Adding text under words (to count words) and automatically

Question

In order to count easily words in a text, i'd like to display for each word its "number",

Context : I'm teaching my students to copy a text and to evaluate them I count how many words they successfully copied.

It's not necessary that the counting is done automatically, I'm using the same text,

This is what I've tried for now :

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{amsmath,stackengine}
\stackMath
\newcommand{\wordcount}[2]{\stackunder{\text{#1}}{\scriptstyle \text{#2}}}
\[
\setstackgap{S}{3pt}
\wordcount{Jusqu'}{5}
\wordcount{au}{6}
\wordcount{{\fontsize{14}{11}\selectfont XII}}{7}
\wordcount{siècle}{8}
\]
\end{document}

Which give this result :

My problem are multiple :

• The code is "heavy" I have a long text, ideally I'd like a simple command...
• It's in math mode
• Spacing is a nightmare (the 6 and 7 are higher than the 5 and no space between words)...

Any help is appreciated (sorry for any mistake, french here),

Thanks !

Answer 1

This should hopefully be more painless than what you were using.

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{amsmath,stackengine}
\usepackage[french]{babel} 
\renewcommand\stacktype{L}
\setstackgap{L}{9pt}
\newcounter{wordcnt}
\newcommand{\wordcount}[2][-1]{%
  \ifnum#1>-1\relax\setcounter{wordcnt}{#1}\fi%
  \wordcountaux#2 \relax}
\def\wordcountaux#1 #2\relax{%
  \stepcounter{wordcnt}%
  \stackunder{#1}{\scriptsize\thewordcnt}\ %
  \ifx\relax#2\relax\else\wordcountaux#2\relax\fi}
\begin{document}
\[
y = mx + b\quad\wordcount[4]{Jusqu' au \fontsize{14}{11}\selectfont 
  XII\ieme{} siècle}
\]\[
E= mc^2\quad\wordcount{Count picks up by default}
\]
\end{document}