Evaluating children's literature by using the cloze procedure
Lewis B. Smith · Literacy Research and Instruction · 1982
This study reveals the results when passages from children's literature books were prepared using cloze techniques and presented to college and elementary school students. The readability levels of the books were measured as were the capabilities of the college students. The readability measures and the cloze results yielded widely differing results. College students did not do well on many of the cloze passages; elementary students achieved much less well. An analysis of the nature of college student errors is reported. Questions are raised about the desirability of using cloze for matching readers to creative writing in the forms of literature, such as was used in this study.