Text Complexity in the Content Areas:

Implications for Instruction

Adapted from Text Complexity in the Content Areas: Implications for Instruction,
A Trainer’s Training Resource Package by Nemah N. Hermosa, PhD.

Prepared by:

Winnie F. Tugade, PhD.

Education Program Supervisor
Curriculum Implementation Division
Schools Division Office-Valenzuela City
Department of Education-National Capital Region

Day 1 Session 1
 1. Explain the nature of text complexity;
2. Describe the tools used to measure text
complexity;
Session 3. Articulate the knowledge and skills
Objectives teachers need to match students with
the right texts/tasks;
4. Apply text complexity diagnostic tools
to a content area text; and
5. Recommend appropriate pedagogical
support to help students cope with the
demands/challenges posed by the text.
• As students move through the
grades, they are faced with texts
that are increasingly longer and
more complex in terms of the
vocabulary used, sentence
structure and text organization.

• Most if not all teachers often

complain that many of their
students cannot understand the
texts used in their grade level.
• Is this true in the classroom?
• Do we move students to easier texts?
• Do we read the texts to students?
• Do we tell students what texts say?
• Do we ignore that students can’t read
the text?
• Do you think there is a better
solution?
 Let’s BLENDigram!
•Read the sample texts.
•Answer and discuss with your groupmates
the following:

1. Are the texts saying the same thing?

2. Which text is more difficult to understand?
3. Cite pieces of evidence of difficulty.
4. React on the text structures of the two texts
through a Venn Diagram.
1. What makes the first/second text difficult from the
other?
2. What makes it different from the other?

3. What are some sources of difficulty?

4. What is the target grade level or reader of each text?

Why do you think so?
5. Why should teachers choose reading texts appropriate
for learners? How?

6. What insights did you gain from the activity?

Previewing questions:

1. What is text complexity?

2. What are the aspects of text complexity?

How are these aspects described?

3. How do we determine the complexity of

texts?

4. How are readability formulas used in

determining complexity of texts?
Previewing questions:

5. What are the qualitative values of

text, in terms of meaning, structure,
language, and knowledge?

6. How do motivation and scaffolding

improve students’ ability to read
complex text?

7. What do teachers need to know to help

students understand complex texts?
Let’s EXPLORE!

Video:
Text Complexity in the Content Areas:
Implications for Instruction,
A Trainer’s Training Resource Package
by Nemah N. Hermosa, PhD.
Post viewing questions:

1. What is text complexity?

 What is text complexity?
There is no exact science for determining the
complexity of a text. Nor is there a single
source of information that can accurately
summarize the complexity of a text. Teachers
need to use their professional judgment as
they take into consideration a range of factors.
 13

Post viewing questions:

2. What are the aspects of text

complexity? How are they described?
 3 Sources for Measuring Text Complexity

What a Text features

computer can best judged
“see” and by human
measure evaluation

What the teacher does with the text to

help students read and understand it
Qualitative
 15

Post viewing questions:

3. How do we determine the complexity of

texts?
Assigning a single measure
(grade level equivalent or
number) based on
• Sentence and word length
• Frequency of unfamiliar words You can
• Number of personal pronouns do these
• Number of prepositional phrases manually.

Dale-Chall Readability Formula

Flesch Reading Ease Readability Formula
Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level Readability Formula
Fry Readability Graph
Gunning’s Fog Index (or FOG) Readability Formula
 17

Post viewing questions:

4. How are readability formulas used in

determining complexity of texts?
Fry Readability Graph (1968)
1. Randomly select three 100-word passages from a
book or an article.
2. Plot the average number of syllables and the average
number of sentences per 100 words on the Fry
Readability Graph to determine the grade level of the
material.
3. Choose more passages per book if great variability is
observed and conclude that the book has uneven
readability.
4. Few books will fall into the solid black area, but when
they do grade level scores are invalid.
Quantitative Measures: Computer Software
 TEXT TWO LEXILE
SCORE
Humans have been manipulating crop 1060L
genetics for thousands of years, crossing and Gr 7
selecting plants that exhibit desirable traits. In
the last century, breeders exposed crops to
radiation and chemicals that caused them to
mutate. A mutation is a change in a crop's
genes that may be passed down to later
generations. Mutations can give fruits and
vegerables new colors and make crops disease
resistant. Most grains, vegetables and fruits are
descendants of mutant varieties.
 TEXT ONE LEXILE
SCORE

People have been experimenting with

crops for thousands of years. In the 560L
1900s, some people put chemicals on Gr 3
crops. This made the crops mutate. A
mutation is a change in the crop's
genes. Changing their genes made the
crops different. It gave some of them
new colors. Many crops grown today
come from mutated crops.
 TEXT ONE LEXILE
SCORE

The Human Rights Watch is a group 850L

that studies whether human rights are Gr 5
being denied around the world. They
found that many migrant children are
fleeing abuses. Some are afraid of being
forced to be soldiers, or forced to marry
someone. Their schools may have
been attacked.
 TEXT TWO LEXILE
SCORE

Human Rights Watch found that many 1170L

involuntary migrant children are fleeing Gr 9
abuses. These include recruitment as
soldiers, child marriage and attacks on
schools or other effects of armed
conflict.
Post viewing questions:

5. What are the qualitative values of

the text, in terms of meaning,
structure, language, and knowledge?
 Qualitative Values

• Layers of meaning • Text features

• Purpose • Genre
• Concept • Organization
complexity

• Vocabulary • Content
• Sentence length knowledge
and structure • Disciplinary
• Figurative knowledge
language • Intertextuality
• Regional/historical • Background &
usage (dialects) experiences
 Qualitative Values
SIMPLE TEXT COMPLEX TEXT
Single level of meaning Multiple levels of meaning

Explicit in purpose Implicit, hidden, obscure

purpose
Conventional Structure: Unconventional structure:
Chronological, traits of a Frequent use of flashbacks,
common genre other manipulations of time and
sequence
Simple language: Clear, Complex language: Figurative,
contemporary, familiar ironic, ambiguous, archaic,
conversational academic, domain-specific
 Qualitative Values
SIMPLE TEXT COMPLEX TEXT
Graphics: Unnecessary, Graphics: Essential, providing
supplemental information not conveyed by
text
Common everyday Experiences distinctly
experiences different from one’s own
Single perspective/ Multiple perspectives/
Perspective like one’s own Perspective unlike one’s
own
Tools for Measuring Text Complexity
 33

CAVEAT:

Not all descriptors described in each of

the categories will necessarily occur
together at each level of complexity. A
text may have very simple vocabulary and
short, simple sentences yet still be
complex because the ideas expressed are
subtle.
 34

6. How do motivation and scaffolding

improve students’ ability to read
complex text?
35
36
 37

7. What do teachers need to know to help

students understand complex texts?
 38

• Know their students

as readers
• Understand the
complexity of the
texts
• Be able to use a
Teachers range of instructional
need to: strategies flexibly
Express Yourself:

1.How has this session changed (however little)

the way you think about text?
2. What are your realizations and discoveries
about text complexity?
3. How will this change in point of view, change
you, as a teacher?
4. How will you apply what you have learned
from this session to solve the problem of the
students who cannot understand the text used in
your class?
Get Moving, Time to Prove!

1. Scan through the Activity Guide.

2. Evaluate the texts by applying quantitative
and qualitative evaluation tools and reader and
task demands.
3. Evaluate the feature of structure.
4. Discuss among yourselves which of the four
(4) cells applies to your text.
Get Moving, Time to Prove!

5. Take notes and write examples why you

choose the cell.
6. Give specific example or evidence from the
text that shows that such descriptor applies to
the text.
7. Write the answers on the Manila paper.
8. Present the output. (5 minute-presentation)
Subject - Text Title and Complexity Level
Group Author Readability measure plus
professional judgment
Text
Difficulty/ Meaning/ Structure
Complexity Purpose
Features
Language Knowledge Demands

Recommend
ed Teacher
Supports
 There is no magic fairy who is
going to do this work for us.
With the new curriculum, with the
addition of Senior High, with 21st
century demands, text will become
increasingly complex. It’s the job of the
teacher to figure out why it is complex
and what to do about it.
Thank you for
the dynamism!

M’Win