How to Use the Cloze Test (Cloze Deletion Test) to Score Readability
A Cloze Test (also called the "cloze deletion test") is an exercise, test, or assessment consisting of a portion of text with certain words removed (cloze text), where the teacher asks the participant to restore the missing words. Cloze tests require students to understand context and vocabulary to identify the correct words that belong in the deleted passages of a text.
EXAMPLE:
A language teacher may give the following passage to students:
"Today, I went to the ________ and bought some bread and peanut butter. I knew it was going to rain, but I forgot to take my ________, and got wet on the way."
The teacher instructs the students to fill in the blanks with words that they think best fits the passage. Both context in language and content terms are essential in most cloze tests. The first blank is preceded by "the"; therefore, a noun, an adjective or an adverb must follow. However, a conjunction follows the blank; the sentence would not be grammatically correct if anything other than a noun were in the blank. The words "bread and peanut butter" are important for deciding which noun to put in the blank; "supermarket" is a possible answer; depending on the student, however, the first blank could either be store, supermarket, shop or market, while umbrella or raincoat fit the second.
The Development of the Cloze Test
Research indicates that teachers at many elementary schools require their students to read books and materials that they often struggle to read. This condition is largely based on the graded system which assumes that all children learn all things at virtually the same time. It seems imperative that teachers choose materials which match the students' reading skills.
To accomplish this, the first task is to determine the appropriateness of reading materials for various students. To some extent, the standardized achievement tests offered at least once a school year in most school systems, provide such information. However, the results of such tests do not provide a reliable index of reading success in various materials.
The reasons for this are:
1) Achievement tests are based on limited samples; they cannot predict achievement accurately in specific materials which draw on varied concepts, sentence patterns, etc.
2) Achievement tests are most reliable in the middle ranges of achievement. They often mislead in measuring the achievement of those in the lower reading ranges.
Because standardized tests cannot accurately determine the suitability of given reading materials, many reading authorities suggest informal tests of the involved materials. The best test of reading skill relies on the student's ability or inability to read the given material.