Rewordify.com blog

The "Print" view can help

Are you trying to rewordify a web page that doesn't look right or doesn't rewordify properly? Or, is the article you want to rewordify on multiple pages, and you'd like to rewordify it all at once?

Here's what to do: Bring up the web page on a separate tab or window. Then, look to see if there's a "Print" symbol on the web page, or the words "printer version," or something like that. Click that link, and the article should display in a much simpler way.

It's easy to highlight the text in that simpler version. Copy-paste (CTRL-C, CTRL-V) the text from the article into the bottom box of the Rewordify.com web page and click "Rewordify text."

Poetry suggestion

Rewordify.com automatically changes difficult words to easy ones and highlights the easy ones. If you mouse-over (or tap) the easy highlighted word, the original difficult word appears.

When reading poetry, you might think about changing the highlighting on the Settings page to "reverse loud," "reverse quiet," or "reverse silent." These settings show all the original words, highlighting the hard ones (except for "reverse silent", which doesn't highlight anything). When you mouse-over (or tap) the highlighted word, an easier word appears.

These settings keep the original rhyming and beat of the poem visible, so the beauty of these things are more obvious as you read.

This is only a suggestion. Try out all the highlighting settings and set them to the way you want, so you learn more words in the way that works best for you.

Why read? High speed!

Let's say that you wanted to read Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens.

That novel has about 160,000 words. About 7,500 of them are difficult. Let's assume that out of 7,500 words, there are 750 unique difficult words.

So as you read the book, you'd have to stop reading about 750 times to look up words in the dictionary.

If it took you ten seconds to look up each one, it would take you 7500 seconds, which equals more than two solid hours.

Then, you'd have to spend more time figuring out which of the multiple dictionary definitions were appropriate for the particular use of that word, and go back to the story and try to figure out what the sentence means.

Rewordify.com can do all of that in about five seconds. No, really. We're not kidding. Five seconds.

So, you can read the easier-to-understand, rewordified version of Oliver Twist now, or hundreds and hundreds of other simplified versions of classic literature.

Happy reading!

Smarter than a dictionary

Rewordify.com is a smarter choice when you need to understand what you're reading.

It knows context

Rewordify.com understands how a word is being used. It has the intelligence to know when a word should be left alone and when it should be simplified.

Original sentence	Rewordify.com output
The young scientist lobbies for stronger anti-pollution laws whenever she can.	The young scientist tries to convince lawmakers about stronger anti-pollution laws whenever she can.
The lobbies of the new hotels in town are fancier than ever.	[no change]
Going to college will afford them many new opportunities.	Going to college will give them many new opportunities.
He cannot afford to buy a new car right now.	[no change]
The strong wind will hamper his efforts to paint his house.	The strong wind will interfere with/slow down his efforts to paint his house.
Put all your dirty clothes in the hamper before you go to bed.	[no change]

It knows parts of speech and verb tense

Rewordify.com knows the part of speech and verb tense of difficult words. When it rewordifies a difficult word, it maintains the part of speech and verb tense, so the sentence is clear.

Original sentence	Rewordify.com output
The child is afflicted with the flu.	The child is sick with the flu.
The flu is afflicting millions of people right now.	The flu is sickening millions of people right now.
Every year, the flu afflicts huge numbers of people.	Every year, the flu sickens huge numbers of people.
She surpassed her wildest dreams.	She went past her wildest dreams.
She is surpassing her wildest dreams.	She is going past her wildest dreams.
They have surpassed their wildest dreams.	They have gone past their wildest dreams.
Chris always surpasses her wildest dreams.	Chris always goes past her wildest dreams.
We plan to surpass our wildest dreams.	We plan to go past our wildest dreams.
He plans to advocate for the rights of his son.	He plans to fight for the rights of his son.
He is an advocate for those who have been treated wrongly.	He is a strong supporter for those who have been treated wrongly.

It provides simple, easy replacement words

When Rewordify.com simplifies a word, it does just that: it makes it easy to understand. It never uses other difficult words, or any form of the original difficult word, in the simplified version.

Difficult word	Rewordify.com output	Online dictionary¹
vehemence	forcefulness	The quality of being vehement; ardor; fervor.
calamitous	terrible	Causing or involving calamity.
flamboyant	showy	Tending to attract attention because of their exuberance, confidence, and stylishness.
misrepresentations	lies	Misleading falsehoods.
remonstrances	objections/criticisms	A forcefully reproachful protest.
salutation	greeting	A word or phrase serving as the prefatory greeting in a letter or speech.
interdict	forbid (by law)	To prohibit or place under an ecclesiastical or legal sanction.

Try using Rewordify.com right now, and actually understand what you read.

¹ All examples taken from either www.dictionary.com, www.thefreedictionary.com, or Google's define: function.

Lower-literacy readers and your writing

The Rewordify.com Reading Level can help you broaden the audience of your writing.

Every time Rewordify.com simplifies text, it gives a Reading Level of from 1 (easiest) to 10 (hardest). If you want your writing to be understood by the broadest possible audience, strive for a Reading Level of 1 (broadly accessible).

If you're a writer, you might be surprised at the level of word simplicity needed to achieve a Reading Level of 1. But you must remember, you're a writer! You already have a high literacy level. You may be unknowingly creating reading that's too difficult for a large number of readers.

For example, most articles on news web pages are at a Reading Level of 3 to 5. In almost all cases, this writing can be simplified so that it gets a Reading Level of 1 without substantially changing the meaning or the beauty of the written page. By doing so, more people will clearly understand what you write.

Printing tips

Having the highlights show when printing

In most web browsers, when you print a rewordified page the highlighting won't show. That's because the highlighting is a "background color", and most browsers don't print background colors by default to save ink and toner.

(Note: Google Chrome does not support printing background colors as of 2/26/2013. If you want to print pages so the highlighting appears, use a different web browser.)

To get the highlighting to show.

In your browser, find the Print menu.
In the Print menu there should be an option for Page Setup.
In Page Setup, click the option to "print background colors and images," or any similar-sounding option.

Now the highlighting will print correctly!

Highlight it your way

When you start using Rewordify.com, it "rewords" difficult words and phrases to easy ones, and highlights the easy rewordings in yellow. We call this "loud" highlighting:

Rumors of word-based energy were proven true.

You can switch it to what we call "quiet" highlighting, like this: