In this article, we describe an online English collocation explorer developed to help English L2 learners produce correct and appropriate collocations. Our tool, which is able to visually represent relevant correct/incorrect collocations on a single webpage, was designed based on the notions of collocation clusters and intercollocability proposed…

Extensive knowledge of collocations is a key factor that distinguishes learners from fluent native speakers. Such knowledge is difficult to acquire simply because there is so much of it. This paper describes a system that exploits the facilities offered by digital libraries to provide a rich collocation-learning environment. The design is based on…

This article discusses the use of the General Architecture for Text Engineering (GATE) as a tool for the development of ICALL and NLP applications. It outlines a paradigm shift in software development, which is mainly influenced by projects such as the Free Software Foundation. It looks at standards that have been proposed to facilitate the…

We built an NLP system implementing a "virtual writing conference" for elementary-school children, with German as the target language. Currently, state-of-the-art computer support for writing tasks is restricted to multiple-choice questions or quizzes because automatic parsing of the often ambiguous and fragmentary texts produced by pupils…

Previous work in the literature reveals that EFL learners were deficient in collocations that are a hallmark of near native fluency in learner's writing. Among different types of collocations, the verb-noun (V-N) one was found to be particularly difficult to master, and learners' first language was also found to heavily influence their collocation…

This paper describes the development of an intelligent computer-assisted language learning (ICALL) system for learning Arabic. This system could be used for learning Arabic by students at primary schools or by learners of Arabic as a second or foreign language. It explores the use of Natural Language Processing (NLP) techniques for learning…