Abstract:

Abstract   The purpose of this study is to assess the readability of Science and Technology Textbooks for Secondary Schools through cloze procedure (CP) and the effect of the variable "word" on the assessment of readability through cloze tests in which different parts of the same text are deleted. The population of the study was comprised of the students at TOKI Mehmet Akif Ersoy Secondary School and Bogazici Secondary School in Duzce. The population consisted of a total of 383 students, namely fifth grade students (n=123), sixth grade students (n=81), seventh grade students (n=90) and eighth grade students (n=89). The data were collected through different cloze tests with 49 to 51 blanks, which were based on the texts extracted from the Science and Technology textbooks for fifth to eighth grade students. Three types of CP were followed on the basis of the same text. The study concluded that the texts included in the Science and Technology textbooks for fifth to eighth grade students were easily legible for the fifth and eighth grade students whereas they were legible at the grade level for the sixth and seventh grade students. Another important finding is that there was not a significant difference among the three types of CP, in which words were removed in a different rhythmic order on the same text. The results suggest that CP is not influenced by the variable "word" and that it can be used for assessing the readability of Turkish texts. Keywords: readability, readability formulas, filling in the blanks, cloze test  

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