Readability and style: The view from our textbooks

MacAllister, Joyce; Duckworth, James

doi:10.1080/02773948109390606

Cited by 1 publication

(1 citation statement)

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“…Using the Gunning FOG Readability test, Flesch Reading Ease Formula, Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level, SMOG Index, Coleman-Liau and Automated Readability Index, Owu-Ewie found that most of the passages were above the age of learners and were therefore difficult for them to read and comprehend. Similar methods and conclusions have been drawn by others in different fields including the sciences, mathematics, and economics from different countries (Barret, 2014;Barrett, Mtana, Osaki, & Rubagumya, 2014;EdQual, 2010;Li, 2011;MacAllister & Duckworth, 1981;O'keeffe & O'donoghue, 2014;Percorari, Shaw, Malmstrom, & Irvine, 2011;Perekeme & Agbor, 2012;Tinkler & Woods, 2013;Torki, 2012). The conclusion from these numerous research is that most textbooks are much difficult to read than the level of the intended readers.…”

Section: Exiting Studies On Readability Of English Language Textbookssupporting

confidence: 63%

Readability of English language textbooks for diploma students of the University of Cape Coast

Kodom¹,

Pearl²

2019

IJRSLL

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Textbooks are important for teaching and learning at every level of education. Being one source of learning materials from which students can read on their own, with the goal of further understanding what has been discussed in class, it is important that these textbooks are written in a way that would be understandable to students. Yet, a number of researches have concluded that textbooks are usually difficult to read by the intended audience. Therefore, this paper examined the readability of English Language textbooks for diploma students of the Centre for Distance Learning, University of Cape Coast. Three textbooks (for year one -three diploma students) were used for the study. Passages were selected from each textbook for readability analyses. Flesch reading ease (FRE) and Flesch -Kincaid grade level (FKGL) indexes were used to compute readability scores of the textbooks. Measures of central tendencies, one-sample T-test, with bootstrapping, were used to analyse the data. The results revealed that the three textbooks were generally between 'fairly difficult' and 'difficult' to read ranges (M = 40.69 and 52.73). The readability of the textbooks was found to be statistically different from recommended readability scores for public documents. Further, the results indicated that the average word per sentence was to be between 22 and 25 for all three textbooks. This may have contributed to the low readability of the textbooks. The researcher recommends the revision of the textbooks, so that they will serve the intended purpose and contribute to effective teaching and learning of English Language.

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