..... to make a best match between readers and text it is necessary to obtain information about the intended readers, information about the
readability of the material, and information about the purpose for its use.
Information on the intended readers might include
– when available – their reading ability, their previous knowledge and interest in the
topic, and how the material is to be read – whether independently or
as part of instruction by a teacher. A students‟ reading ability may be estimated by scores or bands on a
recently administered reading test. If these are not available, estimates of reading ability may be made by noting readability of the books,
magazines, and newspaper they read.
29
Therefore, as there are some aspects that should be considered in readability assessment, the writer would like to focus only on one aspect, it
is the use of readability formula n measuring the readability of selected texts.
C.
Readability
1. The Understanding of Readability
Bidyarani Asem in her article Readability Assessment of Printed Materials: Going beyond Readability Formulas points out
, “Readability is a term used to determine the ease with which people read and understand a
particular text. It is one of the most important factors that depict the comprehensibility of the concerned text.”
30
Readability, according to Asem, is a term related to the comprehensibility of a text in which the
readers understand or not regarding to the ease of the text. Furthermore, DuBay defines
“Readability is what makes some texts easier to
read and understand than others.”
31
Readability, according to DuBay, is a factor that makes a text easy to be read and understood by
particular readers.
29
Ibid., p. 46.
30
Bidyarani Asem, Readability Assessment of Printed Materials: Going Beyond Readability Formulas, International Journal of Environment, Ecology, Family and Urban Studies
IJEEFUS, Vol. 2, Issue 4, Dec. 2012, p. 45.
31
William H. DuBay, the Principles of Readability, Costa Mesa: Impact Information, 2004, p. 3.
George Klare in DuBay defines readability as “the ease of
understanding or comprehension due to the style of writing.” This definition is based on writing style out of content, coherence, and
organization of the texts.
32
In the same book, Gretcen Hargis et.al. defines readabili
ty as the “ease of reading words and sentences.”
33
They also add that readability is an attribute of clarity. Thus, the clarity of words and
senetences leads to the ease of the texts. Further, G. Harry McLaughlin points out that readability i
s “the degree to which a given class of people find certain reading matter compelling and comprehensible.”
34
When a class of people find a text is comprehensible for them, they have met the
text‟s readability that suits their reading level. Edgar Dale and Jeanne Call in DuBay
define readability as “the sum total including all the interactions of all those elements within a given
piece of printed material that affect the success a group of readers have with it. The success is the extent to which they understand it, read it at an
optimal speed, and find it interesting.”
35
We can also say that when students find a text is interesting for them and they are able to read and
understand it, then the text is readable for them. In the book Teaching Reading Skills in a Foreign Language, Nuttal
defines readability as the combination of structural and lexical difficulty.
36
Thus, the term readability is not only refers to the lexical difficulty of a text but also the structural difficulty. To sum up, readability is a
combination of the difficulty in vocabulary and the structure of the text. From various definitions above, it can be concluded that readability is
the ease and difficulty level of texts related to students‟ reading ability.
32
Ibid.
33
Ibid.
34
Ibid.
35
Ibid.
36
Nuttal, op. cit., p. 25.
