How You Can Use Your Computer
to Determine the Readability Level of a Book or Article

 

• You can check the readability level of a passage using the Klesch-Kincaid Reading Level built into the newer versions of Microsoft® Word.  Randomly select three 100-word passages from a book or an article.

For example, in Word XP, to display readability statistics...

• On the Tools menu, click "Options", and click the "Spelling & Grammar" tab.
• Select the "Show readability statistics" check box, and then click "OK".
• On the Tools menu, click Spelling and Grammar .
• When Microsoft® Word finishes checking spelling and grammar, it displays information about the reading level of the document.  The grade level of the passage is the last item under “Readability”.

For Word 2007,