I've recently been experimenting with QuillBot, an ai-powered spelling and grammar checking tool that also has rewriting capabilities thanks to generative ai. Additionally, QuillBot offers ai detection and summary tools, but I didn't explore those features for this story.
After using the free version available as a Google Chrome extension and having it monitor my writing in emails and stories for several days, I am impressed with the tool overall and think it would be useful for my students. However, I have some serious warnings.
For example, I'm a fan of the traditional spelling and grammar aspects of QuillBot, No Generative ai rewrites what you offer. These rewrites violate the policies of most of the publications I write for as a journalist, including this one, as well as my personal ethics. Additionally, it would violate the rules I set for my students about generative ai in my classes.
These ethical questions aside, when I tested its rewriting capabilities for the purposes of this class, I have to grudgingly admit that it did a decent job. I still prefer his original phrasing, but it wasn't as boring as most ai rewrites I've seen, and it highlighted the changes he made, which is a nice feature.
Below I talk more about QuillBot's spelling and grammar checking capabilities, its interface, and generative ai rephrasing.
I used QuillBot primarily as a spell checking tool and as an alternative to popular options like grammatically. In this sense, QuillBot excels and exceeds my expectations.
After downloading the Chrome plugin, the tool automatically scanned the stories I was writing in Google Docs and was great at catching small but important errors like typos and missing commas. For example, he reminded me to put a comma after the word “respect” in the second sentence of the paragraph above, something I had missed in my initial draft of this story.
QuillBot works by underlining in pink or yellow words and phrases for which it suggests changes. The tool also offers the option to use a sidebar while you type. This will point out errors with small animations and give you the ability to navigate through each suggestion you make one by one.
I will return later to the usefulness of this tool. At first I liked that it showed hints and reminded me to fix errors as I went, but eventually I found that it slowed me down. However, different writers may have different preferences and I can see an argument for using the sidebar tool.
Some small drawbacks
Like any spell check tool, QuillBot will occasionally make incorrect or imperfect suggestions. In the last sentence of the paragraph above, you suggest a comma after “At the beginning…”, which I think hurts the flow of the sentence. However, I don't mind checking the word, so I can take another look and think about whether a comma should go there or not.
For experienced writers, these types of suggestions won't be a problem. It can be a bit problematic for students who still struggle with grammar rules and are therefore more likely to listen to what the tool says. But even then, I think students will find the vast majority of its suggestions useful and, despite being occasionally led astray by the tool, will still benefit overall from its use.
<h2 id="generative-ai-features-3″>Generative ai Features
Now let's take a closer look at generative ai paraphrasing tools.
The QuillBot sidebar that appears in Chrome gives you the option to enter text and have QuillBot “paraphrase” it. You can only do this a few times with the free version, but the subscription version offers unlimited paraphrasing.
Here is the first sentence of this story I wrote: I've recently been experimenting with QuillBot, an ai-powered spelling and grammar checking tool that also has rewriting capabilities thanks to generative ai.
This is how QuillBot rewrote it: Recently, I have state explorer with QuillBot, an ai-powered tool for grammar and spelling checks which also uses generative ai to rewrite text.
I like that it highlights the new words you've added to the sentence and I'm not too proud to admit that somehow the sentence could read a little better. But I don't like it. First and foremost, it has erased my voice as a writer, and that is what writing is all about. Furthermore, the change from “explore” to “experiment” seems to me to change the meaning of my opening sentence.
It's true that a writing student might benefit from this type of paraphrasing by seeing how a sentence can be reworked and improved, but I wouldn't recommend it to a student because I worry that if they start using this tool, the temptation to overuse it will be. will disappear. be too big. And yes, I know that many students will use ai whether it is recommended or not, but I still prefer not to be the person who leads them to the dark side.
The conclusion about QuillBot
QuillBot's traditional spelling and grammar checker is a wonderful free tool and acts as a second pair of eyes, catching many errors and misspellings that could otherwise hinder my writing. I'm still skeptical about their generative ai features, but I'm not a fan of these tools for writing in general.
Overall, I am a fan of QuillBot, I will use it in the future and I think it can be useful for students as well.
