Overview:

• Editing assistance softwares are programs that check the grammar of a writing piece by providing corrections, suggestions, and tips in much the same manner as a spellchecker.

• Editing assistance tools are typically built-in to programs (ex. Word, Google Docs) and with either autocorrect or underline spelling and grammatical mistakes. After right clicking on the incorrectly spelt word, a list of suggestions will appear.

• Editing assistance tools can support students with spelling and writing difficulties, allowing them to focus on the content of their writing.

To see Editing Assistance in action, check out this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uzrpa-gwN1A

Research

Leacock et al. (2010)

• This book provides an overview of  automated approaches to correct English language errors.

• The authors suggest  that these tools are most useful for proficient and skilled writers to search for typographical errors; the errors targeted by typical commercial proofreading tools do not include those aspects of a second language that are hardest to learn for new english language learners

Napoles, Sakaguchi & Tetreault (2016)

• This conference paper examined grammatical error correction systems.

• Results suggested that the method most of these softwares use for identifying errors suffers from penalizing grammatical edits that are correct but not in the gold standard therefore over-identifying “errors”.

Research Quick Facts

Advantages

• Can help proficient language users edit documents.

Disadvantages

• More challenging to use when user has low english proficiency or significant writing skill deficits.

To Consider

• May be more useful for typical users who are not English language learners and do not have a learning disability.

Insights from Practice

When considering suggested changes students must manually review suggestions, we advise against clicking "accept all suggestions". For students who are overwhelmed with writing, it can be best to get their ideas down and then go back and revise rather than trying to complete these tasks simultaneously. Editing assistance can be useful for this second stage. Beyond just spelling, these tools look at grammar, flow, and readability. These tools can be used with a wide variety of students including those with learning disabilities, multi language learners, and the general student body.