Summarization is an effective strategy to promote and enhance learning and deep comprehension of texts. However, summarization is seldom implemented by teachers in classrooms because the manual evaluation of students' summaries requires time and effort. This problem has led to the development of automated models of summarization quality. However,…

The opinions of second language learning (L2) theorists and researchers are divided over whether to use authentic or simplified reading texts as the means of input for beginning- and intermediate-level L2 learners. Advocates of both approaches cite the use of linguistic features, syntax, and discourse structures as important elements in support of…

Lexical proficiency, as a cognitive construct, is poorly understood. However, lexical proficiency is an important element of language proficiency and fluency, especially for second language (L2) learners. Lexical proficiency is also an important attribute of L2 academic achievement. Generally speaking, lexical proficiency comprises breadth of…

An NLP algorithm was developed to assess question quality to inform feedback on questions generated by students within iSTART (an intelligent tutoring system that teaches reading strategies). A corpus of 4575 questions was coded using a four-level taxonomy. NLP indices were calculated for each question and machine learning was used to predict…

Objective: To develop novel, scalable, and valid literacy profiles for identifying limited health literacy patients by harnessing natural language processing. Data Source: With respect to the linguistic content, we analyzed 283 216 secure messages sent by 6941 diabetes patients to physicians within an integrated system's electronic portal.…

Limited health literacy is a barrier to optimal healthcare delivery and outcomes. Current measures requiring patients to self-report limitations are time-consuming and may be considered intrusive by some. This makes widespread classification of patient health literacy challenging. The objective of this study was to develop and validate…

This study evaluates the use of a hierarchical classification approach to automated assessment of essays. Automated essay scoring (AES) generally relies onmachine learning techniques that compute essay scores using a set of text variables. Unlike previous studies that rely on regression models, this study computes essay scores using a hierarchical…

The Writing Pal (W-Pal) is an intelligent tutoring system (ITS) designed to provide students with explicit writing strategy instruction and practice. W-Pal includes a suite of educational games developed to increase writing engagement and provide opportunities to practice writing strategies. In this study, first (L1) (n = 26) and second (L2)…

Writing researchers have suggested that students who are perceived as strong writers (i.e., those who generate texts rated as high quality) demonstrate flexibility in their writing style. While anecdotally this has been a commonly held belief among researchers and educators, there is little empirical research to support this claim. This study…