cpsc 689 digital libraries

1
readability metrics of childrens e-books

• cpsc 689 digital libraries
• december 10, 2002
• lisa m. smith

2
accelerated reader

• reading curriculum
• AR books
• 28,000 K-12 titles
• AR reading level
• help students choose books that maximize
  beneficial level of reading practice
• AR point value
• measure amount of reading practice received by
  the reader
• AR tests
• multiple-choice comprehension test
• earn AR points based on percentage of correct
  answers and AR point value

3
readability metrics

• AR Reading Level
• 1986 - May 2000
• FKGL
• June 2000 - present
• ATOS readabilty formula
• ave. words/sentence
• ave. chars/word
• ave. grade level of words
• AR Point Value
• (10 AR reading level) (number of words /
  100000)

• Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level
• DoD standard test
• Word Spelling and Grammar Tool
• FKGL formula
• (L 0.39) (N 11.8) - 15.59 years
• L ave.words/sent
• N ave. syllables/word
• Point Value
• (10 FKGL reading level) (number of words /
  100000)

4
childrens e-books

• 1-15 e-books also on AR list
• Little Women
• A Little Princess
• Alices Adventures in Wonder..
• Red Badge of Courage, The
• Oliver Twist
• Hound of Baskervilles, The
• Annes House of Dreams
• Men of Iron
• Uncle Toms Cabin
• Huckleberry Finn
• Tom Sawyer
• Connecticut Yankee in King
• Around the World in Eighty
• Birds Christmas Carol, The
• Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm

• 16-25 (10 additional e-books)
• Tom Swift in the Land of
• Marvelous Land of Oz, The
• The Lost Prince
• A Christmas Carol
• Lost World, The
• Jungle Book, The
• Polly of the Circus
• Pollyanna Grows Up
• Innocents Abroad
• Island of Dr. Moreau, The

5
fkgl vs. ar level

• implementation
• ATOS
• word-frequency corpus
• 474 million words
• grade-level vocabulary
• FKGL
• Word ?
• classic e-books
• writing style
• slang, shortened words
• vocabulary
• not found in dictionary
• conversion from book to e-book
• typos

• extra text in e-book ?
• illustration titles
• chapter dividers
• page separators
• page numbers

6
childrens e-book collection

• 25 e-books
• e-book file (.html)
• image of cover (.jpg or .gif)
• 1 metadata file
• index.txt
• 2 sources
• http//etext.lib.virginia.edu/ebooks/subjects/subj
  ects-young.html
• http//hamilton.dpsk12.org/ARauthor.html

• 10 metadata
• e-book title
• author
• year of authorship
• flesch-kincaid grade level
• point value
• AR reading level
• AR point value
• image
• link to e-book
• link to source

7
demonstration

• e-book list
• http//goober.shsu.edu/lisas/cpsc689dl/project_dl
  .html
• childrens e-book digital library collection
• http//128.194.147.811026/gsdl
• full-text search
• browsing hierarchies
• search results
• image of physical book
• readability metrics
• link to e-book
• link to source