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86-595: The Flesch–Kincaid readability tests are readability tests designed to indicate how difficult a passage in English is to understand. There are two tests: the Flesch Reading-Ease, and the Flesch–Kincaid Grade Level. Although they use the same core measures (word length and sentence length), they have different weighting factors. The results of the two tests correlate approximately inversely:

172-414: A "literary piano". The only "word processing" these mechanical systems could perform was to change where letters appeared on the page, to fill in spaces that were previously left on the page, or to skip over lines. It was not until decades later that the introduction of electricity and electronics into typewriters began to help the writer with the mechanical part. The term “word processing” (translated from

258-405: A Flesch reading ease score of 45 or greater. Use of this scale is so ubiquitous that it is bundled with popular word processing programs and services such as KWord , IBM Lotus Symphony , Microsoft Office Word , WordPerfect , WordPro , and Grammarly . Polysyllabic words affect this score significantly more than they do the grade-level score. These readability tests are used extensively in

344-652: A clear and readable style, Bryson found that it was rare. He wrote that such language is the result of a "... discipline and artistry that few people who have ideas will take the trouble to achieve... If simple language were easy, many of our problems would have been solved long ago." Bryson helped set up the Readability Laboratory at the college. Two of his students were Irving Lorge and Rudolf Flesch . In 1934, Ralph Ojemann investigated adult reading skills, factors that most directly affect reading ease, and causes of each level of difficulty. He did not invent

430-656: A computer-based word processing dedicated device with Japanese writing system in Business Show in Tokyo. Toshiba released the first Japanese word processor JW-10  [ jp ] in February 1979. The price was 6,300,000 JPY, equivalent to US$ 45,000. This is selected as one of the milestones of IEEE . The Japanese writing system uses a large number of kanji (logographic Chinese characters) which require 2 bytes to store, so having one key per each symbol

516-413: A formula based on physical states and mental states. However, she found this was no better than word familiarity and sentence length in showing reading ease. Word processing A word processor ( WP ) is a device or computer program that provides for input, editing, formatting, and output of text, often with some additional features. Early word processors were stand-alone devices dedicated to

602-427: A formula, but a method for assessing the difficulty of materials for parent education . He was the first to assess the validity of this method by using 16 magazine passages tested on actual readers. He evaluated 14 measurable and three reported factors that affect reading ease. Ojemann emphasized the reported features, such as whether the text was coherent or unduly abstract. He used his 16 passages to compare and judge

688-421: A grade level of −1.3. (Most of the 50 used words are monosyllabic ; "anywhere", which occurs eight times, is the only exception.) As readability formulas were developed for school books, they demonstrate weaknesses compared to directly testing usability with typical readers. They neglect between-reader differences and effects of content, layout and retrieval aids. Readability test Higher readability in

774-616: A project sponsored by the U.S. Navy, the Reading Ease formula was recalculated to give a grade-level score. The new formula is now called the Flesch–Kincaid grade-level formula. The Linsear Write Raygor readability estimate was developed in 1977. In 1978, John Bormuth of the University of Chicago looked at reading ease using the new Cloze deletion test developed by Wilson Taylor. His work supported earlier research including

860-424: A readability formula to predict the difficulty of adult reading material. Investigators in many fields began using it to improve communications. One of the variables it used was personal references, such as names and personal pronouns. Another variable was affixes . In 1947, Donald Murphy of Wallace's Farmer used a split-run edition to study the effects of making text easier to read. He found that reducing from

946-552: A set of stick-on "keycaps" describing the function were provided with the software. Lexitype was popular with large organizations that had previously used the Lexitron. Eventually, the price differences between dedicated word processors and general-purpose PCs, and the value added to the latter by software such as “ killer app ” spreadsheet applications, e.g. VisiCalc and Lotus 1-2-3 , were so compelling that personal computers and word processing software became serious competition for

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1032-742: A technical writer might focus on clear and concise language and formatting that allows easy-reading. In contrast, a scholarly journal would use sophisticated writing that would appeal and make sense to the type of audience to whom they are directing information. Readability is essential to the clarity and accessibility of texts used in classrooms, work environments, and everyday life. The government prioritizes readability as well through Plain Language Laws which enforces important documents to be written at an 8th grade level. Much research has focused on matching prose to reading skill, resulting in formulas for use in research, government, teaching, publishing,

1118-483: A text eases reading effort and speed for the general population of readers. For those who do not have high reading comprehension , readability is necessary for understanding and applying a given text. Techniques to simplify readability are essential to communicate a set of information to the intended audience. Whether it is code, news information, or storytelling, every writer has a target audience that they have to adjust their readability levels to. The term "readability"

1204-696: A text with a comparatively high score on the Reading Ease test should have a lower score on the Grade-Level test. Rudolf Flesch devised the Reading Ease evaluation; somewhat later, he and J. Peter Kincaid developed the Grade Level evaluation for the United States Navy . "The Flesch–Kincaid" (F–K) reading grade level was developed under contract to the U.S. Navy in 1975 by J. Peter Kincaid and his team. Related U.S. Navy research directed by Kincaid delved into high-tech education (for example,

1290-680: A text. Text leveling is commonly used to rank the reading ease of texts in areas where reading difficulties are easy to identify, such as books for young children. At higher levels, ranking reading ease becomes more difficult, as individual difficulties become harder to identify. This has led to better ways to assess reading ease. In the 1920s, the scientific movement in education looked for tests to measure students' achievement to aid in curriculum development. Teachers and educators had long known that, to improve reading skill, readers—especially beginning readers—need reading material that closely matches their ability. University-based psychologists did much of

1376-456: A typewriter) was patented in 1714 by Henry Mill for a machine that was capable of "writing so clearly and accurately you could not distinguish it from a printing press". More than a century later, another patent appeared in the name of William Austin Burt for the typographer . In the late 19th century, Christopher Latham Sholes created the first recognizable typewriter, which was described as

1462-504: A user to rewrite text that had been written on another tape, and it also allowed limited collaboration in the sense that a user could send the tape to another person to let them edit the document or make a copy. It was a revolution for the word processing industry. In 1969, the tapes were replaced by magnetic cards. These memory cards were inserted into an extra device that accompanied the MT/ST, able to read and record users' work. Throughout

1548-402: A variety of settings and regions. The test used a number of passages from newspapers , magazines, and books—as well as a standard reading test. They found a mean grade score of 7.81 (eighth month of the seventh grade ). About one-third read at the 2nd to 6th- grade level , one-third at the 7th to 12th-grade level, and one-third at the 13th–17th grade level. The authors emphasized that one-half of

1634-417: A word processor and a desktop publishing program has become unclear as word processing software has gained features such as ligature support added to the 2010 version of Microsoft Word . Common word processor programs include LibreOffice Writer , Google Docs and Microsoft Word . Word processors developed from mechanical machines, later merging with computer technology. The history of word processing

1720-608: Is a number that corresponds with a U.S. grade level. The sentence, "The Australian platypus is seemingly a hybrid of a mammal and reptilian creature" is an 11.3 as it has 24 syllables and 13 words. The different weighting factors for words per sentence and syllables per word in each scoring system mean that the two schemes are not directly comparable and cannot be converted. The grade level formula emphasizes sentence length over word length. By creating one-word strings with hundreds of random characters, grade levels may be attained that are hundreds of times larger than high school completion in

1806-412: Is calculated with the following formula: 0.39 ( total words total sentences ) + 11.8 ( total syllables total words ) − 15.59 {\displaystyle 0.39\left({\frac {\mbox{total words}}{\mbox{total sentences}}}\right)+11.8\left({\frac {\mbox{total syllables}}{\mbox{total words}}}\right)-15.59} The result

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1892-600: Is infeasible. Japanese word processing became possible with the development of the Japanese input method (a sequence of keypresses, with visual feedback, which selects a character) -- now widely used in personal computers. Oki launched OKI WORD EDITOR-200 in March 1979 with this kana-based keyboard input system. In 1980 several electronics and office equipment brands including entered this rapidly growing market with more compact and affordable devices. For instance, NEC introduced

1978-439: Is inherently broad and can become confusing when examining all of the possible definitions. Readability is a concept that involves audience, content, quality, legibility, and can even involve the formatting and design structure of any given text. Different definitions of readability exist from various sources. The definition fluctuates based on the type of audience to whom one is presenting a certain type of content to. For example,

2064-548: Is often recommended for use in healthcare. The Golub Syntactic Density Score was developed by Lester Golub in 1974. In 1973, a study commissioned by the US military of the reading skills required for different military jobs produced the FORCAST formula. Unlike most other formulas, it uses only a vocabulary element, making it useful for texts without complete sentences. The formula satisfied requirements that it would be: In 1975, in

2150-477: Is read. This was called reading persistence, depth, or perseverance He also found that people will read less of long articles than of short ones, for example, a story nine paragraphs long will lose 3 out of 10 readers by the fifth paragraph. In contrast, a shorter story will lose only 2 out of 10 readers. A study in 1947 by Melvin Lostutter showed that newspapers were generally written at a level five years above

2236-467: Is the story of the gradual automation of the physical aspects of writing and editing, and then to the refinement of the technology to make it available to corporations and Individuals. The term word processing appeared in American offices in the early 1970s centered on the idea of streamlining the work to typists, but the meaning soon shifted toward the automation of the whole editing cycle. At first,

2322-877: The Gypsy word processor). These were popularized by MacWrite on the Apple Macintosh in 1983, and Microsoft Word on the IBM PC in 1984. These were probably the first true WYSIWYG word processors to become known to many people. Of particular interest also is the standardization of TrueType fonts used in both Macintosh and Windows PCs. While the publishers of the operating systems provide TrueType typefaces, they are largely gathered from traditional typefaces converted by smaller font publishing houses to replicate standard fonts. Demand for new and interesting fonts, which can be found free of copyright restrictions, or commissioned from font designers, developed. The growing popularity of

2408-612: The NWP-20  [ jp ] , and Fujitsu launched the Fujitsu OASYS  [ jp ] . While the average unit price in 1980 was 2,000,000 JPY (US$ 14,300), it was dropped to 164,000 JPY (US$ 1,200) in 1985. Even after personal computers became widely available, Japanese word processors remained popular as they tended to be more portable (an "office computer" was initially too large to carry around), and become commonplace for business and academics, even for private individuals in

2494-515: The University of Chicago and Bernice Leary of Xavier College in Chicago published What Makes a Book Readable, one of the most important books in readability research. Like Dale and Tyler, they focused on what makes books readable for adults of limited reading ability. Their book included the first scientific study of the reading skills of American adults. The sample included 1,690 adults from

2580-406: The $ 10,000 range. Cheap general-purpose personal computers were still the domain of hobbyists. In Japan, even though typewriters with Japanese writing system had widely been used for businesses and governments, they were limited to specialists and required special skills due to the wide variety of letters, until computer-based devices came onto the market. In 1977, Sharp showcased a prototype of

2666-466: The 16th to the 11th-grade level, where it remains today. Publishers discovered that the Flesch formulas could increase readership up to 60%. Flesch's work made an enormous impact on journalism. The Flesch Reading Ease formula became one of the most widely used, tested, and reliable readability metrics. In 1951, Farr, Jenkins, and Patterson simplified the formula further by changing the syllable count. In

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2752-432: The 1940s, Robert Gunning helped bring readability research into the workplace. In 1944, he founded the first readability consulting firm dedicated to reducing the "fog" in newspapers and business writing. In 1952, he published The Technique of Clear Writing with his own Fog Index, a formula that correlates 0.91 with comprehension as measured by reading tests. Edgar Dale , a professor of education at Ohio State University,

2838-612: The 1960s and 70s, word processing began to slowly shift from glorified typewriters augmented with electronic features to become fully computer-based (although only with single-purpose hardware) with the development of several innovations. Just before the arrival of the personal computer (PC), IBM developed the floppy disk . In the 1970s, the first proper word-processing systems appeared, which allowed display and editing of documents on CRT screens . During this era, these early stand-alone word processing systems were designed, built, and marketed by several pioneering companies. Linolex Systems

2924-576: The 9th to the 6th-grade reading level increased readership by 43% for an article about 'nylon'. He also found a 60% increase in readership for an article on corn, with better responses from people under 35. The result was a gain of 42,000 readers in a circulation of 275,000. Wilber Schramm, who directed the Communications Research program at the University of Illinois interviewed 1,050 newspaper readers in 1947. He found that an easier reading style helps to determine how much of an article

3010-769: The College Entrance Examination Board. In 1988, Jack Stenner and his associates at MetaMetrics, Inc. published the Lexile Framework for assessing readability and matching students with appropriate texts. The Lexile framework uses average sentence length, and average word frequency in the American Heritage Intermediate Corpus to predict a score on a 0–2000 scale. The AHI Corpus includes five million words from 1,045 published works often read by students in grades three to nine. In 2000, researchers of

3096-441: The Flesch reading-ease score (FRES) test is: 206.835 − 1.015 ( total words total sentences ) − 84.6 ( total syllables total words ) {\displaystyle 206.835-1.015\left({\frac {\text{total words}}{\text{total sentences}}}\right)-84.6\left({\frac {\text{total syllables}}{\text{total words}}}\right)} Scores can be interpreted as shown in

3182-533: The German word Textverarbeitung ) itself was possibly created in the 1950s by Ulrich Steinhilper , a German IBM typewriter sales executive, or by an American electro-mechanical typewriter executive, George M. Ryan, who obtained a trademark registration in the USPTO for the phrase. However, it did not make its appearance in 1960s office management or computing literature (an example of grey literature ), though many of

3268-553: The McCall-Crabbs reading tests. In 1948, Bernard Feld did a study of every item and ad in the Birmingham News of 20 November 1947. He divided the items into those above the 8th-grade level and those at the 8th grade or below. He chose the 8th-grade breakpoint, as that was determined to be the average reading level of adult readers. An 8th-grade text "...will reach about 50% of all American grown-ups," he wrote. Among

3354-544: The School Renaissance Institute and Touchstone Applied Science Associates published their Advantage-TASA Open Standard (ATOS) Reading ease Formula for Books. They worked on a formula that was easy to use and that could be used with any texts. The project was one of the widest reading ease projects ever. The developers of the formula used 650 normed reading texts, 474 million words from all the text in 28,000 books read by students. The project also used

3440-483: The United States. Due to the formula's construction, the score does not have an upper bound. The lowest grade level score in theory is −3.40 (belonging to the passage "Go. See. Stop. Rest." for example), but there are few real passages in which every sentence consists of a single one-syllable word. Green Eggs and Ham by Dr. Seuss comes close, averaging 5.7 words per sentence and 1.02 syllables per word, with

3526-498: The Windows operating system in the 1990s later took Microsoft Word along with it. Originally called "Microsoft Multi-Tool Word", this program quickly became a synonym for “word processor”. Early in the 21st century, Google Docs popularized the transition to online or offline web browser based word processing. This was enabled by the widespread adoption of suitable internet connectivity in businesses and domestic households and later

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3612-433: The ability of average American adult readers. The reading ease of newspaper articles was not found to have much connection with the education, experience, or personal interest of the journalists writing the stories. It instead had more to do with the convention and culture of the industry. Lostutter argued for more readability testing in newspaper writing. Improved readability must be a "conscious process somewhat independent of

3698-518: The adult population at that time lacked suitable reading materials. They wrote, "For them, the enriching values of reading are denied unless materials reflecting adult interests are adapted to their needs." The poorest readers, one-sixth of the adult population, need "simpler materials for use in promoting functioning literacy and in establishing fundamental reading habits." In 1939, Irving Lorge published an article that reported other combinations of variables that indicate difficulty more accurately than

3784-468: The age of 13, Rubakin published many articles and books on science and many subjects for the great numbers of new readers throughout Russia. In Rubakin's view, the people were not fools. They were simply poor and in need of cheap books, written at a level they could grasp. The earliest reading ease assessment is the subjective judgment termed text leveling . Formulas do not fully address the various content, purpose, design, visual input, and organization of

3870-528: The best indicators of reading ease. He showed that the measures of reading ease worked as well for adults as for children. The same things that children find hard are the same for adults of the same reading levels. He also developed several new measures of cutoff scores. One of the most well known was the Mean Cloze Formula , which was used in 1981 to produce the Degree of Reading Power system used by

3956-454: The closer writing is to speech, the more clear and effective the content becomes. In 1889 in Russia, the writer Nikolai A. Rubakin published a study of over 10,000 texts written by everyday people. From these texts, he took 1,500 words he thought most people understood. He found that the main blocks to comprehension are unfamiliar words and long sentences . Starting with his own journal at

4042-495: The criterion books. It was also the first to introduce the variable of interest to the concept of readability. Between 1929 and 1939, Alfred Lewerenz of the Los Angeles School District published several new formulas. In 1934, educational psychologist Edward Thorndike of Columbia University noted that, in Russia and Germany, teachers used word frequency counts to match books to students. Word skill

4128-486: The dedicated machines and soon dominated the market. In the late 1980s, innovations such as the advent of laser printers , a "typographic" approach to word processing ( WYSIWYG - What You See Is What You Get), using bitmap displays with multiple fonts (pioneered by the Xerox Alto computer and Bravo word processing program), and graphical user interfaces such as “copy and paste” (another Xerox PARC innovation, with

4214-511: The degree of reading ease for each kind of reading. The best level for classroom "assisted reading" is a slightly difficult text that causes a "set to learn", and for which readers can correctly answer 50% of the questions of a multiple-choice test. The best level for unassisted reading is one for which readers can correctly answer 80% of the questions. These cutoff scores were later confirmed by Vygotsky and Chall and Conard. Among other things, Bormuth confirmed that vocabulary and sentence length are

4300-587: The designers of word processing systems combined existing technologies with emerging ones to develop stand-alone equipment, creating a new business distinct from the emerging world of the personal computer. The concept of word processing arose from the more general data processing, which since the 1950s had been the application of computers to business administration. Through history, there have been three types of word processors: mechanical, electronic and software. The first word processing device (a "Machine for Transcribing Letters" that appears to have been similar to

4386-536: The early research, which was later taken up by textbook publishers. In 1921, Harry D. Kitson published The Mind of the Buyer , one of the first books to apply psychology to marketing. Kitson's work showed that each type of reader bought and read their own type of text. On reading two newspapers and two magazines, he found that short sentence length and short word length were the best contributors to reading ease. In 1923, Bertha A. Lively and Sidney L. Pressey published

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4472-452: The education and experience of the staffs writers. " In 1948, Flesch published his Reading Ease formula in two parts. Rather than using grade levels, it used a scale from 0 to 100, with 0 equivalent to the 12th grade and 100 equivalent to the 4th grade. It dropped the use of affixes. The second part of the formula predicts human interest by using personal references and the number of personal sentences. The new formula correlated 0.70 with

4558-620: The electronic authoring and delivery of technical information), usefulness of the Flesch–Kincaid readability formula, computer aids for editing tests, illustrated formats to teach procedures, and the Computer Readability Editing System (CRES). The F–K formula was first used by the Army for assessing the difficulty of technical manuals in 1978 and soon after became a United States Military Standard . Pennsylvania

4644-401: The field of education. The "Flesch–Kincaid Grade Level Formula" presents a score as a U.S. grade level , making it easier for teachers, parents, librarians, and others to judge the readability level of various books and texts. It can also mean the number of years of education generally required to understand this text, relevant when the formula results in a number greater than 10. The grade level

4730-415: The first reading ease formula. They were concerned that junior high school science textbooks had so many technical words and that teachers would spend all class time explaining these words. They argued that their formula would help to measure and reduce the "vocabulary burden" of textbooks. Their formula used five variable inputs and six constants. For each thousand words, it counted the number of unique words,

4816-417: The function, but current word processors are word processor programs running on general purpose computers. The functions of a word processor program fall somewhere between those of a simple text editor and a fully functioned desktop publishing program. While the distinction between a text editor and a word processor is clear—namely the capability of editing rich text —the distinctions between

4902-518: The ideas, products, and technologies to which it would later be applied were already well known. Nonetheless, by 1971, the term was recognized by the New York Times as a business " buzz word ". Word processing paralleled the more general "data processing", or the application of computers to business administration. Thus, by 1972, the discussion of word processing was common in publications devoted to business office management and technology; by

4988-583: The importance of organization, coherence, and emphasis in good writing. In the 1880s, English professor L. A. Sherman found that the English sentence was getting shorter. In Elizabethan times, the average sentence was 50 words long while in Sherman's modern time, it was 23 words long. Sherman's work established that: Sherman wrote: "No man should talk worse than he writes, no man should write better than he should talk..." He wrote this wanting to emphasize that

5074-426: The limits of the reading ease formulas, some research looked at ways to measure the content, organization, and coherence of text. Although this did not improve the reliability of the formulas, their efforts showed the importance of these variables in reading ease. Studies by Walter Kintch and others showed the central role of coherence in reading ease, mainly for people learning to read. In 1983, Susan Kemper devised

5160-484: The mat." scores 116. The score does not have a theoretical lower bound; therefore, it is possible to make the score as low as wanted by arbitrarily including words with many syllables. The sentence "This sentence, taken as a reading passage unto itself, is being used to prove a point." has a readability of 69. The sentence "The Australian platypus is seemingly a hybrid of a mammal and reptilian creature." scores 37.5 as it has 24 syllables and 13 words. While Amazon calculates

5246-617: The mid-1970s, the term would have been familiar to any office manager who consulted business periodicals. By the late 1960s, IBM had developed the IBM MT/ST (Magnetic Tape/Selectric Typewriter). It was a model of the IBM Selectric typewriter from earlier in 1961, but it came built into its own desk, integrated with magnetic tape recording and playback facilities along with controls and a bank of electrical relays. The MT/ST automated word wrap, but it had no screen. This device allowed

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5332-485: The military, medicine, and business. The two publications with the largest circulations, TV Guide (13 million) and Reader's Digest (12 million), are written at the 9th-grade level. The most popular novels are written at the 7th-grade level. This supports the fact that the average adult reads at the 9th-grade level. It also shows that, for recreation, people read texts that are two grades below their actual reading level. For centuries, teachers and educators have seen

5418-883: The most popular systems of the 1970s and early 1980s. The Wang system displayed text on a CRT screen, and incorporated virtually every fundamental characteristic of word processors as they are known today. While early computerized word processor system were often expensive and hard to use (that is, like the computer mainframes of the 1960s), the Wang system was a true office machine, affordable to organizations such as medium-sized law firms, and easily mastered and operated by secretarial staff. The phrase "word processor" rapidly came to refer to CRT-based machines similar to Wang's. Numerous machines of this kind emerged, typically marketed by traditional office-equipment companies such as IBM, Lanier (AES Data machines - re-badged), CPT, and NBI. All were specialized, dedicated, proprietary systems, with prices in

5504-596: The number of words not on the Thorndike list, and the median index number of the words found on the list. Manually, it took three hours to apply the formula to a book. After the Lively–Pressey study, people looked for formulas that were more accurate and easier to apply. In 1928, Carleton Washburne and Mabel Vogel created the first modern readability formula. They validated it by using an outside criterion, and correlated .845 with test scores of students who read and liked

5590-428: The ones Gray and Leary used. His research also showed that, "The vocabulary load is the most important concomitant of difficulty." In 1944, Lorge published his Lorge Index , a readability formula that used three variables and set the stage for simpler and more reliable formulas that followed. By 1940, investigators had: In 1943, Rudolf Flesch published his PhD dissertation, Marks of a Readable Style , which included

5676-412: The public. By the late 1970s, computerized word processors were still primarily used by employees composing documents for large and midsized businesses (e.g., law firms and newspapers). Within a few years, the falling prices of PCs made word processing available for the first time to all writers in the convenience of their homes. The first word processing program for personal computers ( microcomputers )

5762-499: The reading ease of other texts, a method now called scaling . He showed that even though these factors cannot be measured, they cannot be ignored. Also in 1934, Ralph Tyler and Edgar Dale published the first adult reading ease formula based on passages on health topics from a variety of textbooks and magazines. Of 29 factors that are significant for young readers, they found ten that are significant for adults. They used three of these in their formula. In 1935, William S. Gray of

5848-404: The reading records of more than 30,000 who read and were tested on 950,000 books. They found that three variables give the most reliable measure of text reading ease: They also found that: Beginning in the 1970s, cognitive theorists began teaching that reading is really an act of thinking and organization. The reader constructs meaning by mixing new knowledge into existing knowledge. Because of

5934-496: The second half of the 1980s. The phrase "word processor" has been abbreviated as "Wa-pro" or "wapuro" in Japanese. The final step in word processing came with the advent of the personal computer in the late 1970s and 1980s and with the subsequent creation of word processing software. Word processing software that would create much more complex and capable output was developed and prices began to fall, making them more accessible to

6020-524: The short-term rather than drilling words and meanings teachers hope will stick. The incidental learning tactic is meant to help learners build comprehension and learning skills rather than memorizing words. Through this strategy, students would hopefully be able to navigate various levels of readability using context clues and comprehension. During the recession of the 1930s, the U.S. government invested in adult education . In 1931, Douglas Waples and Ralph Tyler published What Adults Want to Read About. It

6106-545: The table below. Reader's Digest magazine has a readability index of about 65, Time magazine scores about 52, an average grade six student's written assignment (age of 12) has a readability index of 60–70 (and a reading grade level of six to seven), and the Harvard Law Review has a general readability score in the low 30s. The highest (easiest) readability score possible is 121.22, but only if every sentence consists of only one-syllable words. "The cat sat on

6192-433: The text of Moby-Dick as 57.9, one particularly long sentence about sharks in chapter 64 has a readability score of −146.77. One sentence in the beginning of Scott Moncrieff's English translation of Swann's Way , by Marcel Proust, has a score of −515.1. The U.S. Department of Defense uses the reading ease test as the standard test of readability for its documents and forms. Florida requires that insurance policies have

6278-464: The time, (about $ 60,000 adjusted for inflation). The Redactron Corporation (organized by Evelyn Berezin in 1969) designed and manufactured editing systems, including correcting/editing typewriters, cassette and card units, and eventually a word processor called the Data Secretary. The Burroughs Corporation acquired Redactron in 1976. A CRT-based system by Wang Laboratories became one of

6364-529: The vocabulary burden of textbooks. This was the last of the early formulas that used the Thorndike vocabulary-frequency list. Until computers came along, word frequency lists were the best aids for grading reading ease of texts. In 1981 the World Book Encyclopedia listed the grade levels of 44,000 words. A popular strategy amongst educators in modern times is "incidental vocabulary learning," which enforces efficiency in learning vocabulary in

6450-402: The wire-service stories, the lower group got two-thirds more readers, and among local stories, 75% more readers. Feld also believed in drilling writers in Flesch's clear-writing principles. Both Rudolf Flesch and Robert Gunning worked extensively with newspapers and the wire services in improving readability. Mainly through their efforts in a few years, the readability of US newspapers went from

6536-559: The word lists by regular plurals of nouns, regular forms of the past tense of verbs, progressive forms of verbs etc. In 1948, he incorporated this list into a formula he developed with Jeanne S. Chall , who later founded the Harvard Reading Laboratory. In 1995, Dale and Chall published a new version of their formula with an upgraded word list, the New Dale–Chall readability formula. The Spache readability formula

6622-513: Was Electric Pencil , from Michael Shrayer Software , which went on sale in December 1976. In 1978, WordStar appeared and because of its many new features soon dominated the market. WordStar was written for the early CP/M (Control Program–Micro) operating system, ported to CP/M-86 , then to MS-DOS , and was the most popular word processing program until 1985 when WordPerfect sales first exceeded WordStar sales. Early word processing software

6708-467: Was a two-year study of adult reading interests. Their book showed not only what people read but what they would like to read. They found that many readers lacked suitable reading materials: they would have liked to learn but the reading materials were too hard for them. Lyman Bryson of Teachers College, Columbia University found that many adults had poor reading ability due to poor education. Even though colleges had long tried to teach how to write in

6794-506: Was developed in 1952. In 1963, while teaching English teachers in Uganda, Edward Fry developed his Readability Graph . It became one of the most popular formulas and easiest to apply. The automated readability index was developed in 1967. Harry McLaughlin determined that word length and sentence length should be multiplied rather than added as in other formulas. In 1969, he published his SMOG (Simple Measure of Gobbledygook) formula. It

6880-449: Was founded in 1970 by James Lincoln and Robert Oleksiak. Linolex based its technology on microprocessors, floppy drives and software. It was a computer-based system for application in the word processing businesses and it sold systems through its own sales force. With a base of installed systems in over 500 sites, Linolex Systems sold 3 million units in 1975 — a year before the Apple computer

6966-596: Was not as intuitive as word processor devices. Most early word processing software required users to memorize semi-mnemonic key combinations rather than pressing keys such as "copy" or "bold". Moreover, CP/M lacked cursor keys; for example WordStar used the E-S-D-X-centered "diamond" for cursor navigation. A notable exception was the software Lexitype for MS-DOS that took inspiration from the Lexitron dedicated word processor's user interface and which mapped individual functions to particular keyboard function keys , and

7052-417: Was one of the first critics of Thorndike's vocabulary-frequency lists. He claimed that they did not distinguish between the different meanings that many words have. He created two new lists of his own. One, his "short list" of 769 easy words, was used by Irving Lorge in his formula. The other was his "long list" of 3,000 easy words, which were understood by 80% of fourth-grade students. However, one has to extend

7138-495: Was released. At that time, the Lexitron Corporation also produced a series of dedicated word-processing microcomputers. Lexitron was the first to use a full-sized video display screen (CRT) in its models by 1978. Lexitron also used 5 1 ⁄ 4 inch floppy diskettes, which became the standard in the personal computer field. The program disk was inserted in one drive, and the system booted up . The data diskette

7224-412: Was the best sign of intellectual development, and the strongest predictor of reading ease. In 1921, Thorndike published Teachers Word Book , which contained the frequencies of 10,000 words. He also published his readability formula. He wrote that word skills can be increased if the teacher introduces new words and repeats them often. In 1939, W.W. Patty and W. I Painter published a formula for measuring

7310-525: Was the first U.S. state to require that automobile insurance policies be written at no higher than a ninth-grade level (14–15 years of age) of reading difficulty, as measured by the F–K formula. This is now a common requirement in many other states and for other legal documents such as insurance policies. In the Flesch reading-ease test, higher scores indicate material that is easier to read; lower numbers mark passages that are more difficult to read. The formula for

7396-414: Was then put in the second drive. The operating system and the word processing program were combined in one file. Another of the early word processing adopters was Vydec, which created in 1973 the first modern text processor, the "Vydec Word Processing System". It had built-in multiple functions like the ability to share content by diskette and print it. The Vydec Word Processing System sold for $ 12,000 at

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