words, and ran the check. We then changed the word "report" to statement" (with everything else unchanged) and Word indicated a higher grade level. However, the grade level should not have been affected, since "report" and "statement" are both two-syllable words. It looks like Word is somehow incorporating number of characters in each word into it's Flesch-Kincaid score, which it should not. Any idea what the problem might be? You're right, Word handles the formula a little differently. BTW, they say the sample s/b 200+ words for reliability. See these links: University of Memphis and: Wikipedia [Edited entry from 1/23/2006] See all Topics Labels: Word <Doug Klippert@ 3:36 AM |