Reading Ease: Can people easily read what you’re writing?
There’s a couple of ways to test whether people can easily read what you write.
Most versions of MsWord have the Flesch-Kincaid Readability Test buried in the Tools menu as part of your grammar and spelling check. more…
May 5th, 2008 at 9:33 pm
Interesting stuff. I agree that these sorts of tests are useful indicators. And I agree that, as a rule, short sentences should be preferred to long sentences, and little words peferred to big words, as long as they carry sufficient precision. But the x-factor is that of ‘fluency’. It seems to me that writing needs to be ’smooth’ rather than ‘bumpy’, but how do you test for this? Long sentences which flow comfortably and don’t disturb the reader’s equalibrium can add rhythm to a piece and make it more enjoyable to read. Whereas short stacatto sentences sometimes stun senses. Whaddayareckon?