Tuesday, November 13, 2012

Self Editing in Microsoft Word Part 1

As a parent, I am in constant battles with my sons about composing and revising documents. (yeah , yeah I know I am no Language Arts expert) So here are two things you can do to help your student/child self edit a document.  The first is to check the grade level equivalence.  You can do this by:

  1. Click the Microsoft Office Button, and then click Word Options.
  2. Click Proofing.
  3. Make sure Check grammar with spelling is selected.
  4. Under When correcting grammar in Word, select the Show readability statistics check box.
I am using an older version of Word ( my employer says there is no monies to up grade even though other units received new laptops )on my Mac  so I went to :
  • Tools- spelling and grammar
  • Options on the bottom right hand corner
  • Show readability statistics
  • Once you finish the document you can run it through spell check and at the end it will give you a readability score.
I was so tempted to take out my red pen, add my comments and make edits but I resisted and ran it through the Readability test.

So what does this mean and how are these scores calculated...

Understand readability scores

Each readability test bases its rating on the average number of syllables per word and words per sentence. The following sections explain how each test scores your file's readability.

Flesch Reading Ease test

This test rates text on a 100-point scale. The higher the score, the easier it is to understand the document. For most standard files, you want the score to be between 60 and 70.
The formula for the Flesch Reading Ease score is:
206.835 – (1.015 x ASL) – (84.6 x ASW)
where:
ASL = average sentence length (the number of words divided by the number of sentences)
ASW = average number of syllables per word (the number of syllables divided by the number of words)

Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level test

This test rates text on a U.S. school grade level. For example, a score of 8.0 means that an eighth grader can understand the document. For most documents, aim for a score of approximately 7.0 to 8.0.
The formula for the Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level score is:
(.39 x ASL) + (11.8 x ASW) – 15.59
where:
ASL = average sentence length (the number of words divided by the number of sentences)
ASW = average number of syllables per word (the number of syllables divided by the number of words)
Here is a sample of my son's assignment. Even though I thought it was weak, it did pass my readability test standards since he is currently in the fifth grade and his grade level equivalence came out to be 7.0

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