about flesch-kincaid grade level

[rsanda]

In some pages it says the highest Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level is 12 but I got
12.6. What is the reason?

 

[Bob I]

It's strictly math, so you could work up most any score you desire, see
below for explanation.

Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level test
This test rates text on a U.S. school grade level. For example, a score
of 8.0 means that an eighth grader can understand the document. For most
documents, aim for a score of approximately 7.0 to 8.0.

The formula for the Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level score is:


(.39 x ASL) + (11.8 x ASW) – 15.59
where:

ASL = average sentence length (the number of words divided by the number
of sentences)

ASW = average number of syllables per word (the number of syllables
divided by the number of words)


http://office.microsoft.com/client/...&rt=2&ns=WINWORD&lcid=1033&pid=CH101512471033

 

[r7red]

In some pages it says the highest Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level is 12 but
got
12.6. What is the reason

Yeah, I have been curious about this, too. However, I can tell you tha
12 by no means is the ceiling (which you already know) -- my academi
papers/essays typically fall somewhere between 14 and 16 (although i
looking through my old papers, I found one that was 19.7).

Since I am an English/Literature major, the prose of my essays i
generally non-technical, but I imagine if I were...oh, say a
engineering major using highly technical language, the scores might b
considerably higher.

A 12.6 would imply that readers below grade 12 might find the idea
and/or vocabulary of your composition somewhat challenging

By the way, just for fun, I did a copy and paste of the above text (th
paragraphs above this sentence), and according to the Flesch-Kincai
grade-level measurement on MS Word, my response to your questio
received a 14.8, yet I'm sure that many 9th graders could easil
comprehend its meaning.

(The entire post excluding this sentence is 16.8....lol post-grad?
doubt it)

 

[duncand2006]

Since this is purely mathematical, on a hunch I created an absur
word-sentence to reach the conclusion that the actual highes
flesch-kincaid grade level is 33.3 using the following word cluster

CupuscularalogrythmicfunctionalityjustificationofsubtletiesdemonstrativediatribesCupuscularalogrythmicfunctionalityjustificationofsubtletiesdemonstrativediatribeCupuscularalogrythmicfunctionalityjustificationofsubtletiesdemonstrativediatribesCupuscularalogrythmicfunctionalityjustificationofsubtletiesdemonstrativediatribeCupuscularalogrythmicfunctionalityjustificationofsubtletiesdemonstrativediatribesCupuscularalogrythmicfunctionalityjustificationofsubtletiesdemonstrativediatribeCupuscularalogrythmicfunctionalityjustificationofsubtletiesdemonstrativediatribesCupuscularalogrythmicfunctionalityjustificationofsubtletiesdemonstrativediatribeCupuscularalogrythmicfunctionalityjustificationofsubtletiesdemonstrativediatribesCupuscularalogrythmicfunctionalityjustificationofsubtletiesdemonstrativediatribeCupuscularalogrythmicfunctionalityjustificationofsubtletiesdemonstrativediatribesCupuscularalogrythmicfunctionalityjustificationofsubtletiesdemonstrativediatribeCupuscularalogrythmicfunctionalityjustificationofsubtletiesdemonstrativediatribesCupuscularalogrythmicfunctionalityjustificationofsubtletiesdemonstrativediatribeCupuscularalogrythmicfunctionalityjustificationofsubtletiesdemonstrativediatribesCupuscularalogrythmicfunctionalityjustificationofsubtletiesdemonstrativediatribeCupuscularalogrythmicfunctionalityjustificationofsubtletiesdemonstrativediatribesCupuscularalogrythmicfunctionalityjustificationofsubtletiesdemonstrativediatribeCupuscularalogrythmicfunctionalityjustificationofsubtletiesdemonstrativediatribesCupuscularalogrythmicfunctionalityjustificationofsubtletiesdemonstrativediatribes.

You can shorten this to the first or second repitition to come to th
same result of 0.0 reading ease and 33.3 grade level, just FYI since th
OP asked about maximums