Benefits and Challenges

Benefits:

WriteCoach uses mobile intelligence to transform writing instruction by making feedback immediate, interactive, and individualized, addressing many of the limitations of traditional classroom practices. In conventional settings, students often receive delayed feedback that focuses only on a few lines or obvious errors, leaving many issues, such as tone and detail, unnoticed. Mobile intelligence platforms like WriteCoach can address this gap by providing continuous, real-time guidance that helps students identify patterns in their own writing and understand how specific choices affect clarity, flow, and coherence. Additionally, algorithmic assessment of writing reduces bias and is likely more consistently accurate than the judgments of human experts (Escalante et al., 2023, p. 3). Furthermore, students perceive GenAI feedback to be more readable and detailed than instructor feedback, while still showing high agreement with instructors on many aspects of writing (Escalante et al., 2023, p. 4). This combination of immediacy, accuracy, and clarity allows students to engage more confidently with their writing, experiment with revisions in real time, and develop stronger, more independent writing skills. Ultimately, by incorporating these features of mobile intelligence and GenAI, WriteCoach aims to provide unbiased student feedback and decrease teacher workload, and prevent teacher burnout (Escalante et al., 2023, p. 4).

Additionally, the flexibility of mobile platforms also expands opportunities for practice beyond the classroom. Through using WriteCoach, students can engage with writing tasks independently, at their own pace, and receive immediate reinforcement as they experiment with language and structure. When WriteCoach offers a suggestion, students can try something new, and if that also creates weakness in their writing, WriteCoach can immediately let them know, and they can try many different approaches until they discover one that works. This supports the idea of active learning and allows students to engage more deeply with the writing process, as they do not have to constantly approach their teacher with these ideas and possibly face shame and discouragement if their ideas are misunderstood. By providing a safe, private space to test, revise, and refine their ideas, WriteCoach encourages this experimentation and helps build confidence in young writers. 

This flexibility extends even further when we consider student access to smartphones, as most already carry them in their backpacks or pockets throughout the day, making WriteCoach highly accessible beyond the classroom. Whether they are riding the bus, in the car after sports practice, or sitting on their couch at home, students can continue engaging with writing tasks and receive feedback at any time of the day, regardless of where they are. This constant access means that learning is no longer confined or limited to the classroom space. By leveraging what students already use regularly, WriteCoach can turn distance and busy schedules into productive learning opportunities, allowing students to maintain continuity in their writing practice. 

Challenges

Although mobile intelligence platforms such as WriteCoach can be beneficial for students, there are also some challenges that must be addressed. In order to use the program, access to a reliable and stable internet connection is essential, and disparities in technology can limit equitable participation. For instance, if a student lives in a community where they do not have access to a physical learning space, then WriteCoach can significantly help them; however, this help is rendered useless when they only have a stable WI-FI connection for a few hours a week. Furthermore, smartphone access is also essential in order to download and connect to the program, and many young students do not have access to these devices as a result of financial or family backgrounds. If a young student, aged 12, is not allowed to have a smartphone, then they would not be able to access the app, and thus, there would be an inequality between them and their peers who are regularly using it via their smartphones. Additionally, students facing financial barriers may experience heightened anxiety when they see peers using smartphones and the app to strengthen their writing skills, while they are unable to access the same resource. 

Furthermore, students may also risk becoming over-reliant on automated suggestions, focusing more on correcting issues than on critically evaluating their own ideas. Students need to be able to develop the skill of proofreading their work and refining their ideas without the line-by-line prompting of a program. In some ways, this app limits the development of those skills as it continuously instructs students on what they need to fix, rather than providing them with the opportunity to figure that out themselves. Therefore, to help mitigate this, teachers need to model how to interpret feedback and provide opportunities for students to independently and critically review their work and make their own judgements about which revisions to apply. This can be done, for instance, by having students produce their own draft off of WriteCoach, highlight areas for improvement, and then compare it with WriteCoach's suggestions to see if they match up. 

References

Escalante, J., Pack, A., & Barrett, A. (2023). AI-generated feedback on writing: Insights into efficacy and ENL student preference. International Journal of Educational Technology in Higher Education, 20, 57. https://doi.org/10.1186/s41239-023-00425-2