Teaching Spell Checkers to Teach: Pedagogical Program Synthesis for Interactive Learning

Fuente: arXiv
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Hauptverfasser: Siddiqui, Momin N., Cavez, Vincent, Rangasrinivasan, Sahana, Olszewski, Abbie, Setlur, Srirangaraj, Agrawala, Maneesh, Subramonyam, Hari
Format: Preprint
Veröffentlicht: 2025
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author Siddiqui, Momin N.
Cavez, Vincent
Rangasrinivasan, Sahana
Olszewski, Abbie
Setlur, Srirangaraj
Agrawala, Maneesh
Subramonyam, Hari
author_facet Siddiqui, Momin N.
Cavez, Vincent
Rangasrinivasan, Sahana
Olszewski, Abbie
Setlur, Srirangaraj
Agrawala, Maneesh
Subramonyam, Hari
contents Spelling taught through memorization often fails many learners, particularly children with language-based learning disorders who struggle with the phonological skills necessary to spell words accurately. Educators such as speech-language pathologists (SLPs) address this instructional gap by using an inquiry-based approach to teach spelling that targets the phonology, morphology, meaning, and etymology of words. Yet, these strategies rarely appear in everyday writing tools, which simply detect and autocorrect errors. We introduce SPIRE (Spelling Inquiry Engine), a spell check system that brings this inquiry-based pedagogy into the act of composition. SPIRE implements Pedagogical Program Synthesis, a novel approach for operationalizing the inherently dynamic pedagogy of spelling instruction. SPIRE represents SLP instructional moves in a domain-specific language, synthesizes tailored programs in real-time from learner errors, and renders them as interactive interfaces for inquiry-based interventions. With SPIRE, spelling errors become opportunities to explore word meanings, word structures, morphological families, word origins, and grapheme-phoneme correspondences, supporting metalinguistic reasoning alongside correction. Evaluation with SLPs and learners shows alignment with professional practice and potential for integration into writing workflows.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2512_12115
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Teaching Spell Checkers to Teach: Pedagogical Program Synthesis for Interactive Learning
Siddiqui, Momin N.
Cavez, Vincent
Rangasrinivasan, Sahana
Olszewski, Abbie
Setlur, Srirangaraj
Agrawala, Maneesh
Subramonyam, Hari
Human-Computer Interaction
Spelling taught through memorization often fails many learners, particularly children with language-based learning disorders who struggle with the phonological skills necessary to spell words accurately. Educators such as speech-language pathologists (SLPs) address this instructional gap by using an inquiry-based approach to teach spelling that targets the phonology, morphology, meaning, and etymology of words. Yet, these strategies rarely appear in everyday writing tools, which simply detect and autocorrect errors. We introduce SPIRE (Spelling Inquiry Engine), a spell check system that brings this inquiry-based pedagogy into the act of composition. SPIRE implements Pedagogical Program Synthesis, a novel approach for operationalizing the inherently dynamic pedagogy of spelling instruction. SPIRE represents SLP instructional moves in a domain-specific language, synthesizes tailored programs in real-time from learner errors, and renders them as interactive interfaces for inquiry-based interventions. With SPIRE, spelling errors become opportunities to explore word meanings, word structures, morphological families, word origins, and grapheme-phoneme correspondences, supporting metalinguistic reasoning alongside correction. Evaluation with SLPs and learners shows alignment with professional practice and potential for integration into writing workflows.
title Teaching Spell Checkers to Teach: Pedagogical Program Synthesis for Interactive Learning
topic Human-Computer Interaction
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2512.12115