Elementary Education Online, 14(2), 671-681, 2015. İlköğretim Online, 14(2), 671-6 81, 2015. [Online]: http://ilkogretim-online.org.tr DOI: Evaluating the Readability Levels of Elementary School Textbooks Regarding Students with Learning Disabilities* Orhan Çakıroğlu 1 ABSTRACT. Although limited information is available regarding the number of students with learning disabilities in Turkey, it ’s believed that there is a large number of students in this category. Reading is the area that students with learning disabilities have the most difficulty. This difficulty effects the students ’ attitudes towards reading. Therefore, especially during the preparation of textbooks, educators should consider attitudes of these students towards reading and readability levels of the textbooks should be appropriate for these students. The purpose of this study is to evaluate the readability levels of textsbooks (1- 4th grade) by using readability formulas and compare these findings with expert opinions. According to the findings of the study, readabilit y levels of texts in those boo ks are “easy” and some text in third and fourth grade are in “medium” difficulty according to the Ateşman readability formula values. Key Words: special education, learning disability, readability, reading achievement. SUMMARY Purpose and significance: The purpose of this study is to evaluate the readability levels of textbooks (1- 4th grade) by using readability formulas and compare these findings with expert opinions. The second purpose of this study is to identify the difference of readability levels across grades. Changing attitudes towards reading and improving reading achievement bring other achievements. Improving reading achievement have positive impact not only in the long run but in the short run as well. Many research studies in the literature indicate that there is a positive relationship between reading achievement and academic achievement. Students who have poor reading skills are likely to present poor reading success in the future years. About 10-15% of these students drop out of school (Yılmaz and Kaşıkçıçam, 2012). Methods: The method used in this study is decriptive method. The data were collected from textbooks that are used in Turkish elementary schools during 2014-15 school year. The textbooks were gathered from the Turkish Ministry of Education official website. After downloading the textbooks, each book was converted to word file and then analyzed. A total of 41 texts were identified and analyzed. These texts did not include poems. After identifying the texts, two readability formulas were used for determining the readability levels of texts. The first formula used was developed by Bezirci and Yılmaz (2010) and called New Readability Formula. The second readability formula used was developed by Ateşman (1997). In addition to these two formulas, the readability levels were asked to teachers as experts for determining the difficulty level of each text. Results: According to the findings of the study, readability levels of text in these books are “easy” and some text in third and fourth grade are in “medium” difficulty according to the Ateşman readability formula values. There was a correlation between findings from the two readability formulas and opinions of experts. Discussion and Conclusions: Findings of the study indicated that most of the texts in elementary school textsbooks are above reading levels of the students. When using texts for educating students with learning disabilities, teachers should consider the number of words and syllables in each sentence. If the difficulty of textbooks are higher than students’ reading level, they would hesitate reading. As a consequence their reading performance would decrease. In order to determine readability levels of texts, teachers can use readability formulas such as New Readability formula and Ateşman formula. However, teachers should not limit themselves with the readability formulas, they can use their expertise and ask for feedback from their colleagues. 1 Assist.Prof., Karadeniz Technical University, Fatih Education Faculty, cakirogluorhan@gmail.com * This research was supported by Grant 113K726 from The Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey.