Readability index analysis of English textbooks for Ghanaian Senior High Schools

Abstract

Readability of a text enhances text comprehension. In academic circles, textbooks are to be written such that an individual would be able read and comprehend the text on his/her own, an approach which is especially important to second language learners of English. However, a number of studies have reported low readability of textbooks across disciplines. In Ghana, only one of such studies have been reported. Hence, this paper aims at evaluating the readability of four popular English language course books used at the senior high school level in Ghana. Passages from each textbook were conveniently selected for readability analyses. Flesch reading ease (FRE) and Flesch – Kincaid grade level (FKGL) indexes were used to compute readability scores. Measures of central tendencies, one-sample t-test, with bootstrapping, were used to analyse the data. The findings from the results indicate that the readability of the four books ranged between fairly difficult to very difficult to read. The most difficult to read text was in the ‘summary’ and ‘objectives’ books. On the average, easiest to read textbook (a touch of class) required about 11 years of education to read (SHS 3 students). In addition, that two out of the four books recorded significantly higher FKGL scores than the threshold of 10 (SHS 1). This study has brought to light the need for attention to be given to the language of pedagogy in Ghana. Policy makers on education are encouraged to make the use of plain language in teaching and learning in our educational institutions a matter of serious concern.