To succeed in the information age, students need to learn to communicate their understanding of complex topics effectively. This is reflected in both educational standards and standardized tests. To improve their writing ability for highly structured domains like scientific explanations, students need feedback that accurately reflects the…

With the exponential increase of digital assessment, different types of data in addition to item responses become available in the measurement process. One of the salient features in digital assessment is that process data can be easily collected. This non-conventional structured or unstructured data source may bring new perspectives to better…

Digitalization and automation of test administration, score reporting, and feedback provision have the potential to benefit large-scale and formative assessments. Many studies on automated essay scoring (AES) and feedback generation systems were published in the last decade, but few connected AES and feedback generation within a unified framework.…

This study evaluated the construct validity of six scoring traits of an automated writing evaluation (AWE) system called "MI Write." Persuasive essays (N = 100) written by students in grades 7 and 8 were randomized at the sentence-level using a script written with Python's NLTK module. Each persuasive essay was randomized 30 times (n =…

This article reviews recent literature (2011-present) on the automated scoring (AS) of writing and speaking. Its purpose is to first survey the current research on automated scoring of language, then highlight how automated scoring impacts the present and future of assessment, teaching, and learning. The article begins by outlining the general…

Current writing support tools tend to focus on assessing final or intermediate products, rather than the writing process. However, sensing technologies, such as keystroke logging, can enable provision of automated feedback during, and on aspects of, the writing process. Despite this potential, little is known about the critical indicators that can…

This study explored the role of written languaging (WL) in response to automated written corrective feedback (AWCF) in L2 accuracy improvement in English classrooms at a university in China. A total of 254 freshmen enrolled in intermediate composition classes participated, and they wrote 4 essays and received AWCF. A half of them engaged in WL…

This study compared the effects of teacher feedback (TF) and online automated feedback (AF) on the quality of revision of English writing. It also examined the strengths and weaknesses of the two types of feedback perceived by English language learners (ELLs) as a foreign language (FL). Sixty-eight Chinese students from two English classes…

Rapid advancements in computing have enabled automatic analyses of written texts created in educational settings. The purpose of this symposium is to survey several applications of computerized text analyses used in the research and development of productive learning environments. Four featured research projects have developed or been working on:…

Writing essays and receiving feedback can be useful for fostering students' learning and motivation. When faced with large class sizes, it is desirable to identify students who might particularly benefit from feedback. In this article, we tested the potential of Latent Semantic Analysis (LSA) for identifying poor essays. A total of 14 teaching…

The assessment of writing proficiency generally includes analyses of the specific linguistic and rhetorical features contained in the singular essays produced by students. However, researchers have recently proposed that an individual's ability to flexibly adapt the linguistic properties of their writing might more closely capture writing skill.…

This study investigated the application of "WriteToLearn" on Chinese undergraduate English majors' essays in terms of its scoring ability and the accuracy of its error feedback. Participants were 163 second-year English majors from a university located in Sichuan province who wrote 326 essays from two writing prompts. Each paper was…

This study utilized a theory proposed by Mohan, Slater, Luo, and Jaipal (2002) regarding the Developmental Path of Cause to investigate AWE score use in classroom contexts. This "path" has the potential to support validity arguments because it suggests how causal linguistic features can be organized in hierarchical order. Utilization of…

Writing an essay is a very important skill for students to master, but a difficult task for them to overcome. It is particularly true for English as Second Language (ESL) students in China. It would be very useful if students could receive timely and effective feedback about their writing. Automatic essay feedback generation is a challenging task,…

Computer technology made its way into writing instruction and assessment with spelling and grammar checkers decades ago, but more recently it has done so with automated essay evaluation (AEE) and diagnostic feedback. And although many programs and tools have been developed in the last decade, not enough research has been conducted to support or…