This essay investigates and compares the readability in two different schoolbooks: Eko Historia (the primary school grade 4-6) and Epos Historia (the upper secondary school). The questions of the survey are:

- Which differences in linguistic and layout can be found between books meant for the primary school and books meant for the upper secondary school?

- Are the texts easy to read according to the former research in readability?

In order to answer the questions structural dimensions as lexicon, syntax, bounds between sentences and narrative voices have been studied. Also the texts disposition and typography have been examined.

The results demonstrate that the book designed for the primary school has a verbal structure with an explicit vocabulary, lots of verbs and short sentences. A clear narrative voice gives an impression of spoken language. The publication also has many pictures and figures. The book aimed for upper secondary school has, in opposite to this, a typical written language with compounded substantives and long noun phrases. There are fewer illustrations and the layout follows a stringent policy. Moreover a high density of information demands the readers to draw conclusion on basis of prior experiences. If the pupils don’t have such previous knowledge the reading can complicates. In spite of this the book, in doubt, shows several signs of readability, for example simple subordinated clauses and strong bounds between the sentences.

Accordingly, both similarities and differences can be found between the primary and upper secondary schoolbook.