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"Computer assisted language learning"
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Technology and the future of language teaching
We are living in a time with unprecedented opportunities to communicate with others in authentic and compelling linguistically and culturally contextualized domains. In fact, language teachers today are faced with so many fascinating options for using technology to enhance language learning that it can be overwhelming. Even for those who are inclined to experiment with emerging technologies, it can be challenging to identify which resources, tools, or Web sites may best fit a particular lesson, activity, or goal. Many of the most compelling opportunities are situated within the same global social and technology trends that have become commonplace in our daily lives, including social media, artificial intelligence, big data, and augmented reality. This article addresses the extent to which technology‐mediated social interactions dominate our daily lives, how we can leverage those interactions to the benefit of our learners, and how we can engage them in learning experiences in ways that will encourage them to practice language extensively. Challenges Technology offers unprecedented opportunities to communicate with others in authentic and compelling, linguistically and culturally contextualized domains. How can we leverage learners’ technologically mediated and highly participatory culture and an array of quickly emerging technologies, including language learning media, artificial intelligence, big data, and augmented reality to enhance language teaching and learning?
Journal Article
Technology in Language Use, Language Teaching, and Language Learning
This article offers a capacious view of technology to suggest broad principles relating technology and language use, language teaching, and language learning. The first part of the article considers some of the ways that technological media influence contexts and forms of expression and communication. In the second part, a set of heuristic questions is proposed to help guide language teachers and researchers in determining how to incorporate technology into their teaching practice or research agenda and evaluate its suitability and impact. These questions are based primarily on the goal of helping learners to pay critical attention to the culturally encoded connections among forms, contexts, meanings, and ideologies that they will encounter and produce in different mediums, both traditional and new.
Journal Article
Metaphors for social media‐enhanced foreign language teaching and learning
As L2 (foreign and second language) instructors and materials designers are faced with online and distance learning mandates, new perspectives on how to use familiar, everyday technologies that learners can access from home like social media are welcome. Imagining these new uses, however, may require going beyond the traditional computer‐assisted language learning (CALL) metaphors of computer‐as‐tutor or tool, which were established before social media. This article outlines four new metaphors that better capture the new user dynamics of social media: windows, mirrors, doorways, and playgrounds. After a discussion of the brief history of CALL metaphors, these new metaphors are presented with support from research alongside ideas for L2 teaching and learning. The Challenge Social media—Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and so forth—are ubiquitous and popular among learners, but how can they be used for formal L2 learning purposes? How can we conceptualize the design of social media‐enhanced learning activities? This article presents four metaphors for thinking about the value of social media for L2 learning: windows, mirrors, doorways, and playgrounds.
Journal Article
Facilitating technology‐based character learning in emergency remote teaching
The study reports pedagogical adaptations that Chinese language instructors made to support students' character learning during emergency remote teaching in 2020. Data from an online questionnaire and follow‐up interviews show that the handwriting requirement in the language curriculum was modified to give way to technology‐based instruction, making the conventionally isolated and solitary task of character learning more integrative and interactive. Beginning‐level instructors' use of technology in character instruction was correlated with their self‐confidence, perceived time sufficiency, technology access, and support received. Meanwhile, intermediate‐ and upper‐level instructors' self‐confidence and perceived values of online teaching were factors associated with their technology use. The crucial role of teacher communities in offering language‐specific training and peer support is emphasized, and implications to the broader field of foreign language teaching are discussed. The Challenge Emergency remote teaching (ERT) took place amidst foreign language instructors' skepticism toward online teaching. The study reveals the impact of ERT through the lens of Chinese character instruction. What are instructors' perceptions, strategies, and needs in this area? These questions were explored through a nationwide questionnaire and follow‐up interviews.
Journal Article
Pronunciation Can Be Acquired Outside the Classroom: Design and Assessment of Homework-Based Training
Even though there is ample evidence that pronunciation plays a crucial role in effective second language (L2) communication, pronunciation training is frequently neglected in L2 classrooms due to time constraints or because instructors do not feel adequately prepared to teach pronunciation. To address this discrepancy, the present study investigates the effectiveness of a novel, homework-based method of pronunciation instruction. Novice German learners' (N = 122) perception and oral production skills on the word and sentence level were assessed at the beginning and the end of the semester. Learners were assigned to 1 of 3 groups: a homework-based pronunciation training group, an in-class training group, and a control group. The results showed that the learners in the homework training group significantly outperformed learners in the control group on some (but not all) measures of phonological perception skills and on comprehensibility measures of productions of individual words. Results further revealed no significant difference between learners who received homework-based or in-class pronunciation training and responses on a debriefing questionnaire showed that learners were equally satisfied with both training modalities. Taken together, these results suggest that homework-based pronunciation training is similarly effective as in-class practice. (Verlag).
Journal Article
The effectiveness of app‐based language instruction for developing receptive linguistic knowledge and oral communicative ability
Hundreds of millions of language learners around the globe study a second language with popular apps such as Duolingo, Rosetta Stone, Busuu, and Babbel. This study examined the effectiveness of one app, Babbel, for developing both receptive linguistic knowledge of vocabulary and grammar, as well as oral communicative ability in Spanish as a second language. Fifty‐four English speakers not enrolled in Spanish classes studied Spanish on Babbel over the course of 12 weeks, with a goal of studying roughly 10 min per day. Participants completed pretests and posttests, and provided data on their motivation to learn Spanish and use Babbel. Results showed that learners were able to develop grammar and vocabulary knowledge as well as oral communicative ability. The amount of Babbel study time was the strongest predictor for all three measures, with motivation to learn Spanish also significantly predicting growth in oral communicative ability. The Challenge Hundreds of millions of learners use digital apps to learn world languages, but how effective are these apps for learning how to speak a second language? To answer this question, this article compares the grammar, vocabulary, and speaking development of 54 learners who spent three months studying Spanish with the app Babbel.
Journal Article
Improving Computer-Assisted Language Learning Through the Lens of Cognitive Load
A contemporary review (over a 10-year period) was conducted into studies that used computer-assisted language learning (CALL) strategies to learn a second language (L2) by considering the impact of cognitive load. Twelve affordances were identified that led to enhanced learning, namely, online annotations and glosses, captioning, digital game-based language learning, videoconferencing and video feedback, visualization-based learning approaches, online instructional content and features, online machine translation tools, online interactive collaborative learning, (meta)cognitive learning strategies argument mapping, computer-mediated dictionary assisted learning, and multiple display screens. Associated with these affordances were a number of conditions and learner characteristics that modified the effectiveness of the affordances such as L2 proficiency. Most learning strategies were used to reduce cognitive load, although a limited number fostered germane cognitive load through generative learning practices. A number of issues associated with measuring cognitive load, multimedia learning, and research designs are also discussed.
Journal Article