| Creator | MetaMetrics |
|---|---|
| Website | www.lexile.com |
The Lexile Framework for Reading is an educational tool that uses a measure called a Lexile to match readers of all ages with books, articles and other leveled reading resources.
Recognized as the most widely adopted measure of reading ability, more than 28 million Lexile measures are reported from reading programs and assessments annually.[1] Thus, about half of U.S. students in grades 3rd through 12th receive a Lexile measure each year.[2] Lexile measures are being used across schools in all 50 states and abroad.[3]
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The Lexile Framework for Reading is made up of Lexile reader measures and Lexile text measures, both of which are put on the Lexile scale.
The Lexile scale runs from below 0L (Lexile) to above 2000L.[4] Scores 0L and below are reported as BR (Beginning Reader).
A Lexile measure is defined as "the numeric representation of an individual’s reading ability or a text’s readability (or difficulty), followed by an “L” (Lexile)".[5] There are two types of Lexile measures: Lexile reader measures and Lexile text measures. A Lexile reader measure typically is obtained when an individual completes a reading comprehension test. Once a field study has been performed to link Lexile Framework with the test, the individual’s reading score can be reported as a Lexile measure.
For an individual, a Lexile measure is typically obtained from a reading comprehension assessment or program. These range from the adolescent level (DIBELS: Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills) to the adult level (TABE: Test of Adult Basic Education). A Lexile text measure is obtained by evaluating the readability of a piece of text, such as a book or an article. The Lexile Analyzer, a software program specially designed to evaluate reading demand, analyzes the text’s semantic (word frequency) and syntactic (sentence length) characteristics and assigns it a Lexile measure. Over 60,000 Web sites, 115,000 fiction and nonfiction books, and 80 million articles have Lexile measures, and these numbers continue to grow. Over 150 publishers including Capstone Publishers,[6] Discovery Ed, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, McGraw-Hill, Pearson PLC, Riverside Publishing, Scholastic Corporation, Simon & Schuster,[7] Workman Publishing Company,[8] and World Book[9] offer certified Lexile® text measures for their materials.[10]
The maker claims that noting the Lexile measure of a text can assist in selecting “targeted” materials that present an appropriate level of challenge for a reader — not too difficult to be frustrating, yet difficult enough to challenge a reader and encourage reading growth.
There is no direct correspondence between a specific Lexile measure and a specific grade level.
The genesis of the Lexile Framework for Reading can be traced back to work that A. Jackson Stenner, MetaMetrics chairman and CEO, was performing for the national evaluation of Head Start, when he had to compare different programs from across the country that used different outcome measures.[11] These different outcome measures were due to the different tests that were used to measure academic skills.
The development of the Lexile Framework was fueled by conversations and comments from Dr. John B. Carroll (UNC-Chapel Hill) and Dr. Benjamin Wright (University of Chicago), and was done with mathematical and psychometrical assistance from Dr. Donald S. Burdick, associate professor emeritus of Statistical Science, Duke University, and current senior scientist at MetaMetrics.[12]
The Lexile Framework was developed by MetaMetrics co-founders Stenner and Malbert Smith III, Ph.D. The initial funding for the development of the Lexile Framework was provided by the National Institute of Health through the Small Business Innovation Research grant program. Over a twelve-year period, Stenner and Smith received a total of five grants.[13]
The measurement ideas embedded in the Lexile Framework can be found in two early articles by Drs. Stenner and Smith, “Testing Construct Theories” (1982) in Perceptual and Motor Skills and “Toward a Theory of Construct Definition”(1983) in the Journal of Educational Measurement.[14]
In Mesmer's Tools for Matching Readers to Texts: Research Based Practices, she stated that the Lexile Framework for Reading was valid, reliable, and had "excellent psychometric properties."[15] Mesmer mentioned a study by Walpole et al. (2006) that reported that the Lexile Framework was used to successfully match the participants to text 93% of the time. She also noted that the framework has been praised by reading experts.
In 2002, the Lexile Framework was evaluated by Dr. Dale Carlson. The independent consultant found that the Lexile Framework had a "well-delineated theoretical foundation."[16] Both Carlson and Mesmer have remarked on the positive and unique characteristic of having both the student and text on the same scale.[17]
In 2001, the National Center for Educational Statistics (NCES) formally reviewed Lexile measures. The report acknowledged the science behind Lexile measures: “The panel affirmed the value of both sentence length and word frequency as overall measures of semantic and syntactic complexity....”[18] Additionally, according to one panel member, the Lexile Framework appears “…exceptional in the psychometric care with which it has been developed; the extent of its formal validation with different populations of texts, tests, and children; in its automation; and in its developers’ continual quest to improve it.”[19]
Stephen Krashen, prominent educational researcher in language acquisition and professor emeritus at the University of Southern California, raised serious concerns with the Lexile rating system in his article, “The Lexile Framework: Unnecessary and Potentially Harmful.” [20] Krashen argues that a reading difficulty rating system limits children’s choices and steers them away from reading books in which they may be interested.
Furthermore, like most reading formulas, the formula used to determine a book’s Lexile level can often lead to a flawed rating. For example, The Library Mouse, by Daniel Kirk, is a 32-page children’s picture book rated by Amazon.com as “for ages 4-8” and has a Lexile score of 830. However, Stephenie Meyer’s 498-page, young adult novel Twilight only garnishes a Lexile score of 720. Similarly, Beverly Cleary’s Ramona Quimby, Age 8, has a Lexile score of 860, while Michael Crichton’s Jurassic Park only has a score of 710. [21]
Dr. Elfrieda H. Hiebert, Professor of Educational Psychology at University of California, Berkeley, noted in her study, "Interpreting Lexiles in Online Contexts and with Informational Texts," “The variability across individual parts of texts can be extensive. Within a single chapter of Pride and Prejudice, for example, 125-word excerpts of text (the unit of assessments used to obtain students’ Lexile levels) that were pulled from every 1,000 words had Lexiles that ranged from 670 to 1310, with an average of 952. The range of 640 on the LS [Lexile Scale] represents the span from third grade to college.” [22]
Dr. Hiebert also demonstrated that slight changes in punctuation, such as changing commas to periods, resulted in “significant reclassification on the LS [Lexile Scale]. [23]
Besides limiting children’s reading choices and misrepresenting books’ reading difficulty, adoption of the Lexile Scale has had other negative effects, but more at a systemic level. When school districts and states began to mandate specific readability programs, textbook publishers responded by manipulating texts to tailor them to the requirements of the readability formulas. [24]
Furthermore, the Lexile Framework costs states and school districts valuable resources. Even though other readability formulas, such as the Flesch-Kincaid used in Microsoft Word’s software, are widely used to establish reading levels and difficulty, the Lexile Scale is the major method of establishing text difficulty in American schools. However, unlike readability formulas of the past, MetaMetrics, the creator of the Lexile Framework, “retained the processing of readability as intellectual property, requiring educators and other clients to pay for their services to obtain readability levels.” [25]
Lexile measures are cited in the U.S. Common Core State Standards for English Language Arts to provide text complexity grade and corresponding Lexile ranges. These grade and Lexile ranges are used to help determine at what text complexity level students should be reading to help ensure students are prepared for the reading demands of college and careers.[26]
More examples are available here.
Over 40 reading assessments and programs report Lexile measures, including many popular instruments from Scholastic, Pearson, CTB/McGraw-Hill and Riverside Publishing, as well as a growing number of year-end state assessments.[28]
Both Barnes & Noble’s Lexile Reading Level Wizard and MetaMetrics’ Find a Book are free utilities that enable students to find books on subjects that interests them and are within their Lexile range. MetaMetrics also offers two tools free of charge to educators. The organization offers access to the Lexile Analyzer, a software program that is used to determine the Lexile measure of a text, and the Lexile Titles Database Download, a file containing Lexile measures for tens of thousands of books.