Text Leveling System

I am Benjamin Franklin

RDQ:	968	Max Word/Sent	36	Total Words	1891		Diff Words	688
Lex	730	Ave Word/.Sent	10	Hi Freq occurs	1303	68.9%	Hi freq	270	39.2%
AR	3.6	Long Sentences	7	Low Freq occurs	149	7.9%	Low freq	121	17.6%

I am Benjamin Franklin.]]
I come from a big family in Boston. A really big one. I was the youngest boy, with ten older siblings and two younger sisters. That's a lot of people in a small house. Tell 'em how small! It only had two rooms!]]
As a kid, I loved swimming so much, I tried to figure out how to swim faster. First, I studied the problem the bigger your hands and feet are, the more water you can push. Then I started to experiment. I made two big mitts that had holes for the thumbs I also made a set for my feet. Look at him go!]]
My next swimming experiment was with a kite. You really think you can learn something from a kite? Do you want to break it to him or should I? Once we got the kite in the air, I ran into the nearby pond. Almost there. It's working!]]
Floating on my back, I waited for it to pull me across the water. Almost there. The kids good with kites. Meet me on the other side! And bring my shoes! If you're willing to experiment, you can learn something new and use it to improve things.]]
 at ten years old, I got my first job working for my dad, making candles and soap. Hoping to find something I liked, my dad showed me many different jobs. That's a tailor, who works on clothes. That's a Baker who works with food. And that's a blacksmith, right? Yup, he works with metal. I like seeing all the ways to make things. The world has so much to discover. But there was one thing I liked most of all.]]
Reading books period I loved reading so much that anytime I had extra money, I used it to buy books. At twelve years old, one of my favorite books was this one, plutarch's lives. It taught me that our individual actions could change history and make the world better. That means history doesn't just happen by itself. It's written and built and improved upon by people like you and me.]]
Since I loved reading and writing, I went to work for my brother James. He owned one of the most powerful tools in the world: a newspaper. My brother's was the first independent paper in Boston. Back then America was ruled by the king of England, George. But the king didn't control our newspaper, which meant that if he was being unfair, my brother could write a story about it. It's called a Free Press. I wrote that no leader should have infinite power.]]
I wanted to be a writer too, but my brother wouldn't let me. So one night, when I was 16, I wrote an essay and slipped it under the door of the newspaper. I used different handwriting and a fake name, pretending I was an old woman who lived in the countryside. Mrs silence dogood? I never heard of her, but wow, can she write! Let's print it! That's how I became a published author. Eventually I decided to forge my own path to write my own history. I headed for the big city.]]
Philadelphia. My new home. On the day I arrived, I saw a girl, Deborah, in front of a house. Eventually, we'll get married. We'll what?]]
I came to Philadelphia for a better job and a better life. I found both. But the number one thing I work to improve?]]
Myself. In order to be a better person, I wrote new rules to live by, my very own plan for future conduct. First, be frugal, which means, don't spend your money on things you don't need. Second, tell the truth. 3rd, work hard. 4th, don't speak badly about other people.]]
To sharpen my mind, I even started my own club the junto club. How do you achieve happiness? Why do those beads of sweat appear on a cold mug? If a government takes away the right of its citizen, is it OK to fight back? Why do I feel like that's going to be a very important question?]]
My most vital work came from my job. In Philadelphia, I opened a print shop for my own newspaper, the Pennsylvania Gazette. I was a champion of the Free Press, printing many differing opinions. People will always have disagreements. That's not a bad thing.]]
Remember: if you listen to just one side of an argument, you won't have all the important facts. You won't be able to make an informed decision. Early on, Ben printed this image, the very first political cartoon. Its meaning was that we are much stronger when we stand together.]] Every year in addition to the newspaper, I also published poor Richard's Almanak. An Almanac is like a calendar, containing weather forecasts and the times that the sun will rise and set. I also added advice like: early to bed and early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise. Haste makes waste. God helps them that helps themselves.]]
He that lies down with dogs shall rise up with fleas. No gains without pains. He really wrote all of these? He'll never say it, but at times he was probably America's best writer. My real goal was to help my readers be better people.]]
If you want to improve the world, you need to start with yourself. Overtime, I made a newer and bigger list of virtues to follow in life: 13 in total, including sincerity which is meaning what you say, justice which means treating people fairly, and humility which means not bragging. I tried mastering them all at once, but it was impossible. Temperance silence order resolution frugality industry sincerity justice moderation cleanliness tranquility chastity humility. Instead I experimented: every week I focused on just one virtue. I'm a messy person, so this week I'm focusing on cleanliness. Next week will be moderation. None of us is perfect. But we can all keep working to make ourselves better.]]
Throughout it all, I never lost my love of learning and discovery. I observed how people got sick and became one of the first to figure out that colds are contagious. I knew it! I did experiments to prove how dark colors absorb more heat than light ones. See the snow under the dark ones melts more quickly.]]
My theories of how storms move was the start of people predicting the weather. there she blows! And let's not forget my most famous scientific experiment.]]
Electricity! Back then people didn't know exactly how electricity worked. By observing it up close, I discovered that when there's a positive charge or energy of one type, there's also an equal negative charge, or energy that holds the opposite. It was a successful scientific breakthrough. First I studied the problem. I think it's the metal on the roof. I think the metal is drawing the lightning from the sky. The words he invented, like charge and battery are still being used today. I also noticed that terrible fires were being caused when the tops of church steeples got struck by lightning there had to be a way to make things safer. You're sure about that? Let the experiment be made!]]
At the time, I've been waiting for a local church to finish building its steeples so we could put a metal rod up and test it. They were taking so long that my son and I decided to try it ourselves. With a kite. In June 1752, on a cloudy night, we put a pointy wire at the top of a silk kite. Then we tied a key to the kite sweat string hoping it would show us sparks after the lightning hit the wire. Almost there. Almost there. And then look at the string! The strands started to rise.]]
People think I was an old man by then but I was only forty six and my son was twenty one.
Almost there. When the clouds first passed over nothing happened. Give it time period almost there. And then the key. It worked! Instead of hitting and burning the kite, the lightning was attracted to the metal. Soon after, the world's very first lightning rods were installed in Philadelphia. To this day, rods around the world have prevented millions of fires.]]
Of all my experiments, perhaps the most important one was this: an american experiment. Back then, the United states didn't exist yet. There were no states just 13 colonies, all controlled by King George who was treating us unfairly. We shouldn't be ruled by a king! We should be our own country. And make our own rules!]]
In 1775, the American Revolution was beginning. I was elected to the second Continental Congress where we voted for the 13 colonies to join together and fight as one against the king. Over twenty years after he first published it, this cartoon became a symbol for the country to stand together for freedom.]]
Thomas Jefferson was selected to write a document that would declare our independence from England. In it we'd tell the king what kind of country we hope to be. People who lived here would have certain rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.]]
Jefferson asked me to read his first draft. I made a number of changes, including this one period we hold these truths to be sacred and undeniable. What if we changed it to this? We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal. Through history it has always been true: nothing can stop a good idea.]]
In my life, I worked hard to improve things including improving myself. That doesn't come easy. When you're trying to improve things, there will always be a risk of failure. Don't let it stop you. By learning from failures, you will make progress.]]
New ideas are like lightning. They can appear instantly, striking from nowhere with staggering power. That power is yours. Use it wisely and period]] 
you'll change the world. Can you believe all of his inventions? The lightning rod. Bye focals. The mechanical arm for getting books off high shelves! And so many more! Did you know that he also helped start a fire brigade, a core of night Watchmen, his own college, and the first ever subscription library?]]
He was the only person to work on & the four major documents that helped establish the united states! The Declaration of Independence, the treaty with France, the Treaty of Paris with Britain, and the constitution. But no matter how famous he became, he continued to sign his name B Franklin, printer. We're responsible for ourselves and each other period good people can do a lot individually. But it's nothing compared to what we can do together.]]
I was a printer, a writer, an inventor, a scientist, a scholar, and a founding father. You don't have to be just one thing. But you do need to be a good person. You can always improve yourself. You can always improve your world.]]
There are countless ways to do it: look for problems that need solving. Experiment and find solutions. Help the people in your community. And of course, use your voice speak up and speak the truth.]]
Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I remember, involve me and I learn.]]

Subjective Criteria

Illustrations: Some support

Sophisticated graphics supplementing text

Speech Bubbles

Unconventional format

Dialog: Multiple speakers

Vocabulary: Few decoding/definition issues

Language: Few descriptive words

Sentences: Multiple phrases

Text structure: Oral/Natural

Inserts/Side bars

Concepts: Concrete/Simple Social

Features

Character traits

Integral Setting

First Person

Topic

Experiments

*Science

Innovation

*History

Government

Independence

American History

US Constitution

Discovery

*Citizenship & Laws

Low Frequency Words

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liberty	major	mastering	mechanical	moderation
negative	nowhere	observed	observing	opinions
opposite	ourselves	overtime	paris	pennsylvania
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solutions	staggering	steeples	strands	studied
subscription	sweat	symbol	tailor	theories
throughout	treaty	undeniable	virtue	virtues
vital	watchmen	wealthy	writer	younger
youngest