The Internet TESL Journal
CALL is not a Hammer and not Every Teaching Problem is a Nail!
Changing Expectations of Computers in the Classroom
Judy F. Chen
jfc [at] rs1.occc.edu.tw
http://www.occc.edu.tw/~jfc/
The Overseas Chinese College of Commerce (Taichung, Taiwan, ROC)
CAI and CALL Application in Taiwan
Past
When looking at CAI (Computer Assisted Instruction) and CALL (Computer Assisted Language Learning) in Taiwan (R.O.C.), it is clear that application of these technologies, in the classroom, is in its embryonic stage. Through a combination of factors, computers have generally not entered the R.O.C. language scene. These factors include, but are not limited to:
* General lack of computerization of schools in the R.O.C.
An observer outside of Taiwan would be surprised that one of the world's technology manufacturing centers actually has been slow to adopt computers in its schools. This situation, however, is undergoing change as the R.O.C. Ministry of Education places more emphasis on computer use in educational institutions.
* Lack of access to mainframes and minis, on which many CAI and CALL software was originally developed
Computer departments have traditionally limited access of their mainframes and minis to computer majors. Since PCs have existed only since the early 1980s, most software, and especially powerful software often needed in CAI, has been developed on mainframe computers. This has changed, however, as PCs have taken over as the workhorses of the computer revolution and computer departments quickly upgraded their machines, thus leaving many "outdated," yet still useful, 8086, 80286 and 80386 computers with no users. On the software side, 80386 and 80486 computers, combined with modern programming technologies (Sarna & Febish, 1993) can match and even surpass the computing power of many mainframes in existence only a decade earlier.
* Needed technology only recently commercialized, i.e., powerful computer packages: 80486 CPUs, sound cards and CD-ROMs
The rapidly dropping prices of computers has allowed English departments to gain access to used machines as well as newer 80486 machines. Economies of scale in the manufacturing and distribution of "multimedia" compatible computers now means that for under NT$40,000 (approximately US$1,500) an individual system can be purchased that runs the most up-to-date software capable of producing moving graphics, video and good quality sound.
* Expenditures of time and money for non-computer based "language labs" that are not perceived as successful teaching tools
The factors cited above are of a structural nature and have not been influenced by language teachers. One last factor I will cite is directly related to language teachers and the previous "technology solution" for language learners, i.e., the audiolingual methods, from the late fifties and early sixties, as applied in the language lab. Although many of the motivating theories have since been supplanted, the language labs go on. Schools nearly everywhere around the world automatically include labs as part of any English program (Strei, 1979).
It is likely that negative experiences with language labs has led teachers to be skeptical of new technologies in the classroom. Many Taiwan schools have installed language lab equipment that allows a class of students to listen to recorded conversations through headphones, equipped with microphones, while a teacher can send instructions, listen into and monitor students through a central control panel.
Often, the engineers who installed such equipment did not understand all the features and installation requirements and certainly had little grasp of the pedagogical applications. The result was that at many locations, these language labs simply have became glorified, and expensive, tape players. The equipment actually served to separate the students from the teacher and encouraged less motivated students to daydream through the class period. Such experience is not unique to Taiwan, nor is it new, but may be endemic to language labs (Kirpal 1979). Teachers are often placed in these labs with no training, not even a manual on the lab's features and use, while a class of fifty students wait for the teacher to assimilate. With teachers struggling to find use of the technology they already have, it is unrealistic to expect them to quickly swallow another "technology solution" pill.
Present
In the past decade, numerous academics have examined the application of CAI in Taiwan classrooms. From the very start, teachers have realized that computers have enormous potential. Of special interest is the realization that CAI may be especially useful in the Taiwan situation where writing students are often at a low level of skill attainment and class size is large (Chen, 1988).
Many teachers, domestic and foreign have observed that students generally have a positive attitude toward technology in the classroom. Studies have consistently shown that students have positive attitudes about computer technology being used in the classroom and that such technology does have a positive impact (Warden, 1995; Chen, 1988; Nash et al., 1989; Brady, 1990; Herrmann, 1987; Johnson, 1988; Phinney & Mathis, 1988).
However, such attitudes and results may simply reflect the "normal" outlook of most people who live in the Computer Age. Academics such as Pennington (1991) and Thiesmeyer (1989) warn of rushing into CALL without solid evidence of its benefits. Such caution is justified since all of the cultural signals being sent every day, support the believe that technology is good, and that specifically computers are helpful in nearly every human endeavor. Even expressing the slightest doubts about the usefulness of computers is likely to result in one being labeled as a Luddite. Classroom research of CAI must avoid such dogmatism and not make any apriori conclusions.
Future
Clearly, adoption of CAI and CALL approaches will not, and should not, spread until measurable benefits can be seen not only for students but also for teachers. More research into actual results of CAI application results must be performed. All too often, CAI is becoming confused with multimedia and the Information Superhighway. These are useful tools, but are they germane to CAI? I would assert that they are not CAI simply when they are used in the classroom. Although many apriori conclusions can be reached about their effectiveness, it is only after careful research into results that a tool can be justified as having CAI application.
Researchers must make a determination about the pedagogical outcomes of new, and old, CAI software. Some points important to any CAI investigation include:
Avoiding Hawthorne effects that are common in this area
It is quite obvious to any group of students that they are being observed when said group is allowed access to computer equipment and software while others are not. Even the use of class time to introduce computer language labs and/or software rips away the mask of the researcher. Rather than creating research situations that invite the Hawthorne effect, researchers should look into applying some type of technology to all groups being studied. Some groups are actually using the teaching technology in question, while others are receiving a placebo.
Not questioning attitudes about technology
Direct questioning of subjects about the technology in question is certain to illicit inaccurate and irrelevant information. First of all, societal pressures encourage positive responses towards technology. Anyone, especially young people, who does not like technology often is of the opinion that such an attitude is a reflection of his/her own deficiencies. Secondly, direct attitude questions about the material being tested is simply not accurate. If we were to show Mickey Mouse cartoons to one group of students and then had a different group of students read Shakespeare, the results from a direct question about material is obvious. Although details about comprehensible input could be argued ad infinitum, language researchers must understand that it is results that matter and not intermediate attitudes, which are shifting and vacillating at best.
Not judging the software interface but looking for real language improvement results
Somewhat related to the above point, this problem stems from interfaces that today can include animation, actual video clips, dialogue and music. The multimedia revolution has arrived and anyone who looks at some well produced, slick multimedia titles cannot help but to be impressed. However, it is not uncommon that the newness factor wears off quickly and a multimedia title that looked so slick the first few viewings is later found to be empty of real content. The computer screen that shows moving colorful pictures is interesting to the teacher who buys the title, but we must consider the students who will use the software many times over in their attempts to improve their language skills. Will such moving pictures and sound look good after the tenth time around, or will they simply become an annoyance? Content must be paramount in our investigations.
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Senin, 04 Januari 2010
COMPUTER ASSISTED LANGUAGE LEARNING (CALL) IN THE PERSPECTIVE OF INTERACTIVE APPROACH: ADVANTAGES AND APPREHENSIONS
COMPUTER ASSISTED LANGUAGE LEARNING (CALL)
IN THE PERSPECTIVE OF INTERACTIVE APPROACH:
ADVANTAGES AND APPREHENSIONS
by
T. Ravichandran, M.A., M.Phil., P.G.C.T.E., (Ph.D.)
Lecturer, Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar Technological University, Lonere - 402 103.
(Paper presented and published in the Proceedings: National Seminar on CALL,
Anna University, Chennai, 10-12 Feb. 2000, pp. 82-89.)
INTRODUCTION
To begin with the question whether computers really assist second language learning, many teachers who have never touched a computer tend to respond with an emphatic no; whereas, the overwhelming number of teachers who give computers a try find that they are indeed useful in second language learning. No doubt, computers make excellent teaching tools, especially in teaching languages in any aspect, be it vocabulary, grammar, composition, pronunciation, or other linguistic and pragmatic-communicative skills. And the major benefits offered by computer in enhancing language acquisition apparently outweigh its limitations.
ADVANTAGES
Interest and Motivation
It is often necessary, in a language learning classroom, to provide repeated practice to meet important objectives. Because this can be boring, painful, and frustrating, many students lose interest and motivation to learn foreign languages. CALL programmes present the learner with a novelty. They teach the language in different and more interesting, attractive ways and present language through games, animated graphics and problem-solving techniques. As a result even tedious drills become more interesting. In fact, CALL motivates the students to go beyond the point of initial mastery and practice activity until they become automatic.
Individualisation
Many students need additional time and individualised practice to meet learning objectives. The computer offers students self-instructional tasks that let them master prerequisite skills and course objectives at a speed and level dictated by their own needs. Besides, additional programmes can be made available for students who master objectives quickly. These additional programmes can provide more intense study of the same objectives, proceed to higher objectives, or integrate the objectives covered in the unit with other objectives. In this manner, a computer gives individual attention to the learner and replies immediately to questions or commands. It acts as a tutor and guides the learner towards the correct answer while adapting the material to his performance.
A Compatible Learning Style
Students differ in their preferred styles of learning. Many students seem to learn much more effectively when they are able to use a compatible learning style than when they are forced to employ an incompatible one. Serious conflicts may arise when a teacher employs a style that is incompatible with a student's. In this regard, the computer can be used for adapting instruction to the unique styles of individual students. To cite an instance, the computer can provide an exciting rapid-fire drill for one student and a calm, slow-paced mode of presentation for another.
Optimal Use of Learning Time
By using the computer, students are often able to use their Academic Learning Time (ALT) more fruitfully. Academic Learning Time (ALT) is the amount of time a student spends attending to relevant academic tasks while performing those tasks with a high rate of success. For example, not all the time officially scheduled for studying a foreign language is likely to be allocated to it. If an hour is assigned to working on a topic, but the teacher devotes five minutes at the beginning of the session to returning papers and five minutes at the end to reading announcements, then only fifty minutes have been allocated to working on the topic. Scheduled time merely sets an upper limit on allocated time. Likewise, allocated time merely sets the upper limit to engaged time, which refers to the amount of time students actively attend to the subject matter under consideration. Even though fifty minutes may be allocated to studying a topic in French class, students may stare out the window or talk to their neighbours instead of pursuing the assigned activity. Therefore, even when they are actively engaged in studying the foreign language, students learn effectively only when they are performing at a high rate of success. This smaller amount of time is the factor that is most strongly related to the amount of learning that takes place (Lareau 1985:65-67). Computers enhance second/foreign language academic learning time by permitting learners to acquire specific information and practice specific skills and by helping students develop basic tools of learning which they can apply in a wide variety of settings. This also subverts the relationship between time and traditional instruction. Traditional instruction holds time constant and allows achievement to vary within a group. Computer-assisted learning reverses this relationship by holding achievement constant and letting the time students spend in pursuit of the objectives vary.
Immediate Feedback
Learners receive maximum benefit from feedback only when it is supplied immediately. Their interest and receptivity declines when the information on their performance is delayed. Yet, for various reasons, classroom feedback is often delayed and at times denied. A deferment of positive feedback, though important to act as encouragement and reinforcement, may not harm the progress of the learners. Nonetheless, any delay in offering negative feedback, the knowledge that one is wrong, will become crucial. A blissfully ignorant student may continue mispronouncing a word or applying a misconception before discovering the nature of this error. In such case, the computer can give instantaneous feedback and help the learner ward off his misconception at the initial stage itself. In addition to this, the computer can look for certain types of errors and give specific feedback, such as, "It looks as if you forgot the article."
Error Analysis
Computer database can be used by the instructor to classify and differentiate the type of general errors as well as errors committed by learners on account of the influence of the first language. And thus determine the most common errors cross-linguistically and more specifically, the particular form of a particular error type within a particular language group. One such study conducted reveals interesting findings, for example, that in subject-verb agreement errors the base form of verb was over generalised incorrectly more often than the -s form by all speakers. Also, Chinese writers typically omitted the articles a/an more often than the (Dalgish 1987:81-82). A computer can thus analyse the specific mistakes the student has made and can react in a different way from the usual teacher--this leads the student not only to self-correction, but also to understanding the principles behind the correct solution.
Guided and Free Writing
A word-processor in the computer can be very effective in teaching guided/free writing activities. The ability to create and manipulate text easily is the principle on which the word-processor programmes are founded. In this manner, the word-processor encourages practice in guided or free writing activities together with a number of sub-skills which comprise the writing process. Aspects of paragraphing, register, style, cohesion, rhetorical structure, lexical choice and expression can all receive attention without requiring the user to learn different programmes. The advantage is that the teacher can direct the student's writing without exerting total and rigid control, allowing for freedom of expression within certain bounds. Insights into grammar, vocabulary, punctuation, can also be developed.
Pre-determined to Process Syllabus
One major advantage in using a microprocessor is that it can enhance the learning process from a pre-determined syllabus to an emerging/process syllabus. Even the ordinary 'fill-in-the-blanks' type of monotonous exercise on paper can be made an exciting task on the screen in the self-access mode, where the students themselves choose their own material. CALL thus facilitates the synthesis of the pre-planned syllabus and learner syllabuses "through a decision making process undertaken by teacher and learners together" (Breen 1986:51).
Other Prospects
As students and teachers become more sophisticated in their use of such CALL software, more complicated use of these packages become possible. For instance, the ability of the computer to handle data, and allow the students to become computational linguists, is very powerful (Hardistry 1988:42-43). The experiential use of Wide Area Network (WAN) and Local Area Network (LAN) can reveal unexplored teaching materials and untouched learning methods. By effective use of linking computer with internet, authentic material can be brought directly into the classroom. A reading text can be done using that day's news item or weather forecast than using a news clipping of the previous year. The topicality of the issue can generate lot of interest and create authenticity of purpose. Correspondingly, the facility of LAN can be very useful for the practising of writing pithy telegraphic and telex messages. Of course, the joy and the excitement involved in the online communication process, both local and international, is an additional increment one gets from screen-based learning!
APPREHENSIONS
Man versus Machine
In spite of its glaring merits, the prospect of computer-assisted language learning has troubled teachers more. Perhaps, the major cause of their worry might have developed from the basic problem of accessibility. Often the computers have been kept in Science or Maths department causing a real and psychological distance in the minds of the Arts faculty. Nevertheless, many see computer as a threat not only in terms of its power to replace the traditional skills, which the language teachers promote, but also its eventual replacement of the teacher himself. Furthermore, shifting the control centre from the authoritarian teacher to the need-based learner and accepting the humble role of a facilitator/moderator instead of being a veritable dictator does not come easy for the traditionally clad chalk-talk teacher. In addition, the computer-student interactive learning not only allows the possibility of role changes, but also the potential for role-reversal, endangered by physical reversal by students. That is, the students literally turn their back to the teachers, and silence is now on the part of the teacher until called for assistance. Yet this role reversal can be exploited, since, it allows the classroom to become far more "learning centred" (Hardistry 1988:39). This term rather than learner-centred, has been used, to indicate that the central aim of the language lesson is to enable students to learn.
The Language Lab versus Computer
Another reason why teachers and sanctioning authorities alike are uncertain about the use of computers in language learning is that computers too, like language lab and other technological innovations, despite large investments, may remain unused and stored in some dark and abandoned room. After all, language laboratories in many countries fell into disuse, as they were too tied to one particular form of methodology, which limited the awareness of the potential. One real danger is that the computer could be used, like the language lab, as an instrument of Skinnerian behaviourism to facilitate the structuralist approach with an emphasis on "correctness," negating its flexibility and potential as a teaching aid to liberate the imaginations of the learners (Moore 1986:18-19). In this perspective, often CALL courseware has been restricted to drill and practice, with the screen equivalent to the textbook. Much software, like a textbook, is static both in presentation and in content. Another major criticism of CALL software is the lock-step design of the lessons. This, in turn, means that CALL software is missing a chance to exploit the computer's potential, with the result that computer power is not released to the student adequately.
CALL versus TALL
Computer-Assisted Language Learning(CALL) contrasted with Textbook-Assisted Language Learning(TALL), demands certain extra-skills such as typography, graphic design, or paper making and the lack of which panics the teacher and the taught alike. For instance, an inadvertent typographical error on the part of the student input may be classified wrong although the grammar of the student's answer is correct. Further, in terms of communication of ideas, a book is a means of communication between the author and the reader. In the same way, the computer is a means of communication between the programmer and the user. However, in this analogy, the author and the programmer do not mostly share similar concerns. While the author is bound to be a subject expert, the programmer is mostly a technician combined with the likely motives of a businessman. This gap between the author and the programmer is responsible for inappropriate lesson content, poor documentation, errors in format and content, improper feedback, etc. Likewise, in most software, there is little chance for the teacher to add to or modify the existing programmes, even if he wishes too, since most of it is locked to prevent pirating. And for the few of those who develop their own material, the time spent on programming and typing in the lessons can be quite lengthy.
PROBLEMS OR CHALLENGES?
Yet, these apprehensions should be seen in the backdrop of a developmental stage of computerisation of individuals and institutions and as a temporary phenomenon. The next generation of teachers and learners will be part of a computer generation. They will take for granted the skills demanded by computer technology and handle it as coolly as switching on a taperecorder or watching a television. Similarly, the pupils will need no readjustment of attitude when faced with a computer in a classroom and their familiarity and frequent association with the machine would replace the sense of awe and alienation felt by older people. Then planning pre-, actual and post-computer activities would be easily possible. The teachers would ensure that they are the ones in control of educational software by becoming involved in the development process and rejecting those programmes which do not serve their needs. For that reason, the onus is on the present CALL-disposed teachers that in order to convince the CALL-deposed teachers about the potentiality of CALL courseware, they must prove that it is not only perfect in every way, but that it is far better than any other existing teaching aid.
CONCLUSION
An ideal CALL courseware remains not an alternative but a complementary tool in reinforcing classroom activities. Apart from relying on the ability of educators to create suitable CALL courseware, the effectiveness of CALL depends on the teacher's readiness to adopt new attitudes and approaches toward language teaching. The teacher should avoid being skeptical about the use of computer in language teaching and begin to re-evaluate his methods in the light of computer's tremendous teaching potential and boldly address to the challenges offered. The computer can best assist teachers if it is seen not as a replacement for their work but as a supplement to it. By the way, the computer, will not replace the language teachers, but, used creatively, it will relieve them of tedious tasks and will enable students to receive individualised attention from both teachers and machines to a degree that has hitherto been impossible.
****************************************************
Works Consulted
Breen, M. 1984. "Process Syllabuses for the Language Classroom." Brumfit, C. Ed.
General English Syllabus Design, Curriculum and Syllabus Design for the General English Classroom. Oxford: Pergamon Press.
Dalgish, Gerald, M. 1987. "Some Uses of Computers in Teaching English as a Second Language: The Issue of Control." Blanchard, Jay S. and George E. Mason. Eds.
The Computer in the Reading and Language Arts. New Jersey: The Haworth Press, 81-93. Hardisty, David. 1987.
"Personalised Information Gap Activities and CALL," Practical English Teaching, 7/3: 35-7, Mary Glasgow Publications, London. _____. 1988.
"Lessons from the Classroom." Theo Bongaerts, et al. Eds. Computer Applications in Language Learning. Holland: Foris Publications. 35-45.
Higgins, John and Tim Johns. 1984. Computers in Language Learning. London: Collins ELT.
Lareau, Paul and Edward Vockell. 1985. The Computer in the Foreign Language Curriculum. California: Mitchell Publishing Inc.
Last, Rex. 1984. Language Teaching and the Microcomputer. Oxford: Basil Blackwell Limited.
Mirescu, Simona. 1997. "Computer Assisted Instruction in Language Teaching." English Teaching Forum. January: 53-56.
Leech, Geofrrey and Christopher N. Candlin. Eds. 1986. Computers in English Language Teaching and Research. London: Longman.
More, Phil. 1986. Using Computers in English: A Practical Guide. London: Methuen.
Underworld, John H. 1984. Linguistics Computers and the Language Teaching: A Communicative Approach. Rowley: Newbury House Publications Inc.
Wilga, Rivers M. 1987. Interactive Language Teaching. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Wresch, William. 1987. A Practical Guide to Computer Uses in the Language Arts Class Room. New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, Inc.
The author can be contacted at travichandran4@yahoo.com
Read the other article of author on Friendship here.
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IN THE PERSPECTIVE OF INTERACTIVE APPROACH:
ADVANTAGES AND APPREHENSIONS
by
T. Ravichandran, M.A., M.Phil., P.G.C.T.E., (Ph.D.)
Lecturer, Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar Technological University, Lonere - 402 103.
(Paper presented and published in the Proceedings: National Seminar on CALL,
Anna University, Chennai, 10-12 Feb. 2000, pp. 82-89.)
INTRODUCTION
To begin with the question whether computers really assist second language learning, many teachers who have never touched a computer tend to respond with an emphatic no; whereas, the overwhelming number of teachers who give computers a try find that they are indeed useful in second language learning. No doubt, computers make excellent teaching tools, especially in teaching languages in any aspect, be it vocabulary, grammar, composition, pronunciation, or other linguistic and pragmatic-communicative skills. And the major benefits offered by computer in enhancing language acquisition apparently outweigh its limitations.
ADVANTAGES
Interest and Motivation
It is often necessary, in a language learning classroom, to provide repeated practice to meet important objectives. Because this can be boring, painful, and frustrating, many students lose interest and motivation to learn foreign languages. CALL programmes present the learner with a novelty. They teach the language in different and more interesting, attractive ways and present language through games, animated graphics and problem-solving techniques. As a result even tedious drills become more interesting. In fact, CALL motivates the students to go beyond the point of initial mastery and practice activity until they become automatic.
Individualisation
Many students need additional time and individualised practice to meet learning objectives. The computer offers students self-instructional tasks that let them master prerequisite skills and course objectives at a speed and level dictated by their own needs. Besides, additional programmes can be made available for students who master objectives quickly. These additional programmes can provide more intense study of the same objectives, proceed to higher objectives, or integrate the objectives covered in the unit with other objectives. In this manner, a computer gives individual attention to the learner and replies immediately to questions or commands. It acts as a tutor and guides the learner towards the correct answer while adapting the material to his performance.
A Compatible Learning Style
Students differ in their preferred styles of learning. Many students seem to learn much more effectively when they are able to use a compatible learning style than when they are forced to employ an incompatible one. Serious conflicts may arise when a teacher employs a style that is incompatible with a student's. In this regard, the computer can be used for adapting instruction to the unique styles of individual students. To cite an instance, the computer can provide an exciting rapid-fire drill for one student and a calm, slow-paced mode of presentation for another.
Optimal Use of Learning Time
By using the computer, students are often able to use their Academic Learning Time (ALT) more fruitfully. Academic Learning Time (ALT) is the amount of time a student spends attending to relevant academic tasks while performing those tasks with a high rate of success. For example, not all the time officially scheduled for studying a foreign language is likely to be allocated to it. If an hour is assigned to working on a topic, but the teacher devotes five minutes at the beginning of the session to returning papers and five minutes at the end to reading announcements, then only fifty minutes have been allocated to working on the topic. Scheduled time merely sets an upper limit on allocated time. Likewise, allocated time merely sets the upper limit to engaged time, which refers to the amount of time students actively attend to the subject matter under consideration. Even though fifty minutes may be allocated to studying a topic in French class, students may stare out the window or talk to their neighbours instead of pursuing the assigned activity. Therefore, even when they are actively engaged in studying the foreign language, students learn effectively only when they are performing at a high rate of success. This smaller amount of time is the factor that is most strongly related to the amount of learning that takes place (Lareau 1985:65-67). Computers enhance second/foreign language academic learning time by permitting learners to acquire specific information and practice specific skills and by helping students develop basic tools of learning which they can apply in a wide variety of settings. This also subverts the relationship between time and traditional instruction. Traditional instruction holds time constant and allows achievement to vary within a group. Computer-assisted learning reverses this relationship by holding achievement constant and letting the time students spend in pursuit of the objectives vary.
Immediate Feedback
Learners receive maximum benefit from feedback only when it is supplied immediately. Their interest and receptivity declines when the information on their performance is delayed. Yet, for various reasons, classroom feedback is often delayed and at times denied. A deferment of positive feedback, though important to act as encouragement and reinforcement, may not harm the progress of the learners. Nonetheless, any delay in offering negative feedback, the knowledge that one is wrong, will become crucial. A blissfully ignorant student may continue mispronouncing a word or applying a misconception before discovering the nature of this error. In such case, the computer can give instantaneous feedback and help the learner ward off his misconception at the initial stage itself. In addition to this, the computer can look for certain types of errors and give specific feedback, such as, "It looks as if you forgot the article."
Error Analysis
Computer database can be used by the instructor to classify and differentiate the type of general errors as well as errors committed by learners on account of the influence of the first language. And thus determine the most common errors cross-linguistically and more specifically, the particular form of a particular error type within a particular language group. One such study conducted reveals interesting findings, for example, that in subject-verb agreement errors the base form of verb was over generalised incorrectly more often than the -s form by all speakers. Also, Chinese writers typically omitted the articles a/an more often than the (Dalgish 1987:81-82). A computer can thus analyse the specific mistakes the student has made and can react in a different way from the usual teacher--this leads the student not only to self-correction, but also to understanding the principles behind the correct solution.
Guided and Free Writing
A word-processor in the computer can be very effective in teaching guided/free writing activities. The ability to create and manipulate text easily is the principle on which the word-processor programmes are founded. In this manner, the word-processor encourages practice in guided or free writing activities together with a number of sub-skills which comprise the writing process. Aspects of paragraphing, register, style, cohesion, rhetorical structure, lexical choice and expression can all receive attention without requiring the user to learn different programmes. The advantage is that the teacher can direct the student's writing without exerting total and rigid control, allowing for freedom of expression within certain bounds. Insights into grammar, vocabulary, punctuation, can also be developed.
Pre-determined to Process Syllabus
One major advantage in using a microprocessor is that it can enhance the learning process from a pre-determined syllabus to an emerging/process syllabus. Even the ordinary 'fill-in-the-blanks' type of monotonous exercise on paper can be made an exciting task on the screen in the self-access mode, where the students themselves choose their own material. CALL thus facilitates the synthesis of the pre-planned syllabus and learner syllabuses "through a decision making process undertaken by teacher and learners together" (Breen 1986:51).
Other Prospects
As students and teachers become more sophisticated in their use of such CALL software, more complicated use of these packages become possible. For instance, the ability of the computer to handle data, and allow the students to become computational linguists, is very powerful (Hardistry 1988:42-43). The experiential use of Wide Area Network (WAN) and Local Area Network (LAN) can reveal unexplored teaching materials and untouched learning methods. By effective use of linking computer with internet, authentic material can be brought directly into the classroom. A reading text can be done using that day's news item or weather forecast than using a news clipping of the previous year. The topicality of the issue can generate lot of interest and create authenticity of purpose. Correspondingly, the facility of LAN can be very useful for the practising of writing pithy telegraphic and telex messages. Of course, the joy and the excitement involved in the online communication process, both local and international, is an additional increment one gets from screen-based learning!
APPREHENSIONS
Man versus Machine
In spite of its glaring merits, the prospect of computer-assisted language learning has troubled teachers more. Perhaps, the major cause of their worry might have developed from the basic problem of accessibility. Often the computers have been kept in Science or Maths department causing a real and psychological distance in the minds of the Arts faculty. Nevertheless, many see computer as a threat not only in terms of its power to replace the traditional skills, which the language teachers promote, but also its eventual replacement of the teacher himself. Furthermore, shifting the control centre from the authoritarian teacher to the need-based learner and accepting the humble role of a facilitator/moderator instead of being a veritable dictator does not come easy for the traditionally clad chalk-talk teacher. In addition, the computer-student interactive learning not only allows the possibility of role changes, but also the potential for role-reversal, endangered by physical reversal by students. That is, the students literally turn their back to the teachers, and silence is now on the part of the teacher until called for assistance. Yet this role reversal can be exploited, since, it allows the classroom to become far more "learning centred" (Hardistry 1988:39). This term rather than learner-centred, has been used, to indicate that the central aim of the language lesson is to enable students to learn.
The Language Lab versus Computer
Another reason why teachers and sanctioning authorities alike are uncertain about the use of computers in language learning is that computers too, like language lab and other technological innovations, despite large investments, may remain unused and stored in some dark and abandoned room. After all, language laboratories in many countries fell into disuse, as they were too tied to one particular form of methodology, which limited the awareness of the potential. One real danger is that the computer could be used, like the language lab, as an instrument of Skinnerian behaviourism to facilitate the structuralist approach with an emphasis on "correctness," negating its flexibility and potential as a teaching aid to liberate the imaginations of the learners (Moore 1986:18-19). In this perspective, often CALL courseware has been restricted to drill and practice, with the screen equivalent to the textbook. Much software, like a textbook, is static both in presentation and in content. Another major criticism of CALL software is the lock-step design of the lessons. This, in turn, means that CALL software is missing a chance to exploit the computer's potential, with the result that computer power is not released to the student adequately.
CALL versus TALL
Computer-Assisted Language Learning(CALL) contrasted with Textbook-Assisted Language Learning(TALL), demands certain extra-skills such as typography, graphic design, or paper making and the lack of which panics the teacher and the taught alike. For instance, an inadvertent typographical error on the part of the student input may be classified wrong although the grammar of the student's answer is correct. Further, in terms of communication of ideas, a book is a means of communication between the author and the reader. In the same way, the computer is a means of communication between the programmer and the user. However, in this analogy, the author and the programmer do not mostly share similar concerns. While the author is bound to be a subject expert, the programmer is mostly a technician combined with the likely motives of a businessman. This gap between the author and the programmer is responsible for inappropriate lesson content, poor documentation, errors in format and content, improper feedback, etc. Likewise, in most software, there is little chance for the teacher to add to or modify the existing programmes, even if he wishes too, since most of it is locked to prevent pirating. And for the few of those who develop their own material, the time spent on programming and typing in the lessons can be quite lengthy.
PROBLEMS OR CHALLENGES?
Yet, these apprehensions should be seen in the backdrop of a developmental stage of computerisation of individuals and institutions and as a temporary phenomenon. The next generation of teachers and learners will be part of a computer generation. They will take for granted the skills demanded by computer technology and handle it as coolly as switching on a taperecorder or watching a television. Similarly, the pupils will need no readjustment of attitude when faced with a computer in a classroom and their familiarity and frequent association with the machine would replace the sense of awe and alienation felt by older people. Then planning pre-, actual and post-computer activities would be easily possible. The teachers would ensure that they are the ones in control of educational software by becoming involved in the development process and rejecting those programmes which do not serve their needs. For that reason, the onus is on the present CALL-disposed teachers that in order to convince the CALL-deposed teachers about the potentiality of CALL courseware, they must prove that it is not only perfect in every way, but that it is far better than any other existing teaching aid.
CONCLUSION
An ideal CALL courseware remains not an alternative but a complementary tool in reinforcing classroom activities. Apart from relying on the ability of educators to create suitable CALL courseware, the effectiveness of CALL depends on the teacher's readiness to adopt new attitudes and approaches toward language teaching. The teacher should avoid being skeptical about the use of computer in language teaching and begin to re-evaluate his methods in the light of computer's tremendous teaching potential and boldly address to the challenges offered. The computer can best assist teachers if it is seen not as a replacement for their work but as a supplement to it. By the way, the computer, will not replace the language teachers, but, used creatively, it will relieve them of tedious tasks and will enable students to receive individualised attention from both teachers and machines to a degree that has hitherto been impossible.
****************************************************
Works Consulted
Breen, M. 1984. "Process Syllabuses for the Language Classroom." Brumfit, C. Ed.
General English Syllabus Design, Curriculum and Syllabus Design for the General English Classroom. Oxford: Pergamon Press.
Dalgish, Gerald, M. 1987. "Some Uses of Computers in Teaching English as a Second Language: The Issue of Control." Blanchard, Jay S. and George E. Mason. Eds.
The Computer in the Reading and Language Arts. New Jersey: The Haworth Press, 81-93. Hardisty, David. 1987.
"Personalised Information Gap Activities and CALL," Practical English Teaching, 7/3: 35-7, Mary Glasgow Publications, London. _____. 1988.
"Lessons from the Classroom." Theo Bongaerts, et al. Eds. Computer Applications in Language Learning. Holland: Foris Publications. 35-45.
Higgins, John and Tim Johns. 1984. Computers in Language Learning. London: Collins ELT.
Lareau, Paul and Edward Vockell. 1985. The Computer in the Foreign Language Curriculum. California: Mitchell Publishing Inc.
Last, Rex. 1984. Language Teaching and the Microcomputer. Oxford: Basil Blackwell Limited.
Mirescu, Simona. 1997. "Computer Assisted Instruction in Language Teaching." English Teaching Forum. January: 53-56.
Leech, Geofrrey and Christopher N. Candlin. Eds. 1986. Computers in English Language Teaching and Research. London: Longman.
More, Phil. 1986. Using Computers in English: A Practical Guide. London: Methuen.
Underworld, John H. 1984. Linguistics Computers and the Language Teaching: A Communicative Approach. Rowley: Newbury House Publications Inc.
Wilga, Rivers M. 1987. Interactive Language Teaching. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Wresch, William. 1987. A Practical Guide to Computer Uses in the Language Arts Class Room. New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, Inc.
The author can be contacted at travichandran4@yahoo.com
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COMPUTER ASSISTED LANGUAGE LEARNING (CALL)
CALL - Article by T.Ravichandran
COMPUTER ASSISTED LANGUAGE LEARNING (CALL)
IN THE PERSPECTIVE OF INTERACTIVE APPROACH:
ADVANTAGES AND APPREHENSIONS
T. Ravichandran
Assistant Professor of English, IIT Kanpur
(Paper presented and published in the Proceedings: National Seminar on CALL,
Anna University, Chennai, 10-12 Feb. 2000, pp. 82-89.)
INTRODUCTION
To begin with the question whether computers really assist second language learning, many teachers
who have never touched a computer tend to respond with an emphatic no; whereas, the overwhelming
number of teachers who give computers a try find that they are indeed useful in second language
learning. No doubt, computers make excellent teaching tools, especially in teaching languages in any
aspect, be it vocabulary, grammar, composition, pronunciation, or other linguistic and pragmaticcommunicative
skills. And the major benefits offered by computer in enhancing language acquisition
apparently outweigh its limitations.
ADVANTAGES
Interest and Motivation
It is often necessary, in a language learning classroom, to provide repeated practice to meet important
objectives. Because this can be boring, painful, and frustrating, many students lose interest and
motivation to learn foreign languages. CALL programmes present the learner with a novelty. They
teach the language in different and more interesting, attractive ways and present language through
games, animated graphics and problem-solving techniques. As a result even tedious drills become more
interesting. In fact, CALL motivates the students to go beyond the point of initial mastery and practice
activity until they become automatic.
Individualisation
Many students need additional time and individualised practice to meet learning objectives. The
computer offers students self-instructional tasks that let them master prerequisite skills and course
file:///F|/A1/13%20PERSONAL/Home%20Page/Home%20Page/call.htm (1 of 6)8/7/2006 11:40:07 PM
CALL - Article by T.Ravichandran
objectives at a speed and level dictated by their own needs. Besides, additional programmes can be made
available for students who master objectives quickly. These additional programmes can provide more
intense study of the same objectives, proceed to higher objectives, or integrate the objectives covered in
the unit with other objectives. In this manner, a computer gives individual attention to the learner and
replies immediately to questions or commands. It acts as a tutor and guides the learner towards the
correct answer while adapting the material to his performance.
A Compatible Learning Style
Students differ in their preferred styles of learning. Many students seem to learn much more effectively
when they are able to use a compatible learning style than when they are forced to employ an
incompatible one. Serious conflicts may arise when a teacher employs a style that is incompatible with
a student's. In this regard, the computer can be used for adapting instruction to the unique styles of
individual students. To cite an instance, the computer can provide an exciting rapid-fire drill for one
student and a calm, slow-paced mode of presentation for another.
Optimal Use of Learning Time
By using the computer, students are often able to use their Academic Learning Time (ALT) more
fruitfully. Academic Learning Time (ALT) is the amount of time a student spends attending to relevant
academic tasks while performing those tasks with a high rate of success. For example, not all the time
officially scheduled for studying a foreign language is likely to be allocated to it. If an hour is assigned
to working on a topic, but the teacher devotes five minutes at the beginning of the session to returning
papers and five minutes at the end to reading announcements, then only fifty minutes have been
allocated to working on the topic. Scheduled time merely sets an upper limit on allocated time.
Likewise, allocated time merely sets the upper limit to engaged time, which refers to the amount of time
students actively attend to the subject matter under consideration. Even though fifty minutes may be
allocated to studying a topic in French class, students may stare out the window or talk to their
neighbours instead of pursuing the assigned activity. Therefore, even when they are actively engaged in
studying the foreign language, students learn effectively only when they are performing at a high rate of
success. This smaller amount of time is the factor that is most strongly related to the amount of learning
that takes place (Lareau 1985:65-67). Computers enhance second/foreign language academic learning
time by permitting learners to acquire specific information and practice specific skills and by helping
students develop basic tools of learning which they can apply in a wide variety of settings. This also
subverts the relationship between time and traditional instruction. Traditional instruction holds time
constant and allows achievement to vary within a group. Computer-assisted learning reverses this
relationship by holding achievement constant and letting the time students spend in pursuit of the
objectives vary.
Immediate Feedback
Learners receive maximum benefit from feedback only when it is supplied immediately. Their interest
and receptivity declines when the information on their performance is delayed. Yet, for various reasons,
classroom feedback is often delayed and at times denied. A deferment of positive feedback, though
important to act as encouragement and reinforcement, may not harm the progress of the learners.
Nonetheless, any delay in offering negative feedback, the knowledge that one is wrong, will become
file:///F|/A1/13%20PERSONAL/Home%20Page/Home%20Page/call.htm (2 of 6)8/7/2006 11:40:07 PM
CALL - Article by T.Ravichandran
crucial. A blissfully ignorant student may continue mispronouncing a word or applying a misconception
before discovering the nature of this error. In such case, the computer can give instantaneous feedback
and help the learner ward off his misconception at the initial stage itself. In addition to this, the
computer can look for certain types of errors and give specific feedback, such as, "It looks as if you
forgot the article."
Error Analysis
Computer database can be used by the instructor to classify and differentiate the type of general errors as
well as errors committed by learners on account of the influence of the first language. And thus
determine the most common errors cross-linguistically and more specifically, the particular form of a
particular error type within a particular language group. One such study conducted reveals interesting
findings, for example, that in subject-verb agreement errors the base form of verb was over generalised
incorrectly more often than the -s form by all speakers. Also, Chinese writers typically omitted the
articles a/an more often than the (Dalgish 1987:81-82). A computer can thus analyse the specific
mistakes the student has made and can react in a different way from the usual teacher--this leads the
student not only to self-correction, but also to understanding the principles behind the correct solution.
Guided and Free Writing
A word-processor in the computer can be very effective in teaching guided/free writing activities. The
ability to create and manipulate text easily is the principle on which the word-processor programmes are
founded. In this manner, the word-processor encourages practice in guided or free writing activities
together with a number of sub-skills which comprise the writing process. Aspects of paragraphing,
register, style, cohesion, rhetorical structure, lexical choice and expression can all receive attention
without requiring the user to learn different programmes. The advantage is that the teacher can direct
the student's writing without exerting total and rigid control, allowing for freedom of expression within
certain bounds. Insights into grammar, vocabulary, punctuation, can also be developed.
Pre-determined to Process Syllabus
One major advantage in using a microprocessor is that it can enhance the learning process from a predetermined
syllabus to an emerging/process syllabus. Even the ordinary 'fill-in-the-blanks' type of
monotonous exercise on paper can be made an exciting task on the screen in the self-access mode, where
the students themselves choose their own material. CALL thus facilitates the synthesis of the preplanned
syllabus and learner syllabuses "through a decision making process undertaken by teacher and
learners together" (Breen 1986:51).
Other Prospects
As students and teachers become more sophisticated in their use of such CALL software, more
complicated use of these packages become possible. For instance, the ability of the computer to handle
data, and allow the students to become computational linguists, is very powerful (Hardistry 1988:42-
43). The experiential use of Wide Area Network (WAN) and Local Area Network (LAN) can reveal
unexplored teaching materials and untouched learning methods. By effective use of linking computer
with internet, authentic material can be brought directly into the classroom. A reading text can be done
using that day's news item or weather forecast than using a news clipping of the previous year. The
file:///F|/A1/13%20PERSONAL/Home%20Page/Home%20Page/call.htm (3 of 6)8/7/2006 11:40:07 PM
CALL - Article by T.Ravichandran
topicality of the issue can generate lot of interest and create authenticity of purpose. Correspondingly,
the facility of LAN can be very useful for the practising of writing pithy telegraphic and telex messages.
Of course, the joy and the excitement involved in the online communication process, both local and
international, is an additional increment one gets from screen-based learning!
APPREHENSIONS
Man versus Machine
In spite of its glaring merits, the prospect of computer-assisted language learning has troubled teachers
more. Perhaps, the major cause of their worry might have developed from the basic problem of
accessibility. Often the computers have been kept in Science or Maths department causing a real and
psychological distance in the minds of the Arts faculty. Nevertheless, many see computer as a threat not
only in terms of its power to replace the traditional skills, which the language teachers promote, but also
its eventual replacement of the teacher himself. Furthermore, shifting the control centre from the
authoritarian teacher to the need-based learner and accepting the humble role of a facilitator/moderator
instead of being a veritable dictator does not come easy for the traditionally clad chalk-talk teacher. In
addition, the computer-student interactive learning not only allows the possibility of role changes, but
also the potential for role-reversal, endangered by physical reversal by students. That is, the students
literally turn their back to the teachers, and silence is now on the part of the teacher until called for
assistance. Yet this role reversal can be exploited, since, it allows the classroom to become far more
"learning centred" (Hardistry 1988:39). This term rather than learner-centred, has been used, to indicate
that the central aim of the language lesson is to enable students to learn.
The Language Lab versus Computer
Another reason why teachers and sanctioning authorities alike are uncertain about the use of computers
in language learning is that computers too, like language lab and other technological innovations, despite
large investments, may remain unused and stored in some dark and abandoned room. After all, language
laboratories in many countries fell into disuse, as they were too tied to one particular form of
methodology, which limited the awareness of the potential. One real danger is that the computer could
be used, like the language lab, as an instrument of Skinnerian behaviourism to facilitate the structuralist
approach with an emphasis on "correctness," negating its flexibility and potential as a teaching aid to
liberate the imaginations of the learners (Moore 1986:18-19). In this perspective, often CALL
courseware has been restricted to drill and practice, with the screen equivalent to the textbook. Much
software, like a textbook, is static both in presentation and in content. Another major criticism of CALL
software is the lock-step design of the lessons. This, in turn, means that CALL software is missing a
chance to exploit the computer's potential, with the result that computer power is not released to the
student adequately.
CALL versus TALL
Computer-Assisted Language Learning(CALL) contrasted with Textbook-Assisted Language Learning
(TALL), demands certain extra-skills such as typography, graphic design, or paper making and the lack
file:///F|/A1/13%20PERSONAL/Home%20Page/Home%20Page/call.htm (4 of 6)8/7/2006 11:40:07 PM
CALL - Article by T.Ravichandran
of which panics the teacher and the taught alike. For instance, an inadvertent typographical error on the
part of the student input may be classified wrong although the grammar of the student's answer is
correct. Further, in terms of communication of ideas, a book is a means of communication between the
author and the reader. In the same way, the computer is a means of communication between the
programmer and the user. However, in this analogy, the author and the programmer do not mostly share
similar concerns. While the author is bound to be a subject expert, the programmer is mostly a
technician combined with the likely motives of a businessman. This gap between the author and the
programmer is responsible for inappropriate lesson content, poor documentation, errors in format and
content, improper feedback, etc. Likewise, in most software, there is little chance for the teacher to add
to or modify the existing programmes, even if he wishes too, since most of it is locked to prevent
pirating. And for the few of those who develop their own material, the time spent on programming and
typing in the lessons can be quite lengthy.
PROBLEMS OR CHALLENGES?
Yet, these apprehensions should be seen in the backdrop of a developmental stage of computerisation of
individuals and institutions and as a temporary phenomenon. The next generation of teachers and
learners will be part of a computer generation. They will take for granted the skills demanded by
computer technology and handle it as coolly as switching on a taperecorder or watching a television.
Similarly, the pupils will need no readjustment of attitude when faced with a computer in a classroom
and their familiarity and frequent association with the machine would replace the sense of awe and
alienation felt by older people. Then planning pre-, actual and post-computer activities would be easily
possible. The teachers would ensure that they are the ones in control of educational software by
becoming involved in the development process and rejecting those programmes which do not serve their
needs. For that reason, the onus is on the present CALL-disposed teachers that in order to convince the
CALL-deposed teachers about the potentiality of CALL courseware, they must prove that it is not only
perfect in every way, but that it is far better than any other existing teaching aid.
CONCLUSION
An ideal CALL courseware remains not an alternative but a complementary tool in reinforcing
classroom activities. Apart from relying on the ability of educators to create suitable CALL courseware,
the effectiveness of CALL depends on the teacher's readiness to adopt new attitudes and approaches
toward language teaching. The teacher should avoid being skeptical about the use of computer in
language teaching and begin to re-evaluate his methods in the light of computer's tremendous teaching
potential and boldly address to the challenges offered. The computer can best assist teachers if it is seen
not as a replacement for their work but as a supplement to it. By the way, the computer, will not replace
the language teachers, but, used creatively, it will relieve them of tedious tasks and will enable students
to receive individualised attention from both teachers and machines to a degree that has hitherto been
impossible.
COMPUTER ASSISTED LANGUAGE LEARNING (CALL)
IN THE PERSPECTIVE OF INTERACTIVE APPROACH:
ADVANTAGES AND APPREHENSIONS
T. Ravichandran
Assistant Professor of English, IIT Kanpur
(Paper presented and published in the Proceedings: National Seminar on CALL,
Anna University, Chennai, 10-12 Feb. 2000, pp. 82-89.)
INTRODUCTION
To begin with the question whether computers really assist second language learning, many teachers
who have never touched a computer tend to respond with an emphatic no; whereas, the overwhelming
number of teachers who give computers a try find that they are indeed useful in second language
learning. No doubt, computers make excellent teaching tools, especially in teaching languages in any
aspect, be it vocabulary, grammar, composition, pronunciation, or other linguistic and pragmaticcommunicative
skills. And the major benefits offered by computer in enhancing language acquisition
apparently outweigh its limitations.
ADVANTAGES
Interest and Motivation
It is often necessary, in a language learning classroom, to provide repeated practice to meet important
objectives. Because this can be boring, painful, and frustrating, many students lose interest and
motivation to learn foreign languages. CALL programmes present the learner with a novelty. They
teach the language in different and more interesting, attractive ways and present language through
games, animated graphics and problem-solving techniques. As a result even tedious drills become more
interesting. In fact, CALL motivates the students to go beyond the point of initial mastery and practice
activity until they become automatic.
Individualisation
Many students need additional time and individualised practice to meet learning objectives. The
computer offers students self-instructional tasks that let them master prerequisite skills and course
file:///F|/A1/13%20PERSONAL/Home%20Page/Home%20Page/call.htm (1 of 6)8/7/2006 11:40:07 PM
CALL - Article by T.Ravichandran
objectives at a speed and level dictated by their own needs. Besides, additional programmes can be made
available for students who master objectives quickly. These additional programmes can provide more
intense study of the same objectives, proceed to higher objectives, or integrate the objectives covered in
the unit with other objectives. In this manner, a computer gives individual attention to the learner and
replies immediately to questions or commands. It acts as a tutor and guides the learner towards the
correct answer while adapting the material to his performance.
A Compatible Learning Style
Students differ in their preferred styles of learning. Many students seem to learn much more effectively
when they are able to use a compatible learning style than when they are forced to employ an
incompatible one. Serious conflicts may arise when a teacher employs a style that is incompatible with
a student's. In this regard, the computer can be used for adapting instruction to the unique styles of
individual students. To cite an instance, the computer can provide an exciting rapid-fire drill for one
student and a calm, slow-paced mode of presentation for another.
Optimal Use of Learning Time
By using the computer, students are often able to use their Academic Learning Time (ALT) more
fruitfully. Academic Learning Time (ALT) is the amount of time a student spends attending to relevant
academic tasks while performing those tasks with a high rate of success. For example, not all the time
officially scheduled for studying a foreign language is likely to be allocated to it. If an hour is assigned
to working on a topic, but the teacher devotes five minutes at the beginning of the session to returning
papers and five minutes at the end to reading announcements, then only fifty minutes have been
allocated to working on the topic. Scheduled time merely sets an upper limit on allocated time.
Likewise, allocated time merely sets the upper limit to engaged time, which refers to the amount of time
students actively attend to the subject matter under consideration. Even though fifty minutes may be
allocated to studying a topic in French class, students may stare out the window or talk to their
neighbours instead of pursuing the assigned activity. Therefore, even when they are actively engaged in
studying the foreign language, students learn effectively only when they are performing at a high rate of
success. This smaller amount of time is the factor that is most strongly related to the amount of learning
that takes place (Lareau 1985:65-67). Computers enhance second/foreign language academic learning
time by permitting learners to acquire specific information and practice specific skills and by helping
students develop basic tools of learning which they can apply in a wide variety of settings. This also
subverts the relationship between time and traditional instruction. Traditional instruction holds time
constant and allows achievement to vary within a group. Computer-assisted learning reverses this
relationship by holding achievement constant and letting the time students spend in pursuit of the
objectives vary.
Immediate Feedback
Learners receive maximum benefit from feedback only when it is supplied immediately. Their interest
and receptivity declines when the information on their performance is delayed. Yet, for various reasons,
classroom feedback is often delayed and at times denied. A deferment of positive feedback, though
important to act as encouragement and reinforcement, may not harm the progress of the learners.
Nonetheless, any delay in offering negative feedback, the knowledge that one is wrong, will become
file:///F|/A1/13%20PERSONAL/Home%20Page/Home%20Page/call.htm (2 of 6)8/7/2006 11:40:07 PM
CALL - Article by T.Ravichandran
crucial. A blissfully ignorant student may continue mispronouncing a word or applying a misconception
before discovering the nature of this error. In such case, the computer can give instantaneous feedback
and help the learner ward off his misconception at the initial stage itself. In addition to this, the
computer can look for certain types of errors and give specific feedback, such as, "It looks as if you
forgot the article."
Error Analysis
Computer database can be used by the instructor to classify and differentiate the type of general errors as
well as errors committed by learners on account of the influence of the first language. And thus
determine the most common errors cross-linguistically and more specifically, the particular form of a
particular error type within a particular language group. One such study conducted reveals interesting
findings, for example, that in subject-verb agreement errors the base form of verb was over generalised
incorrectly more often than the -s form by all speakers. Also, Chinese writers typically omitted the
articles a/an more often than the (Dalgish 1987:81-82). A computer can thus analyse the specific
mistakes the student has made and can react in a different way from the usual teacher--this leads the
student not only to self-correction, but also to understanding the principles behind the correct solution.
Guided and Free Writing
A word-processor in the computer can be very effective in teaching guided/free writing activities. The
ability to create and manipulate text easily is the principle on which the word-processor programmes are
founded. In this manner, the word-processor encourages practice in guided or free writing activities
together with a number of sub-skills which comprise the writing process. Aspects of paragraphing,
register, style, cohesion, rhetorical structure, lexical choice and expression can all receive attention
without requiring the user to learn different programmes. The advantage is that the teacher can direct
the student's writing without exerting total and rigid control, allowing for freedom of expression within
certain bounds. Insights into grammar, vocabulary, punctuation, can also be developed.
Pre-determined to Process Syllabus
One major advantage in using a microprocessor is that it can enhance the learning process from a predetermined
syllabus to an emerging/process syllabus. Even the ordinary 'fill-in-the-blanks' type of
monotonous exercise on paper can be made an exciting task on the screen in the self-access mode, where
the students themselves choose their own material. CALL thus facilitates the synthesis of the preplanned
syllabus and learner syllabuses "through a decision making process undertaken by teacher and
learners together" (Breen 1986:51).
Other Prospects
As students and teachers become more sophisticated in their use of such CALL software, more
complicated use of these packages become possible. For instance, the ability of the computer to handle
data, and allow the students to become computational linguists, is very powerful (Hardistry 1988:42-
43). The experiential use of Wide Area Network (WAN) and Local Area Network (LAN) can reveal
unexplored teaching materials and untouched learning methods. By effective use of linking computer
with internet, authentic material can be brought directly into the classroom. A reading text can be done
using that day's news item or weather forecast than using a news clipping of the previous year. The
file:///F|/A1/13%20PERSONAL/Home%20Page/Home%20Page/call.htm (3 of 6)8/7/2006 11:40:07 PM
CALL - Article by T.Ravichandran
topicality of the issue can generate lot of interest and create authenticity of purpose. Correspondingly,
the facility of LAN can be very useful for the practising of writing pithy telegraphic and telex messages.
Of course, the joy and the excitement involved in the online communication process, both local and
international, is an additional increment one gets from screen-based learning!
APPREHENSIONS
Man versus Machine
In spite of its glaring merits, the prospect of computer-assisted language learning has troubled teachers
more. Perhaps, the major cause of their worry might have developed from the basic problem of
accessibility. Often the computers have been kept in Science or Maths department causing a real and
psychological distance in the minds of the Arts faculty. Nevertheless, many see computer as a threat not
only in terms of its power to replace the traditional skills, which the language teachers promote, but also
its eventual replacement of the teacher himself. Furthermore, shifting the control centre from the
authoritarian teacher to the need-based learner and accepting the humble role of a facilitator/moderator
instead of being a veritable dictator does not come easy for the traditionally clad chalk-talk teacher. In
addition, the computer-student interactive learning not only allows the possibility of role changes, but
also the potential for role-reversal, endangered by physical reversal by students. That is, the students
literally turn their back to the teachers, and silence is now on the part of the teacher until called for
assistance. Yet this role reversal can be exploited, since, it allows the classroom to become far more
"learning centred" (Hardistry 1988:39). This term rather than learner-centred, has been used, to indicate
that the central aim of the language lesson is to enable students to learn.
The Language Lab versus Computer
Another reason why teachers and sanctioning authorities alike are uncertain about the use of computers
in language learning is that computers too, like language lab and other technological innovations, despite
large investments, may remain unused and stored in some dark and abandoned room. After all, language
laboratories in many countries fell into disuse, as they were too tied to one particular form of
methodology, which limited the awareness of the potential. One real danger is that the computer could
be used, like the language lab, as an instrument of Skinnerian behaviourism to facilitate the structuralist
approach with an emphasis on "correctness," negating its flexibility and potential as a teaching aid to
liberate the imaginations of the learners (Moore 1986:18-19). In this perspective, often CALL
courseware has been restricted to drill and practice, with the screen equivalent to the textbook. Much
software, like a textbook, is static both in presentation and in content. Another major criticism of CALL
software is the lock-step design of the lessons. This, in turn, means that CALL software is missing a
chance to exploit the computer's potential, with the result that computer power is not released to the
student adequately.
CALL versus TALL
Computer-Assisted Language Learning(CALL) contrasted with Textbook-Assisted Language Learning
(TALL), demands certain extra-skills such as typography, graphic design, or paper making and the lack
file:///F|/A1/13%20PERSONAL/Home%20Page/Home%20Page/call.htm (4 of 6)8/7/2006 11:40:07 PM
CALL - Article by T.Ravichandran
of which panics the teacher and the taught alike. For instance, an inadvertent typographical error on the
part of the student input may be classified wrong although the grammar of the student's answer is
correct. Further, in terms of communication of ideas, a book is a means of communication between the
author and the reader. In the same way, the computer is a means of communication between the
programmer and the user. However, in this analogy, the author and the programmer do not mostly share
similar concerns. While the author is bound to be a subject expert, the programmer is mostly a
technician combined with the likely motives of a businessman. This gap between the author and the
programmer is responsible for inappropriate lesson content, poor documentation, errors in format and
content, improper feedback, etc. Likewise, in most software, there is little chance for the teacher to add
to or modify the existing programmes, even if he wishes too, since most of it is locked to prevent
pirating. And for the few of those who develop their own material, the time spent on programming and
typing in the lessons can be quite lengthy.
PROBLEMS OR CHALLENGES?
Yet, these apprehensions should be seen in the backdrop of a developmental stage of computerisation of
individuals and institutions and as a temporary phenomenon. The next generation of teachers and
learners will be part of a computer generation. They will take for granted the skills demanded by
computer technology and handle it as coolly as switching on a taperecorder or watching a television.
Similarly, the pupils will need no readjustment of attitude when faced with a computer in a classroom
and their familiarity and frequent association with the machine would replace the sense of awe and
alienation felt by older people. Then planning pre-, actual and post-computer activities would be easily
possible. The teachers would ensure that they are the ones in control of educational software by
becoming involved in the development process and rejecting those programmes which do not serve their
needs. For that reason, the onus is on the present CALL-disposed teachers that in order to convince the
CALL-deposed teachers about the potentiality of CALL courseware, they must prove that it is not only
perfect in every way, but that it is far better than any other existing teaching aid.
CONCLUSION
An ideal CALL courseware remains not an alternative but a complementary tool in reinforcing
classroom activities. Apart from relying on the ability of educators to create suitable CALL courseware,
the effectiveness of CALL depends on the teacher's readiness to adopt new attitudes and approaches
toward language teaching. The teacher should avoid being skeptical about the use of computer in
language teaching and begin to re-evaluate his methods in the light of computer's tremendous teaching
potential and boldly address to the challenges offered. The computer can best assist teachers if it is seen
not as a replacement for their work but as a supplement to it. By the way, the computer, will not replace
the language teachers, but, used creatively, it will relieve them of tedious tasks and will enable students
to receive individualised attention from both teachers and machines to a degree that has hitherto been
impossible.
Things Computers Can Never Do
Things Computers Can Never Do
Philip J. Erdelsky
First Published in Dr. Dobb's Journal May 1987
Please e-mail comments, corrections and additions to the webmaster at pje@efgh.com.
Anyone who has witnessed the enormous improvements in computers in the last 40 years may get the impression that computers will eventually be able to solve every well-defined problem. Progress in language understanding and other forms of artificial intelligence has been disappointing, but human language is full of ambiguities, so that's not a well-defined problem. Chess, on the other hand, is very well defined. Although it was once considered the epitome of intelligent activity, computers can now play chess better than all but a few human players.
Some problems, although well defined, are too large to be solved in a reasonable time even on our largest computers. But surely, if a computer could be freed from all limitations on time and memory, couldn't it solve any well-defined problem?
The surprising answer to this question, which was known to mathematicians even before the first real computers were constructed, is no. There are some things no computer can ever do because it can be proved that there are no algorithms to do them -- just as there is no way to square a circle with a compass and straightedge.
These things are not mere mathematical curiosities. They are things that programmers would like to have their computers do for them and things that the suppliers of software development tools would like to incorporate into their debuggers. Computer science curricula usually include the subject of uncomputable functions, but programmers who are not computer science majors sometimes ask for the impossible without realizing it.
Alan Turing in 1935 asked whether there is a method by which a computer program can determine whether any other computer program will halt. This is the famous "halting problem." Turing showed that it has no solution.
A debugger with this ability would certainly be useful. Failure to halt normally is a common form of program failure. Moreover, the debugger could be applied successively to parts of the failed program to isolate the part that is hanging up.
It is not obvious that such a debugger is impossible. Of course, the debugger can't just single-step the program to see if it halts. If the program doesn't halt, the debugger could run forever without determining that this is the case. Or it might give up just as the program is about to terminate, as human programmers sometimes do. At some point, the debugger would have to be able to say, "Aha! This loop is infinite!" It seems as though a cleverly written debugger, having all the tools of modern high-level languages at its disposal, might be able to do that.
The impossibility proof is based on the following argument. If you have a debugger that can solve the halting problem, given unlimited time and memory, then you can use the same code to make the debugger do other things, some of which are self-contradictory and hence impossible.
The particular computer language is not important. If you can solve the halting problem for one language, you can solve it for another. Just use a compiler or other translation program before solving the halting problem. Notice that translating an assembly-language program to a higher level language is quite easy, although the object program is bound to be inefficient. The goal, however, is to show that a solution to the halting problem is impossible, not merely inefficient.
Turing himself proposed a minimal machine that has come to be called the Turing Machine. Its memory was supposed to be infinitely long but only one bit wide, and the machine had only sequential access to it, as with a tape. The programming language was essentially a flowchart with only a few basic commands. Nevertheless, Turing showed that his machine was able to emulate any other machine, given enough time and a suitable program. Such a construction is not necessary for our purposes-you can imagine that the computer is programmed in some familiar high-level language.
Now consider the problem of determining whether a program can print out a specified string S (with or without other output). If you can solve the halting problem, you can solve this problem. Just replace every print statement in the program with a routine that does not send the output to the printer but keeps track of the output and halts when the string S appears. Then, to keep the program from halting for any other reason, replace all the halt statements in the program with endless loops. Then solve the halting problem for the result.
Such a program would be useful in itself because many run-time errors produce distinctive messages, and it would be helpful to predict in advance that such errors will occur.
Because this applies to any string S, you can also determine whether a program prints out a copy of itself. This is not as curious as it appears at first glance. It is easy to write a 1,000-character program that prints out all combinations of 1,000 characters, including itself. In fact, 1,000 characters is probably an overestimate of the number of characters required in most high level languages.
Now you can write a program to do the following things. First, generate, one by one, all possible programs. The easiest way to do this is to generate all strings and check each one to see whether it is a program. Compilers do this when they check syntax. Then check each program to see whether it prints out a copy of itself. Finally, print out a copy of every program that does not print out a copy of itself.
This program, in the process of generating all programs, will eventually generate itself. Does it print out a copy of itself? If it does, it is breaking the rule by printing out a copy of a program that prints out a copy of itself. If it does not, it is breaking the rule by failing to print out a copy of a program that does not print out a copy of itself. This fatal contradiction proves that the halting problem has no solution.
You may recognize this as Russell's paradox (the set of all sets that do not contain themselves) or as the barber paradox (the barber who shaves every man who does not shave himself).
Any problem that a debugger can convert to the halting problem, such as the string-output problem, is equally unsolvable. Some other obvious examples are:
1. determining whether a program will reach a specified point (Ada programmers: this is why PROGRAM_ERROR has to be a run-time error, not a compile-time error)
2. determining whether a variable is initialized before it is used
3. determining whether a given segment of code is inaccessible and will never be executed
4. determining whether two programs do the same thing
Of course, a debugger or compiler can sometimes predict such errors -- for example, inaccessible code can sometimes be identified at compile time. But universal solutions to such problems do not exist.
The impossibility of determining whether two programs do the same thing means that it is always possible to defeat a certain kind of Trojan horse. In a lecture reprinted in the Notices of the ACM (August 1984), Ken Thompson argued that he could put a Trojan horse into a C compiler that would miscompile the login statement to allow him access to any Unix system compiled with it, and it would miscompile the C compiler to insert a copy of itself. The Trojan horse itself would not appear in the source code for the C compiler. In a letter to the editor, Steve Draper noted that such a Trojan horse can be defeated by paraphrasing the C compiler (writing different code that does the same thing) and then recompiling it. No Trojan horse can infallibly recognize paraphrased programs -- hence there is always a paraphrase that will defeat the Trojan horse.
My own opinion in this matter is that, unless the Trojan horse were skillfully written, most paraphrases would defeat it, and in fact it would probably be defeated eventually by normal software maintenance. Any Trojan horse smart enough to recognize most paraphrases would probably be much larger than the rest of the C compiler. You'd never get it through the gates.
The halting problem is intimately related to two other problems, which were posed by the mathematician David Hilbert in 1900. Is there a formal proof or disproof for every mathematical statement? Is there an algorithm to find proofs?
The first question was answered in the negative by Kurt Gödel in 1931. Gödel's proof was complex, but if you accept the unsolvability of the halting problem, it can be proved simply. Whether a particular program halts is a mathematical statement. In fact, many mathematical theorems are already special cases of the halting problem because you can write a program to search for counterexamples and halt when it finds one. The theorem is equivalent to the assertion that the program never halts.
If there were always a formal proof or disproof of the assertion that a program halts, then you could simply generate all proofs (more or less as the program described earlier generated all programs) until you found either a proof or a disproof. That would solve the halting problem. Because the halting problem is in general unsolvable, there must be at least one mathematical statement of this kind that is undecidable -- that is, it cannot be formally proved or disproved.
This shows that it is impossible in general to prove that a program works. Specific programs or limited classes of programs can be proved to do certain things, but there is no way to do this for every program.
Given that some mathematical statements are undecidable, is there a program, the "decidability program," that can tell whether any mathematical statement is decidable, even without deciding whether it is true or false? As you might have guessed from the tone of this article, the answer is again no. If you have a decidability program, you can take any program and ask whether it halts. Then apply the decidability program to this question. If the question is decidable, a search of all proofs will prove it or disprove it. If the question is undecidable, then the program never halts; otherwise, you could prove that it halts by simply running it until it halts.
Therefore, theorem-proving programs, however successful they might be in limited areas, can never prove everything. Some things must always remain beyond their grasp.
These arguments are not rigorous in the mathematical sense because too much has been left out. A major part of Turing's and Gödel's work involved formalization of the concepts of "computation" and "proof" to the point at which their arguments would be accepted by mathematicians.
You may have already spotted one tacit assumption that does not correspond to reality. The programs are not constrained by memory limitations. If a program does have a memory limitation, then the halting problem can in theory be solved -- but only by a program with a much larger memory.
This is how it can be done. A program with a memory limitation has only a finite number of states. A debugger can single-step it, keeping track of the states it has occupied. If it occupies the same state twice before halting, it will repeat the same sequence of states indefinitely and will never stop.
To do this, the debugger needs enough memory to keep track of which states the program has occupied. Only one bit is required for each possible state, but the number of possible states for even a simple program is truly mind-boggling. Every combination of bits in the memory is a different state. Hence a program with only 1,024 bytes of memory has at least 2(1024 x 8) states due to memory configuration alone, to say nothing of flags and registers. This number of flip-flops would not fit into the entire known universe. It can therefore be said that the halting problem has no solution even in this case.
It should be clear, then, that there are definitely some limits to what artificial intelligence can accomplish and that mathematicians' and programmers' jobs can never be completely automated. (This is a great comfort to me because I am a mathematician and programmer.
Only perfect solutions are impossible, however. It can still be argued, and it is argued by some, that artificial intelligence programs will eventually be able to solve every problem that the human mind can solve, with at least the same success rate. And if the only requirement is practical solutions, not perfect solutions, then many interesting but theoretically unsolvable problems can be solved.
Philip J. Erdelsky
First Published in Dr. Dobb's Journal May 1987
Please e-mail comments, corrections and additions to the webmaster at pje@efgh.com.
Anyone who has witnessed the enormous improvements in computers in the last 40 years may get the impression that computers will eventually be able to solve every well-defined problem. Progress in language understanding and other forms of artificial intelligence has been disappointing, but human language is full of ambiguities, so that's not a well-defined problem. Chess, on the other hand, is very well defined. Although it was once considered the epitome of intelligent activity, computers can now play chess better than all but a few human players.
Some problems, although well defined, are too large to be solved in a reasonable time even on our largest computers. But surely, if a computer could be freed from all limitations on time and memory, couldn't it solve any well-defined problem?
The surprising answer to this question, which was known to mathematicians even before the first real computers were constructed, is no. There are some things no computer can ever do because it can be proved that there are no algorithms to do them -- just as there is no way to square a circle with a compass and straightedge.
These things are not mere mathematical curiosities. They are things that programmers would like to have their computers do for them and things that the suppliers of software development tools would like to incorporate into their debuggers. Computer science curricula usually include the subject of uncomputable functions, but programmers who are not computer science majors sometimes ask for the impossible without realizing it.
Alan Turing in 1935 asked whether there is a method by which a computer program can determine whether any other computer program will halt. This is the famous "halting problem." Turing showed that it has no solution.
A debugger with this ability would certainly be useful. Failure to halt normally is a common form of program failure. Moreover, the debugger could be applied successively to parts of the failed program to isolate the part that is hanging up.
It is not obvious that such a debugger is impossible. Of course, the debugger can't just single-step the program to see if it halts. If the program doesn't halt, the debugger could run forever without determining that this is the case. Or it might give up just as the program is about to terminate, as human programmers sometimes do. At some point, the debugger would have to be able to say, "Aha! This loop is infinite!" It seems as though a cleverly written debugger, having all the tools of modern high-level languages at its disposal, might be able to do that.
The impossibility proof is based on the following argument. If you have a debugger that can solve the halting problem, given unlimited time and memory, then you can use the same code to make the debugger do other things, some of which are self-contradictory and hence impossible.
The particular computer language is not important. If you can solve the halting problem for one language, you can solve it for another. Just use a compiler or other translation program before solving the halting problem. Notice that translating an assembly-language program to a higher level language is quite easy, although the object program is bound to be inefficient. The goal, however, is to show that a solution to the halting problem is impossible, not merely inefficient.
Turing himself proposed a minimal machine that has come to be called the Turing Machine. Its memory was supposed to be infinitely long but only one bit wide, and the machine had only sequential access to it, as with a tape. The programming language was essentially a flowchart with only a few basic commands. Nevertheless, Turing showed that his machine was able to emulate any other machine, given enough time and a suitable program. Such a construction is not necessary for our purposes-you can imagine that the computer is programmed in some familiar high-level language.
Now consider the problem of determining whether a program can print out a specified string S (with or without other output). If you can solve the halting problem, you can solve this problem. Just replace every print statement in the program with a routine that does not send the output to the printer but keeps track of the output and halts when the string S appears. Then, to keep the program from halting for any other reason, replace all the halt statements in the program with endless loops. Then solve the halting problem for the result.
Such a program would be useful in itself because many run-time errors produce distinctive messages, and it would be helpful to predict in advance that such errors will occur.
Because this applies to any string S, you can also determine whether a program prints out a copy of itself. This is not as curious as it appears at first glance. It is easy to write a 1,000-character program that prints out all combinations of 1,000 characters, including itself. In fact, 1,000 characters is probably an overestimate of the number of characters required in most high level languages.
Now you can write a program to do the following things. First, generate, one by one, all possible programs. The easiest way to do this is to generate all strings and check each one to see whether it is a program. Compilers do this when they check syntax. Then check each program to see whether it prints out a copy of itself. Finally, print out a copy of every program that does not print out a copy of itself.
This program, in the process of generating all programs, will eventually generate itself. Does it print out a copy of itself? If it does, it is breaking the rule by printing out a copy of a program that prints out a copy of itself. If it does not, it is breaking the rule by failing to print out a copy of a program that does not print out a copy of itself. This fatal contradiction proves that the halting problem has no solution.
You may recognize this as Russell's paradox (the set of all sets that do not contain themselves) or as the barber paradox (the barber who shaves every man who does not shave himself).
Any problem that a debugger can convert to the halting problem, such as the string-output problem, is equally unsolvable. Some other obvious examples are:
1. determining whether a program will reach a specified point (Ada programmers: this is why PROGRAM_ERROR has to be a run-time error, not a compile-time error)
2. determining whether a variable is initialized before it is used
3. determining whether a given segment of code is inaccessible and will never be executed
4. determining whether two programs do the same thing
Of course, a debugger or compiler can sometimes predict such errors -- for example, inaccessible code can sometimes be identified at compile time. But universal solutions to such problems do not exist.
The impossibility of determining whether two programs do the same thing means that it is always possible to defeat a certain kind of Trojan horse. In a lecture reprinted in the Notices of the ACM (August 1984), Ken Thompson argued that he could put a Trojan horse into a C compiler that would miscompile the login statement to allow him access to any Unix system compiled with it, and it would miscompile the C compiler to insert a copy of itself. The Trojan horse itself would not appear in the source code for the C compiler. In a letter to the editor, Steve Draper noted that such a Trojan horse can be defeated by paraphrasing the C compiler (writing different code that does the same thing) and then recompiling it. No Trojan horse can infallibly recognize paraphrased programs -- hence there is always a paraphrase that will defeat the Trojan horse.
My own opinion in this matter is that, unless the Trojan horse were skillfully written, most paraphrases would defeat it, and in fact it would probably be defeated eventually by normal software maintenance. Any Trojan horse smart enough to recognize most paraphrases would probably be much larger than the rest of the C compiler. You'd never get it through the gates.
The halting problem is intimately related to two other problems, which were posed by the mathematician David Hilbert in 1900. Is there a formal proof or disproof for every mathematical statement? Is there an algorithm to find proofs?
The first question was answered in the negative by Kurt Gödel in 1931. Gödel's proof was complex, but if you accept the unsolvability of the halting problem, it can be proved simply. Whether a particular program halts is a mathematical statement. In fact, many mathematical theorems are already special cases of the halting problem because you can write a program to search for counterexamples and halt when it finds one. The theorem is equivalent to the assertion that the program never halts.
If there were always a formal proof or disproof of the assertion that a program halts, then you could simply generate all proofs (more or less as the program described earlier generated all programs) until you found either a proof or a disproof. That would solve the halting problem. Because the halting problem is in general unsolvable, there must be at least one mathematical statement of this kind that is undecidable -- that is, it cannot be formally proved or disproved.
This shows that it is impossible in general to prove that a program works. Specific programs or limited classes of programs can be proved to do certain things, but there is no way to do this for every program.
Given that some mathematical statements are undecidable, is there a program, the "decidability program," that can tell whether any mathematical statement is decidable, even without deciding whether it is true or false? As you might have guessed from the tone of this article, the answer is again no. If you have a decidability program, you can take any program and ask whether it halts. Then apply the decidability program to this question. If the question is decidable, a search of all proofs will prove it or disprove it. If the question is undecidable, then the program never halts; otherwise, you could prove that it halts by simply running it until it halts.
Therefore, theorem-proving programs, however successful they might be in limited areas, can never prove everything. Some things must always remain beyond their grasp.
These arguments are not rigorous in the mathematical sense because too much has been left out. A major part of Turing's and Gödel's work involved formalization of the concepts of "computation" and "proof" to the point at which their arguments would be accepted by mathematicians.
You may have already spotted one tacit assumption that does not correspond to reality. The programs are not constrained by memory limitations. If a program does have a memory limitation, then the halting problem can in theory be solved -- but only by a program with a much larger memory.
This is how it can be done. A program with a memory limitation has only a finite number of states. A debugger can single-step it, keeping track of the states it has occupied. If it occupies the same state twice before halting, it will repeat the same sequence of states indefinitely and will never stop.
To do this, the debugger needs enough memory to keep track of which states the program has occupied. Only one bit is required for each possible state, but the number of possible states for even a simple program is truly mind-boggling. Every combination of bits in the memory is a different state. Hence a program with only 1,024 bytes of memory has at least 2(1024 x 8) states due to memory configuration alone, to say nothing of flags and registers. This number of flip-flops would not fit into the entire known universe. It can therefore be said that the halting problem has no solution even in this case.
It should be clear, then, that there are definitely some limits to what artificial intelligence can accomplish and that mathematicians' and programmers' jobs can never be completely automated. (This is a great comfort to me because I am a mathematician and programmer.
Only perfect solutions are impossible, however. It can still be argued, and it is argued by some, that artificial intelligence programs will eventually be able to solve every problem that the human mind can solve, with at least the same success rate. And if the only requirement is practical solutions, not perfect solutions, then many interesting but theoretically unsolvable problems can be solved.
Can Computers See?
Can Computers See?
Gregory Koukl
If they can, does this refute Christianity?
divider
I had an interesting question asked of me last week. It had to do with what philosopher's call the mind/body problem. I answered that question with an illustration and I have gotten a response in the mail to the question that was raised. I want to spend some time responding to this because it really helps us to work through this issue. It helps to make a case, I think, for the existence of the soul, which is very important.
Now the mind/body problem relates to a question: Are we simply a physical body and that's it, or are we a physical body that houses a soul and the soul is what animates the body--it gives the body ultimate life, gives it personhood, gives it identity, the soul is who you are?
The mind/body problem is an important one even for those who are not philosophers because this is not simply an academic issue. What is at stake is the existence of the soul. Some will argue that all that exists is the physical world. Non-physical things like souls simply do not exist. A physicalist would give this assessment of a human being. He would say that all so-called mind activity can be exhaustively explained in physical terms. It can be reduced to physical activity in the brain--C-fibers firing and chemical reactions. I heard one talk show host say not long ago that, after all, an emotion is just a chemical reaction. Well, this plays into this notion that we are only our bodies. Since everything can be explained in physical terms--in terms of the physical activity of the brain--there is no need to posit this eerie, mystical, unscientific, and religious thing called the soul.
Why is this important? It is important because there is something else going on here. What is going on is the argument that if there is no soul then there cannot possibly be any life after death. Think about it. What is life after death? It is when the body dies and the soul goes on. After the physical body dies there is something that remains and continues living. But if the physical body is what you are, then when it dies, you die. And if someone can demonstrate scientifically, without a doubt, that human beings can be exhaustively quantified in physical terms--that there is no mind separate from the brain, that there is no soul separate from the human body, that the soul is just a word we used to use to describe something we thought was there but now have learned that it is not there at all, that there is only the brain--if that can be demonstrated to be true, the game is up for Christians. There is nothing else to discuss, nothing to preach, because why talk about salvation for eternity if once we die we're gone? That is why there is tremendous philosophical currency riding on this particular question. That is why it is very important.
I used an illustration last week to disprove the notion that we are just our bodies and that all soulish activity can actually be explained in strictly physicalistic terms.
By the way, part of this discussion entails the notion that colors are merely physical wave lengths of light. The argument that colors are wave lengths that cause a chemical reaction in your eye that is physical is meant to argue against the notion that colors can exist or be apprehended in some kind of non- physical realm. My illustration that I gave was to make the point that colors are not wave lengths because it is possible to see color when there is no light. If you can see color when there is no light, then colors can't be light. They must be something different than light. They may be associated with light, but they must be different than light.
Here is the illustration I gave. Close your eyes and picture your mother. You are a child. She's in the kitchen washing dishes. Have you got the picture? What color dress is she wearing? What color is there? Some say red. Some say blue. Some say green or white. The point is, there is a color in your imagination. You can conjure up a color with your mind. Note I didn't say brain because your brain isn't conjuring up the color. Your mind is. How do I know it's not the brain? Because you cannot crack your brain open and ever find your mother in there wearing a certain color dress. What you are seeing is not something physical. If is was physical, it would occupy a physical location. You can't find it physically. She's not in there. Nor is the color in there. Not in your brain. It is in your mind. Therefore, it is not physical. It cannot be equated with brain activity. It can't be identified as the same thing as brain activity, and this becomes as argument for the existence of the soul.
I received a letter from a Christian who questioned my illustration. Greg from Redondo Beach offered the counter-example that a computer can supposedly see color, therefore this argument for the mind is compromised.
I'm very glad that he is thinking about this and is responding to this because he is raising questions he might run into. I'm glad to be able to sharpen my point and make the case for the existence of the soul.
I'd like to read the paragraph in which he responds to my illustration. He says this: "I caught a little of your show last weekend and am troubled about the mind/brain question. I'm not sure of the example "If you crack your brain open, you won't find the color blue," is valid since a computer can be programmed [Here's the heart of it] to detect blue with a sensor or camera and verbalize the word blue. The computer is matter which contains in it a representation of the color blue. [He suggests here that a thought is just a complex representation that would be on the physicalist order of things.] So it contains a representation of the color blue, and when you smash the computer there is likewise no blue. But in this case, mere matter and programming, without needing a soul to do it, contain blue. My hunch is there is still a kernel which may require a separate soul, and I can't imagine how any machine or physical brain could achieve self-motivated, independent, free action that was not programmed in by a Designer." Now that's the free moral agency question and I will come to that later in the show. But the earlier challenge is still a good one.
He is saying, You know I don't buy your illustration, Koukl, and here are the reasons. You may still have a point on other grounds and those other grounds are the grounds of free moral agency. But I think that your illustration about color in the mind is flawed because it does seem that computer can recognize color and have a kind of representation of the color blue, even though when you smash a computer you won't find the color blue in there. So that seems to compromise your argument. If we can invent a machine, a computer that can recognize blue and identify it with the name blue, then why do I argue that a soul is necessary to do that in humans? It is an excellent question.
First, let me make a quick observation. To say that it is not necessary to assert the soul's part in this doesn't establish that only physical processes are involved. In other words, just because you could show that a machine could see blue in that way doesn't mean that the brain is seeing blue. It doesn't obviate or make unnecessary the existence of the soul. It's just a way of arguing that it ain't necessarily so. So just because we can show that my point doesn't hold and that a machine can see a color, it doesn't mean that we don't have a soul. It just seems to weaken my argument for the necessity of a soul. Even if a machine could do that, it doesn't mean that in the case of humans a machine is in fact doing that. That is a separate issue. But I am actually going to argue the harder case. I am going to argue that it is not even possible for a machine--and here I mean even biological machines like brains--to do what the soul can do.
Our specific argument is going to focus on the notion of being able to see a color. So our question is, Can a machine see color?
My argument in brief goes something like this: Physical things have physical characteristics. The elements of consciousness--thinking, intending, believing, having sensations and feelings (and that's what we are talking about here when you can see the quality of a color)--these are things that don't have physical properties, therefore they are not physical or material. They are non-physical, they are immaterial. The mind is not the brain. You see my argument?
Let's see how this objection applies to my argument.
Our question here is this: Can a machine--whether a computer or a brain--do the same thing that a soul does? I hold that the machine can't see the color blue. Greg from Redondo suggests that maybe it can. So let me make this distinction. It comes from the words that were used here--talking about a computer that can be programmed to detect blue. I must make a very important distinction here between detecting or measuring and seeing . Seeing is a way of measuring. I could have a visual impression of an object lying along side a ruler. I am seeing the object along side the ruler and my sight allows me to measure that ruler at 12 inches, but I could still measure that ruler at 12 inches even if I was blind. I could touch the ends of the object and the ends of the ruler and see that they are the same. I could put them next to each other and correlate the size of the object with the size of the ruler and determine that the object is one foot long. So I can measure it or detect it without seeing.
But my argument goes beyond that with regards to the soul. All I have to do to demonstrate that there is more to man than his brain is demonstrate that activities that we go through cannot be accounted for by a mere physical process. This accounting or inability to account for something is not a limitation of science--but that it can't be accounted for even in principle. Now that point is important because if something cannot be explained by physical processes even in principle, and we can demonstrate that to be the case, then we don't have to worry about somewhere down the line people discovering something in science that refutes our argument as if it is founded just in the contingencies of scientific discovery.
My point is that this has nothing to do with science. I am trying to make the point and prove the point that it doesn't matter how much scientific sophistication we have, we will never be able to do certain kinds of things because they are the kinds of things that do not respond to physical assessment principally because they are not physical things. There is no science that we will ever discover, for example, that will help us to know what is morally right and wrong. Science doesn't measure that kind of thing. Science measures physical things. A moral is not a physical thing, therefore science cannot measure morality. Rather, science is the subject of morality. In other words, morality impinges upon science, not the other way around.
I'm talking, though, about whether a computer can actually see color. The argument has been, A computer can measure color. That seems to be the case. But can it see color? That is what is at stake here. That's why I made the very important distinction between measuring and seeing. My argument is that a machine can measure, but it can't measure in one of the ways that you and I measure. It can't measure by seeing, that is, by having a visual impression. Why not? Machines can't have visual impressions. Minds have visual impressions. That is a characteristic of consciousness, not of machinery. Therefore, if minds have visual impressions and machines can't have visual impressions then the mind and machines--even the machine of the brain--are not the same thing.
Here is my response to the computer illustration--the computer that can be programmed to detect blue with a sensor and then alert us with the sound blue. Notice I didn't say the word blue as was used in the letter. A word is a physical symbol that stands for something else that is not physical. That non-physical thing is the word's meaning. The computer can't use words like that. It doesn't consciously use symbols. It merely makes a noise and the noise means something to us. So the computer can measure a wave length that we see visually as blue. Yes, it can do that. It can alert us with the sound that we know as the word blue, but is this evidence that the computer sees blue? The answer is no. The computer doesn't see color. It can only measure a wave length, and it can't even do that if light is not available and there is no light in my brain when I imagine my mother washing the dishes wearing a colored dress.
Greg writes in his letter: "The computer contains in it a representation of the color blue." Well, you know he is absolutely right about that. It contains a representation of the color blue, but I think he has conceded more than he realizes with this remark. What is the representation? If all of what blue is is captured in the wiring of the computer--or in the wiring of my brain by analogy through some kind of an electro-chemical reaction--then it doesn't make any sense to say that it represents something else. If the physical description is what blue is, then there is nothing to represent. Of course, that is what a physicalist would argue--blue is the chemical reaction in your brain, not that it represents chemical reactions in your brain.
I'm going to prove this very simply to you in case the change hasn't fallen into the meter yet. I realized this can be kind of an obscure concepts.
Picture the color blue. Now, describe the quality of your impression in physical terms. Tell me what blue looks like. You can't do it. It is not possible to tell me what blue looks like, unless of course you compare it to another color that I am familiar with. In other words, you can only describe a sensory impression by using other sensory impressions. You can't describe it in purely physical terms in any way that captures what you are experiencing.
If I asked you to describe blue to me in physical terms, you would say that it has the wave length of .902 milacrons (I just made that up). Does that help me at all to know what it is that you see right now in your mind when you see the color blue? It doesn't help one single bit. And the reason is that the blue is not physical in that sense. It can apply to physical things, but the visual impression--the thing that you see--is not physical. That's why a computer can't see blue.
The point that I am making is that there is a difference between measuring a color and the color itself. If we say that the measurement represents the color, as Greg did, then it is clear that the color is something different from the measurement--in this case a measurement of wave length. And that's why we say the wave length represents the color. The color is what we see. The wave length is simply the wave of light that produces this visual sensation of blue.
Greg also said that the computer contained the color blue, but what does it mean to contain blue? If the programming is the blue, then how doe the programming contain the blue? It doesn't. The blue is something else. Blue is what we see. Our minds don't simply detect a wave length. We see color.
In fact, a blind person could be equipped with a scanner attached to his brain that would enable him to detect colors much like a computer detects color. It would just communicate the wave length of color through the means of maybe a sound or something like that. Different colored wave lengths might have different pitches of sound corresponding to them. And since sound has a continuous gradient scale just like the colors in a rainbow, one could get an exact correlation of certain sound wave lengths to certain color wave lengths. So a blind person, knowing the sound correlations, could identify from sound cues any particular color that was before him. But would it make any sense in that circumstance to say that the blind person was actually seeing the color? It wouldn't at all. Why? Because he's blind. He sees nothing. That is precisely my point. A computer is the same way--even a sophisticated computer like the brain.
Gregory Koukl
If they can, does this refute Christianity?
divider
I had an interesting question asked of me last week. It had to do with what philosopher's call the mind/body problem. I answered that question with an illustration and I have gotten a response in the mail to the question that was raised. I want to spend some time responding to this because it really helps us to work through this issue. It helps to make a case, I think, for the existence of the soul, which is very important.
Now the mind/body problem relates to a question: Are we simply a physical body and that's it, or are we a physical body that houses a soul and the soul is what animates the body--it gives the body ultimate life, gives it personhood, gives it identity, the soul is who you are?
The mind/body problem is an important one even for those who are not philosophers because this is not simply an academic issue. What is at stake is the existence of the soul. Some will argue that all that exists is the physical world. Non-physical things like souls simply do not exist. A physicalist would give this assessment of a human being. He would say that all so-called mind activity can be exhaustively explained in physical terms. It can be reduced to physical activity in the brain--C-fibers firing and chemical reactions. I heard one talk show host say not long ago that, after all, an emotion is just a chemical reaction. Well, this plays into this notion that we are only our bodies. Since everything can be explained in physical terms--in terms of the physical activity of the brain--there is no need to posit this eerie, mystical, unscientific, and religious thing called the soul.
Why is this important? It is important because there is something else going on here. What is going on is the argument that if there is no soul then there cannot possibly be any life after death. Think about it. What is life after death? It is when the body dies and the soul goes on. After the physical body dies there is something that remains and continues living. But if the physical body is what you are, then when it dies, you die. And if someone can demonstrate scientifically, without a doubt, that human beings can be exhaustively quantified in physical terms--that there is no mind separate from the brain, that there is no soul separate from the human body, that the soul is just a word we used to use to describe something we thought was there but now have learned that it is not there at all, that there is only the brain--if that can be demonstrated to be true, the game is up for Christians. There is nothing else to discuss, nothing to preach, because why talk about salvation for eternity if once we die we're gone? That is why there is tremendous philosophical currency riding on this particular question. That is why it is very important.
I used an illustration last week to disprove the notion that we are just our bodies and that all soulish activity can actually be explained in strictly physicalistic terms.
By the way, part of this discussion entails the notion that colors are merely physical wave lengths of light. The argument that colors are wave lengths that cause a chemical reaction in your eye that is physical is meant to argue against the notion that colors can exist or be apprehended in some kind of non- physical realm. My illustration that I gave was to make the point that colors are not wave lengths because it is possible to see color when there is no light. If you can see color when there is no light, then colors can't be light. They must be something different than light. They may be associated with light, but they must be different than light.
Here is the illustration I gave. Close your eyes and picture your mother. You are a child. She's in the kitchen washing dishes. Have you got the picture? What color dress is she wearing? What color is there? Some say red. Some say blue. Some say green or white. The point is, there is a color in your imagination. You can conjure up a color with your mind. Note I didn't say brain because your brain isn't conjuring up the color. Your mind is. How do I know it's not the brain? Because you cannot crack your brain open and ever find your mother in there wearing a certain color dress. What you are seeing is not something physical. If is was physical, it would occupy a physical location. You can't find it physically. She's not in there. Nor is the color in there. Not in your brain. It is in your mind. Therefore, it is not physical. It cannot be equated with brain activity. It can't be identified as the same thing as brain activity, and this becomes as argument for the existence of the soul.
I received a letter from a Christian who questioned my illustration. Greg from Redondo Beach offered the counter-example that a computer can supposedly see color, therefore this argument for the mind is compromised.
I'm very glad that he is thinking about this and is responding to this because he is raising questions he might run into. I'm glad to be able to sharpen my point and make the case for the existence of the soul.
I'd like to read the paragraph in which he responds to my illustration. He says this: "I caught a little of your show last weekend and am troubled about the mind/brain question. I'm not sure of the example "If you crack your brain open, you won't find the color blue," is valid since a computer can be programmed [Here's the heart of it] to detect blue with a sensor or camera and verbalize the word blue. The computer is matter which contains in it a representation of the color blue. [He suggests here that a thought is just a complex representation that would be on the physicalist order of things.] So it contains a representation of the color blue, and when you smash the computer there is likewise no blue. But in this case, mere matter and programming, without needing a soul to do it, contain blue. My hunch is there is still a kernel which may require a separate soul, and I can't imagine how any machine or physical brain could achieve self-motivated, independent, free action that was not programmed in by a Designer." Now that's the free moral agency question and I will come to that later in the show. But the earlier challenge is still a good one.
He is saying, You know I don't buy your illustration, Koukl, and here are the reasons. You may still have a point on other grounds and those other grounds are the grounds of free moral agency. But I think that your illustration about color in the mind is flawed because it does seem that computer can recognize color and have a kind of representation of the color blue, even though when you smash a computer you won't find the color blue in there. So that seems to compromise your argument. If we can invent a machine, a computer that can recognize blue and identify it with the name blue, then why do I argue that a soul is necessary to do that in humans? It is an excellent question.
First, let me make a quick observation. To say that it is not necessary to assert the soul's part in this doesn't establish that only physical processes are involved. In other words, just because you could show that a machine could see blue in that way doesn't mean that the brain is seeing blue. It doesn't obviate or make unnecessary the existence of the soul. It's just a way of arguing that it ain't necessarily so. So just because we can show that my point doesn't hold and that a machine can see a color, it doesn't mean that we don't have a soul. It just seems to weaken my argument for the necessity of a soul. Even if a machine could do that, it doesn't mean that in the case of humans a machine is in fact doing that. That is a separate issue. But I am actually going to argue the harder case. I am going to argue that it is not even possible for a machine--and here I mean even biological machines like brains--to do what the soul can do.
Our specific argument is going to focus on the notion of being able to see a color. So our question is, Can a machine see color?
My argument in brief goes something like this: Physical things have physical characteristics. The elements of consciousness--thinking, intending, believing, having sensations and feelings (and that's what we are talking about here when you can see the quality of a color)--these are things that don't have physical properties, therefore they are not physical or material. They are non-physical, they are immaterial. The mind is not the brain. You see my argument?
Let's see how this objection applies to my argument.
Our question here is this: Can a machine--whether a computer or a brain--do the same thing that a soul does? I hold that the machine can't see the color blue. Greg from Redondo suggests that maybe it can. So let me make this distinction. It comes from the words that were used here--talking about a computer that can be programmed to detect blue. I must make a very important distinction here between detecting or measuring and seeing . Seeing is a way of measuring. I could have a visual impression of an object lying along side a ruler. I am seeing the object along side the ruler and my sight allows me to measure that ruler at 12 inches, but I could still measure that ruler at 12 inches even if I was blind. I could touch the ends of the object and the ends of the ruler and see that they are the same. I could put them next to each other and correlate the size of the object with the size of the ruler and determine that the object is one foot long. So I can measure it or detect it without seeing.
But my argument goes beyond that with regards to the soul. All I have to do to demonstrate that there is more to man than his brain is demonstrate that activities that we go through cannot be accounted for by a mere physical process. This accounting or inability to account for something is not a limitation of science--but that it can't be accounted for even in principle. Now that point is important because if something cannot be explained by physical processes even in principle, and we can demonstrate that to be the case, then we don't have to worry about somewhere down the line people discovering something in science that refutes our argument as if it is founded just in the contingencies of scientific discovery.
My point is that this has nothing to do with science. I am trying to make the point and prove the point that it doesn't matter how much scientific sophistication we have, we will never be able to do certain kinds of things because they are the kinds of things that do not respond to physical assessment principally because they are not physical things. There is no science that we will ever discover, for example, that will help us to know what is morally right and wrong. Science doesn't measure that kind of thing. Science measures physical things. A moral is not a physical thing, therefore science cannot measure morality. Rather, science is the subject of morality. In other words, morality impinges upon science, not the other way around.
I'm talking, though, about whether a computer can actually see color. The argument has been, A computer can measure color. That seems to be the case. But can it see color? That is what is at stake here. That's why I made the very important distinction between measuring and seeing. My argument is that a machine can measure, but it can't measure in one of the ways that you and I measure. It can't measure by seeing, that is, by having a visual impression. Why not? Machines can't have visual impressions. Minds have visual impressions. That is a characteristic of consciousness, not of machinery. Therefore, if minds have visual impressions and machines can't have visual impressions then the mind and machines--even the machine of the brain--are not the same thing.
Here is my response to the computer illustration--the computer that can be programmed to detect blue with a sensor and then alert us with the sound blue. Notice I didn't say the word blue as was used in the letter. A word is a physical symbol that stands for something else that is not physical. That non-physical thing is the word's meaning. The computer can't use words like that. It doesn't consciously use symbols. It merely makes a noise and the noise means something to us. So the computer can measure a wave length that we see visually as blue. Yes, it can do that. It can alert us with the sound that we know as the word blue, but is this evidence that the computer sees blue? The answer is no. The computer doesn't see color. It can only measure a wave length, and it can't even do that if light is not available and there is no light in my brain when I imagine my mother washing the dishes wearing a colored dress.
Greg writes in his letter: "The computer contains in it a representation of the color blue." Well, you know he is absolutely right about that. It contains a representation of the color blue, but I think he has conceded more than he realizes with this remark. What is the representation? If all of what blue is is captured in the wiring of the computer--or in the wiring of my brain by analogy through some kind of an electro-chemical reaction--then it doesn't make any sense to say that it represents something else. If the physical description is what blue is, then there is nothing to represent. Of course, that is what a physicalist would argue--blue is the chemical reaction in your brain, not that it represents chemical reactions in your brain.
I'm going to prove this very simply to you in case the change hasn't fallen into the meter yet. I realized this can be kind of an obscure concepts.
Picture the color blue. Now, describe the quality of your impression in physical terms. Tell me what blue looks like. You can't do it. It is not possible to tell me what blue looks like, unless of course you compare it to another color that I am familiar with. In other words, you can only describe a sensory impression by using other sensory impressions. You can't describe it in purely physical terms in any way that captures what you are experiencing.
If I asked you to describe blue to me in physical terms, you would say that it has the wave length of .902 milacrons (I just made that up). Does that help me at all to know what it is that you see right now in your mind when you see the color blue? It doesn't help one single bit. And the reason is that the blue is not physical in that sense. It can apply to physical things, but the visual impression--the thing that you see--is not physical. That's why a computer can't see blue.
The point that I am making is that there is a difference between measuring a color and the color itself. If we say that the measurement represents the color, as Greg did, then it is clear that the color is something different from the measurement--in this case a measurement of wave length. And that's why we say the wave length represents the color. The color is what we see. The wave length is simply the wave of light that produces this visual sensation of blue.
Greg also said that the computer contained the color blue, but what does it mean to contain blue? If the programming is the blue, then how doe the programming contain the blue? It doesn't. The blue is something else. Blue is what we see. Our minds don't simply detect a wave length. We see color.
In fact, a blind person could be equipped with a scanner attached to his brain that would enable him to detect colors much like a computer detects color. It would just communicate the wave length of color through the means of maybe a sound or something like that. Different colored wave lengths might have different pitches of sound corresponding to them. And since sound has a continuous gradient scale just like the colors in a rainbow, one could get an exact correlation of certain sound wave lengths to certain color wave lengths. So a blind person, knowing the sound correlations, could identify from sound cues any particular color that was before him. But would it make any sense in that circumstance to say that the blind person was actually seeing the color? It wouldn't at all. Why? Because he's blind. He sees nothing. That is precisely my point. A computer is the same way--even a sophisticated computer like the brain.
Things Computers Can Do in Movies
Things Computers Can Do in Movies
1. Word processors never display a cursor.
2. You never have to use the space-bar when typing long sentences.
3. Movie characters never make typing mistakes.
4. All monitors display inch-high letters.
5. High-tech computers, such as those used by NASA, the CIA or some such governmental institution, will have easy to understand graphical interfaces.
6. Those that don't have graphical interfaces will have incredibly powerful text-based command shells that can correctly understand and execute commands typed in plain English.
7. Note: Command line interfaces will give you access to any information you want by simply typing, "ACCESS THE SECRET FILES" on any near-by keyboard.
8. You can also infect a computer with a destructive virus by simply typing "UPLOAD VIRUS". (See "Fortress".)
9. All computers are connected. You can access the information on the villain's desktop computer even if it's turned off.
10. Powerful computers beep whenever you press a key or the screen changes. Some computers also slow down the output on the screen so that it doesn't go faster than you can read. (Really advanced computers will also emulate the sound of a dot-matrix printer.)
11. All computer panels operate on thousands of volts and have explosive devices underneath their surface. Malfunctions are indicated by a bright flash of light, a puff of smoke, a shower of sparks and an explosion that causes you to jump backwards.
12. People typing on a computer can safely turn it off without saving the data.
13. A hacker is always able to break into the most sensitive computer in the world by guessing the secret password in two tries.
14. You may bypass "PERMISSION DENIED" message by using the "OVERRIDE" function. (See "Demolition Man".)
15. Computers only take 2 seconds to boot up instead of the average minutes for desktop PCs and 30 minutes or more for larger systems that can run 24 hours, 365 days a year without a reset.
16. Complex calculations and loading of huge amounts of data will be accomplished in under three seconds. Movie modems usually appear to transmit data at the speed of two gigabytes per second.
17. When the power plant/missile site/main computer overheats, all control panels will explode shortly before the entire building will.
18. If you display a file on the screen and someone deletes the file, it also disappears from the screen (See "Clear and Present Danger").
19. If a disk contains encrypted files, you are automatically asked for a password when you insert it.
20. Computers can interface with any other computer regardless of the manufacturer or galaxy where it originated. (See "Independence Day".)
21. Computer disks will work on any computer has a floppy drive and all software is usable on any platforms.
22. The more high-tech the equipment, the more buttons it will have (See "Aliens".)
23. Note: You must be highly trained to operate high-tech computers because the buttons have no labels except for the "SELF-DESTRUCT" button.
24. Most computers, no matter how small, have reality-defying three-dimensional active animation, photo-realistic graphics capabilities.
25. Laptops always have amazing real-time video phone capabilities and performance similar to a CRAY Supercomputer.
26. Whenever a character looks at a monitor, the image is so bright that it projects itself onto their face. (See "Alien" or "2001")
27. Searches on the internet will always return what you are looking for no matter how vague your keywords are. (See "Mission Impossible", Tom Cruise searches with keywords like "file" and "computer" and 3 results are returned.)
1. Word processors never display a cursor.
2. You never have to use the space-bar when typing long sentences.
3. Movie characters never make typing mistakes.
4. All monitors display inch-high letters.
5. High-tech computers, such as those used by NASA, the CIA or some such governmental institution, will have easy to understand graphical interfaces.
6. Those that don't have graphical interfaces will have incredibly powerful text-based command shells that can correctly understand and execute commands typed in plain English.
7. Note: Command line interfaces will give you access to any information you want by simply typing, "ACCESS THE SECRET FILES" on any near-by keyboard.
8. You can also infect a computer with a destructive virus by simply typing "UPLOAD VIRUS". (See "Fortress".)
9. All computers are connected. You can access the information on the villain's desktop computer even if it's turned off.
10. Powerful computers beep whenever you press a key or the screen changes. Some computers also slow down the output on the screen so that it doesn't go faster than you can read. (Really advanced computers will also emulate the sound of a dot-matrix printer.)
11. All computer panels operate on thousands of volts and have explosive devices underneath their surface. Malfunctions are indicated by a bright flash of light, a puff of smoke, a shower of sparks and an explosion that causes you to jump backwards.
12. People typing on a computer can safely turn it off without saving the data.
13. A hacker is always able to break into the most sensitive computer in the world by guessing the secret password in two tries.
14. You may bypass "PERMISSION DENIED" message by using the "OVERRIDE" function. (See "Demolition Man".)
15. Computers only take 2 seconds to boot up instead of the average minutes for desktop PCs and 30 minutes or more for larger systems that can run 24 hours, 365 days a year without a reset.
16. Complex calculations and loading of huge amounts of data will be accomplished in under three seconds. Movie modems usually appear to transmit data at the speed of two gigabytes per second.
17. When the power plant/missile site/main computer overheats, all control panels will explode shortly before the entire building will.
18. If you display a file on the screen and someone deletes the file, it also disappears from the screen (See "Clear and Present Danger").
19. If a disk contains encrypted files, you are automatically asked for a password when you insert it.
20. Computers can interface with any other computer regardless of the manufacturer or galaxy where it originated. (See "Independence Day".)
21. Computer disks will work on any computer has a floppy drive and all software is usable on any platforms.
22. The more high-tech the equipment, the more buttons it will have (See "Aliens".)
23. Note: You must be highly trained to operate high-tech computers because the buttons have no labels except for the "SELF-DESTRUCT" button.
24. Most computers, no matter how small, have reality-defying three-dimensional active animation, photo-realistic graphics capabilities.
25. Laptops always have amazing real-time video phone capabilities and performance similar to a CRAY Supercomputer.
26. Whenever a character looks at a monitor, the image is so bright that it projects itself onto their face. (See "Alien" or "2001")
27. Searches on the internet will always return what you are looking for no matter how vague your keywords are. (See "Mission Impossible", Tom Cruise searches with keywords like "file" and "computer" and 3 results are returned.)
Computer-assisted language learning
Computer-assisted language learning
Computer-assisted language learning (CALL) is a form of computer-based learning which carries two important features: bidirectional learning and individualized learning. It is not a method. CALL materials are tools for learning. The focus of CALL is learning, and not teaching. CALL materials are used in teaching to facilitate the language learning process. It is a student-centered accelerated learning material, which promotes self-paced accelerated learning.
Contents
[hide] [hide]
* 1 Definition
* 2 History
* 3 CALL and computational linguistics
* 4 Theoretical basis for CALL instruction design
* 5 Role changes for teachers and students
o 5.1 Teachers
o 5.2 Students
* 6 Use of CALL for the four skills
* 7 Multimedia language centers
* 8 Advantages of CALL
o 8.1 Motivation
o 8.2 Adapting learning to the student
o 8.3 Authenticity
o 8.4 Critical thinking skills
* 9 Problems and criticisms of CALL instruction
* 10 References
* 11 Further reading
* 12 Professional associations
* 13 Professional journals
o 13.1 Journals dedicated to CALL
o 13.2 Journals that regularly include CALL articles
* 14 See also
[edit] Definition
CALL originates from CAI (Computer-Accelerated Instruction), a term that was first viewed as an aid for teachers. The philosophy of CALL puts a strong emphasis on student-centered lessons that allow the learners to learn on their own using structured and/or unstructured interactive lessons. These lessons carry 2 important features: bidirectional (interactive) learning and individualized learning. CALL is not a method. It is a tool that helps teachers to facilitate language learning process. CALL can be used to reinforce what has been learned in the classrooms. It can also be used as remedial to help learners with limited language proficiency.
The design of CALL lessons generally takes into consideration principles of language pedagogy, which may be derived from learning theories (behaviorist, cognitive, and constructivist) and second language learning such as Krashen's Monitor Theory.
Others may call CALL an approach to teaching and learning foreign languages whereby the computer and computer-based resources such as the Internet are used to present, reinforce and assess material to be learned. CALL can be made independent of the Internet. It can stand alone for example in a CDROM format. Depending on its design and objectives, it may include a substantial interactive element especially when CALL is integrated in web-based format. It may include the search for and the investigation of applications in language teaching and learning. [1] Except for self-study software, CALL is meant to supplement face-to-face language instruction, not replace it.[2]
CALL has also been known by several other terms such as technology-enhanced language learning (TELL), computer-assisted language instruction (CALI) and computer-aided language learning but the field is the same. [3] For further information see the ICT4LT website, especially Section 1 of Module 1.4, headed "What is CALL?": Mobile Assisted Language Learning (MALL) is a subset of both Mobile Learning (m-learning) and Computer Assisted Language Learning (CALL).
Computers have been used for language teaching ever since the 1960s. This 40-year period can be divided into three main stages: behaviorist CALL, communicative CALL, and integrative CALL. Each stage corresponds to a certain level of technology and certain pedagogical theories. The reasons for using Computer-assisted Language Learning include: (a) experiential learning, (b) motivation, (c) enhance student achievement, (d) authentic materials for study, (e) greater interaction, (f) individualization, (g) independence from a single source of information, and (h) global understanding. The barriers inhibiting the practice of Computer-assisted Language Learning can be classified in the following common categories: (a) financial barriers, (b) availability of computer hardware and software, (c) technical and theoretical knowledge, and (d) acceptance of the technology.
Introduction
[edit] History
CALL’s origins and development trace back to the 1960’s (Delcloque 2000). Since the early days CALL has developed into a symbiotic relationship between the development of technology and pedagogy.
Warschauer (1996) divided the development of CALL into three phases: Behavioristic CALL, Communicative CALL and Integrative CALL (Multimedia and the Internet)[1]. Bax (2003) perceived the three phases as Restricted, Open and Integrated - and there have been several other attempts to categorize the history of CALL: see the ICT4LT website (Section 3 of Module 1.4)].
Behavioristic CALL is defined by the then-dominant behavioristic theories of learning of Skinner as well as the technological limitations of computers from the 1960’s to the early 1980’s. Up to the late 1970’s, CALL was confined to universities where programs were developed on big mainframe computers, like the PLATO project, initiated at the University of Illinois in 1960. Because repeated exposure to material was considered to be beneficial or even essential, computers were considered ideal for this aspect of learning as the machines did not get bored or impatient with learners and the computer could present material to the student as his/her own pace and even adapt the drills to the level of the student. Hence, CALL programs of this era presented a stimulus to which the learner provided a response. At first, both could be done only through text. The computer would analyze errors and give feedback. More sophisticated programs would react to students’ mistakes by branching to help screens and remedial activities. While such programs and their underlying pedagogy still exist today, to a large part behavioristic approaches to language learning have been rejected and the increasing sophistication of computer technology has lead CALL to other possibilities.
Communicative CALL is based on the communicative approach that became prominent in the late 1970’s and 1980’s. In the communicative approach, the focus is on using the language rather than analysis of the language, teaching grammar implicitly. It also allowed for originality and flexibility in student output of language. It also correlates with the arrival of the PC, making computing much widely available resulting in a boom in the development of software for language learning. The first CALL software in this phase still provided skill practice but not in a drill format, for example, paced reading, text reconstruction and language games but computer remained the tutor. In this phase, however, computers provided context for students to use the language, such as asking for directions to a place. It also allowed for programs not designed for language learning, such as Sim City, Sleuth and Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego? to be used for language learning. However, criticisms of this approach include using the computer in an ad hoc and disconnected manner for more marginal rather than the central aims of language teaching. It usually taught skills such as reading and listening in a compartmentalized way, even if not in a drill fashion.
Integrative/explorative CALL, starting from the 1990’s, tries to address these criticisms by integrating the teaching of language skills into tasks or projects to provide direction and coherence. It also coincides with the development of multimedia technology (providing text, graphics, sound and animation) as well as computer-mediated communication. CALL in this period saw a definitive shift of use of computer for drill and tutorial purposes (computer as a finite authoritative base for a specific task) to a medium for extending education beyond the classroom and reorganizing instruction. Multimedia CALL started with interactive laser videodiscs such as “Montevidisco” (Schneider & Bennion 1984) and “A la rencontre de Philippe” (Fuerstenberg 1993), all of which were simulations of situations where the learner played a key role. These programs later were transferred to CD-ROMs, and new RPGs such as Who is Oscar Lake? made their appearance in a range of different languages.
In multimedia programs, listening is combined with seeing, just like in the real world. Students also control the pace and the path of the interaction. Interaction is in the foreground but many CALL programs also provide links to explanations simultaneously. An example of this is Dustin’s simulation of a foreign student’s arrival in the USA. Programs like this led also to what is called explorative CALL.
More recent research in CALL has favored a learner-centered explorative approach, where students are encouraged to try different possible solutions to a problem, for example the use of concordance programs. This approach is also described as data-driven learning (DDL), a term coined by Tim Johns. See Module 2.4 at the ICT4LT site, Using concordance programs in the Modern Foreign Languages classroom.
[edit] CALL and computational linguistics
CALL and computational linguistics are separate but somewhat interdependent fields of study. The basic goal of computational linguistics is to “teach” computers to generate and comprehend grammatically-acceptable sentences… for purposes of translation and direct communication with computers where the computer understands and generates natural language. Computational linguistics takes the principles of theoretical linguistics with the aim of characterizing a language with computational applications in mind. [2]
A very simple example of computers understanding natural language in relation to second language learning is vocabulary drill exercises. The computer prompts the learner with a word on either the L1 or target language and the student responds with the corresponding word. The computer “understands” the input word by comparing it with a stored answer and gives feedback to the user. Cloze tests work on a similar principle, where the computer compares the words/phrases provided by the learner to a database of correct answers. [2]
On a superficial level, the core issue for humans and computers using language is the same; finding the best match between a given speech sound and it corresponding word string, then generating the correct and appropriate response. However, humans and machines process speech in fundamentally different ways. Humans use complex cognitive processes, taking into account variables such as social situations and rules while speech for a computer is simply a series of digital values to generate and parse language. [2] [3] For this reason, those involved in CALL from a computational linguistics perspective tend to be more optimistic about a computer’s ability to do error analysis and other pedagogical tasks than those who come into CALL via language teaching. [4]
The term Human Language Technologies is often used to describe some aspects of computational linguistics, having replaced the former term Language Engineering. There has been an upsurge of work in this area in recent years, especially with regard to machine translation and speech synthesis and speech analysis. The professional associations EUROCALL (Europe) and CALICO (USA) have special interest groups (SIGs), respectively devoted to Natural Language Processing (NLP) and Intelligent CALL (ICALL). See Module 3.5 at the ICT4LT website for further information.
[edit] Theoretical basis for CALL instruction design
Computers have become so widespread in schools and homes and their uses have expanded so dramatically that the majority of language teachers now think about the implications. Technology brings about changes in the teaching methodologies of foreign language unless they are used simply to automate fill-in-the-gap exercises. [5] The use of the computer in and of itself does not constitute a teaching method, but rather the computer forces pedagogy to think in new ways to exploit the computers benefits and work around its limitations. [1] To exploit computers’ potential we need language teaching specialists who can promote a complementary relationship between computer technology and appropriate pedagogic programs. [5]
A number of pedagogical approaches have developed in the computer age, including the communicative and integrative/experimentative approaches outlined above in the History of CALL. Others include constructivism, whole language theory and sociocultural theory although they are not exclusively theories of language learning. With constructivism, students are active participants in a task in which they “construct” new knowledge based on experience in order to incorporate new ideas into their already-established schema of knowledge. Whole language theory postulates that language learning (either native or second language) moves from the whole to the part; rather than building sub-skills like grammar to lead toward higher abilities like reading comprehension, whole language insists the opposite is the way we really learn to use language. Students learn grammar and other sub-skills by making intelligent guesses bases on the input they have experienced. It also promotes that the four skills (reading, writing, listening and speaking) are interrelated. [6] Sociocultural theory states that learning is a process of becoming part of a desired community and learning that communities rules of behavior. [7]
What most of these approaches have in common is taking the central focus away from the teacher as conveyor of knowledge to giving students learning experiences that are as realistic as possible where they play a central role. Also, these approaches tend to emphasize fluency over accuracy to allow students to take risks in using more student-centered activities and to cooperate, rather than compete. [5] The computer provides opportunity for students to be less dependent on a teacher and have more freedom to experiment on their own with natural language in natural or semi-natural settings.
[edit] Role changes for teachers and students
[edit] Teachers
Although the integration of CALL into a foreign language program can lead to great anxiety among language teachers, [8] researchers consistently claim that CALL changes, sometimes radically, the role of the teacher but does not eliminate the need for a teacher altogether. Instead of handing down knowledge to students and being the center of students’ attention, teachers become guides as they construct the activities students are to do and help them as students complete the assigned tasks. In other words, instead of being directly involved in students’ construction of the language, the teacher interacts with students primarily to facilitate difficulties in using the target language (grammar, vocabulary, etc.) that arise when interacting with the computer and/or other people. [6] [5]
Elimination of a strong teacher presence has been shown to lead to larger quantity and better quality of communication such as more fluidity, more use of complex sentences and more sharing of students’ personal selves. [6] However, teacher presence is still very important to students when doing CALL activities. Teachers should be familiar enough with the resources to be used to anticipate technical problems and limitations. [5] Students need the reassuring and motivating presence of a teacher in CALL environments. Not only are they needed during the initial learning curve, they are needed to conduct review sessions to reinforce what was learned. Encouraging students to participate and offering praise are deemed important by students. Most students report preferring to do work in a lab with a teacher’s or tutor’s presence rather than completely on their own. [6]
[edit] Students
Students, too, need to adjust their expectations of their participation in the class in order to use CALL effectively. Rather than passively absorbing information, learners must negotiate meaning and assimilate new information through interaction and collaboration with someone other than the teacher, be that person a classmate or someone outside of the classroom entirely. Learners must also learn to interpret new information and experiences on their own terms. However, because the use of technology redistributes teachers’ and classmates’ attentions, less-able students can become more active participants in the class because class interaction is not limited to that directed by the teacher. [6] Moreover more shy students can feel free in their own students'-centered environment. This will raise their self-esteem and their knowledge will be improving. If students are performing collaborative project they will do their best to perform it within set time limits.
[edit] Use of CALL for the four skills
A number of studies have been done concerning how the use of CALL affects the development of language learners’ four skills (listening, speaking, reading and writing). Most report significant gains in reading and listening and most CALL programs are geared toward these receptive skills because of the current state of computer technology. However, most reading and listening software is based on drills. [5] Gains in writing skills have not been as impressive as computers cannot assess this well. [6]
However, using current CALL technology, even with its current limitations, for the development of speaking abilities has gained much attention. There has been some success in using CALL, in particular computer-mediated communication, to help speaking skills closely linked to “communicative competence” (ability to engage in meaningful conversation in the target language) and provide controlled interactive speaking practice outside the classroom. [3] Using chat has been shown to help students routinize certain often-used expressions to promote the development of automatic structure that help develop speaking skills. This is true even if the chat is purely textual. The use of videoconferencing give not only immediacy when communicating with a real person but also visual cues, such as facial expressions, making such communication more authentic. [6]
However, when it comes to using the computer not as a medium of communication (with other people) but as something to interact with verbally in a direct manner, the current computer technology’s limitations are at their clearest. Right now, there are two fairly successful applications of automatic speech recognition (ASR) (or speech processing technology) where the computer “understands” the spoken words of the learner. The first is pronunciation training. Learners read sentences on the screen and the computer gives feedback as to the accuracy of the utterance, usually in the form of visual sound waves. [3] The second is software where the learner speaks commands for the computer to do. However, speakers in these programs are limited to predetermined texts so that the computer will “understand” them. [5]
[edit] Multimedia language centers
During the 1960s, language laboratories with cassette players and headphones were introduced into educational institutions. The use of this kind of center grew rapidly in the late 1960s and 1970s, but then went rapidly out of fashion."[9] Later, “digital language labs” were introduced, still following the traditional language format, such as teacher monitoring. What made them new was that they incorporated new technologies such as video. The term multimedia was originally used to describe sets of learning materials which included a book, audiocassettes and/or videocassettes. However, with the advent of computer-based materials, such packages tend to be called multiple media or mixed media - although there is not absolute consensus on this point. Nowadays multimedia refers to computer-based materials that can perform more varied tasks then the purely-audio mixed-media. Not only can such play pre-recorded audio and video material, it can create new audio and video recordings. It also has the capability of integrating the four basic skills of listening, speaking, reading and writing, as well as giving immediate, if limited, feedback to the student. However, like its predecessors, multimedia centers run the risk of being underutilized due to poor management. [10]
While multimedia computer-based materials can be used directly in the classroom, because of costs, such resources are usually found in a multimedia language center, fulfilling the role of the previous cassette-based and digital language laboratories. However, managing such a center requires knowledge of a wide range of equipment and the increasing expectations of such equipment from administrators, language teachers and students. Administrators often have the mistaken belief that buying hardware by itself will meet the needs of the center (often devoting 90% of a center’s budget to such and ignoring software and training needs) and will cut down on the number of teaching staff needed. [11]
While multimedia offers many opportunities for language learning with the availability of text, images, sound and video as well as interactive activities, the problem is that these opportunities have not been taken advantage of well. Most multimedia computer programs tend to be strong on presentation but weak as far as pedagogy and even interaction. One of the main promises of CALL is the ability to individualize learning, but like with past language laboratories, use of the facilities in many cases have devolved into rows of students all doing the same drills. The only advantage to the multimedia in these cases has been better sound and color images. Most modern language learning theories stress the importance of teacher guidance rather than control, giving students control over what they do, how fast they do it and even the ability to find and correct their own mistakes.[11]
Managing a multimedia language center properly requires not only knowledge of foreign languages and language teaching methodology, it also requires a certain amount of technical know-how and budget management ability as well as the ability to combine all these into creative ways of taking advantage of what the technology can offer. Often a center manager needs assistants for technical problems, for managing resources and even the tutoring of students. Multimedia centers lend themselves to self-study, and potentially self-directed learning, but such is often misunderstood. The simple existence of computers in a laboratory does not automatically lead to students learning independently. Significant investment of time is essential for materials development and creating an atmosphere conducive to such.
Self access language learning centers or independent learning centres have emerged partially independently, and partially in response to these issues. In self-access learning, the focus is on developing learner autonomy through varying degrees of self-directed learning, as opposed to (or as a complement to) classroom learning. In most centres, learners access materials and manage their learning independently, but have access to staff for help. Many self-access centres are heavy users of technology and an increasing number of them are now offering online self-access learning opportunities. Some centres have developed novel ways of supporting language learning outside the context of the language classroom (also called 'language support') by developing software to monitor students' self-directed learning and by offering online support from teachers (cf. [12])
Center managers and support staff need to have new roles defined for them to support students’ efforts at self-directed learning. In fact, a new job description has emerged recently, that of a “language advisor”[13].
[edit] Advantages of CALL
[edit] Motivation
Generally speaking, the use of technology inside or outside the classroom tends to make the class more interesting. However, certain design issues affect just how interesting the particular tool creates motivation. [6] One way a program or activity can promote motivation in students is by personalizing information, for example by integrating the student’s name or familiar contexts as part of the program or task. Others include having animate objects on the screen, providing practice activities that incorporate challenges and curiosity and providing a context (real-world or fantasy) that is not directly language-oriented.
For example, a study comparing students who used “CornerStone” (a language arts development program) showed a significant increase in learning (compared to students not using the program) between two classes of English-immersion middle-school students in language arts. This is because CornerStone incorporate personalized information and challenging and imaginative exercises in a fantasy context. [14] Also, using a variety of multimedia components in one program or course has been shown to increase student interest and motivation. [6]
One quantifiable benefit to increased motivation is that students tend to spend more time on tasks when on the computer. More time is frequently cited as a factor in achievement. [6]
[edit] Adapting learning to the student
Computers can give a new role to teaching materials. Without computers, students cannot really influence the linear progression of the class content but computers can adapt to the student. [5] Adapting to the student usually means that the student controls the pace of the learning but also means that students can make choices in what and how to learn, skipping unnecessary items or doing remedial work on difficult concepts. Such control makes students feel more competent in their learning. [14] Students tend to prefer exercises where they have control over content, such as branching stories, adventures, puzzles or logic problems. With these, the computer has the role of providing attractive context for the use of language rather than directly providing the language the student needs. [5]
[edit] Authenticity
“Authenticity” in language learning means the opportunity to interact in one or more of the four skills (reading, writing, listening, speaking) by using or producing texts meant for an audience in the target language, not the classroom. With real communication acts, rather than teacher-contrived ones, students feel empowered and less afraid to contact others. Students believe they learn faster and better with computer-mediated communication. [5] Also, students learn more about culture in such an environment. [6] In networked computer environments, students have a conscious feeling of being members of a real community. In situations where all are learners of a foreign language, there is also a feeling of equality. In these situations students feel less stressed and more confident in a language learning situation, in part because surface errors do not matter so much. This works best with synchronous CMC (e.g. chats) as there is immediate feedback but email exchanges have been shown to provide most of the same benefits in motivation and student affect. [5]
[edit] Critical thinking skills
Use of computer technology in classrooms is generally reported to improve self-concept and mastery of basic skills, more student-centered learning and engagement in the learning process, more active processing resulting in higher-order thinking skills and better recall, gain confidence in directing their own learning. This is true for both language and non-language classrooms. [6]
[edit] Problems and criticisms of CALL instruction
The impact of CALL in foreign language education has been modest. [3] Several reasons can be attributed to this.
The first is the limitations of the technology, both in its ability and availability. First of all, there is the problem with cost[1] and the simple availability of technological resources such as the Internet (either non-existent as can be the case in many developing countries or lack of bandwidth, as can be the case just about anywhere). [5] However, the limitations that current computer technology has can be problematic as well. While computer technology has improved greatly in the last three decades, demands placed on CALL have grown even more so. One major goal is to have computers with which students can have true, human-like interaction, esp. for speaking practice; however, the technology is far from that point. Not to mention that if the computer cannot evaluate a learner’s speech exactly, it is almost no use at all. [3][1]
However, most of the problems that appear in the literature on CALL have more to do with teacher expectations and apprehensions about what computers can do for the language learner and teacher. Teachers and administrators tend to either think computers are worthless or even harmful, or can do far more than they are really capable of. [8]
Reluctance on part of teachers can come from lack of understanding and even fear of technology. Often CALL is not implemented unless it is required even if training is offered to teachers. [8] One reason for this is that from the 1960’s to the 1980’s, computer technology was limited mostly for the sciences, creating a real and psychological distance for language teaching. [15] Language teachers can be more comfortable with textbooks because it is what they are used do, and there is the idea that the use of computers threatens traditional literacy skills since such are heavily tied to books. [15] [16] These stem in part because there is a significant generation gap between teachers (many of whom did not grow up with computers) and students (who did grow up with them).
Also, teachers may resist because CALL activities can be more difficult to evaluate than more traditional exercises. For example, most Mexican teachers feel strongly that a completed fill-in textbook “proves” learning. [16] While students seem may be motivated by exercises like branching stories, adventures, puzzles or logic, these activities provide little in the way of systematic evaluation of progress. [5]
Even teachers who may otherwise see benefits to CALL may be put off by the time and effort needed to implement it well. However “seductive” the power of computing systems may be[5], like with the introduction of the audio language lab in the 1960’s, those who simply expect results by purchasing expensive equipment are likely to be disappointed. [1] To begin with, there are the simple matters of sorting through the numerous resources that exist and getting students ready to use computer resources. With Internet sites alone, it can be very difficult to know where to begin, and if students are unfamiliar with the resource to be used, the teacher must take time to teach it. [5] Also, there is a lack of unified theoretical framework for designing and evaluating CALL systems as well as absence of conclusive empirical evidence for the pedagogical benefits of computers in language. [3] Most teachers lack the time or training to create CALL-based assignments, leading to reliance on commercially-published sources, whether such are pedagogically sound or not. [1]
However, the most crucial factor that can lead to the failure of CALL, or the use of any technology in language education is not the failure of the technology, but rather the failure to invest adequately in teacher and the lack of imagination to take advantage of the technology's flexibility. Graham Davies states that too often, technology is seen as a panacea, especially by administrators, and the human component necessary to make it beneficial is ignored. Under these circumstances, he argues, "it is probably better to dispense with technology altogether".[9]
Rody Klein, Clint Rogers and Zhang Yong (2006) studying the adoption of Learning Technologies in Chinese schools and colleges have also pointed out that the spread of video games on electronic devices, including computers, dictionaries and mobile phones, is feared in most Chinese institutions. And yet every classroom is very well equipped with a desk imbedded computer, Internetconnexion, microphone, video projector and remote controlled screen to be used by the teacher for multimedia presentations. Very often the leaders prefer to ban completely Learning Technologies for students at the dismay of many foreign ESL teachers. Books and exercise books still prevail. In order to enhance CALL for teaching ESL and other languages in developing countries, it would be also crucial to teach students how to learn by themselves and develop the capacity to practice self evaluation and enhance intrinsic motivation. Tests and quizzes should be designed accordingly to encourage and enhance students autonomous practice. Teachers using CALL should be computer literate and trained continously. Ideally each Foreign Language Department using CALL should hire an experienced Computer Scientist who could assist teachers. That expert should demonstrate dual expertise both in Education and Learning Technologies.
Computer-assisted language learning (CALL) is a form of computer-based learning which carries two important features: bidirectional learning and individualized learning. It is not a method. CALL materials are tools for learning. The focus of CALL is learning, and not teaching. CALL materials are used in teaching to facilitate the language learning process. It is a student-centered accelerated learning material, which promotes self-paced accelerated learning.
Contents
[hide] [hide]
* 1 Definition
* 2 History
* 3 CALL and computational linguistics
* 4 Theoretical basis for CALL instruction design
* 5 Role changes for teachers and students
o 5.1 Teachers
o 5.2 Students
* 6 Use of CALL for the four skills
* 7 Multimedia language centers
* 8 Advantages of CALL
o 8.1 Motivation
o 8.2 Adapting learning to the student
o 8.3 Authenticity
o 8.4 Critical thinking skills
* 9 Problems and criticisms of CALL instruction
* 10 References
* 11 Further reading
* 12 Professional associations
* 13 Professional journals
o 13.1 Journals dedicated to CALL
o 13.2 Journals that regularly include CALL articles
* 14 See also
[edit] Definition
CALL originates from CAI (Computer-Accelerated Instruction), a term that was first viewed as an aid for teachers. The philosophy of CALL puts a strong emphasis on student-centered lessons that allow the learners to learn on their own using structured and/or unstructured interactive lessons. These lessons carry 2 important features: bidirectional (interactive) learning and individualized learning. CALL is not a method. It is a tool that helps teachers to facilitate language learning process. CALL can be used to reinforce what has been learned in the classrooms. It can also be used as remedial to help learners with limited language proficiency.
The design of CALL lessons generally takes into consideration principles of language pedagogy, which may be derived from learning theories (behaviorist, cognitive, and constructivist) and second language learning such as Krashen's Monitor Theory.
Others may call CALL an approach to teaching and learning foreign languages whereby the computer and computer-based resources such as the Internet are used to present, reinforce and assess material to be learned. CALL can be made independent of the Internet. It can stand alone for example in a CDROM format. Depending on its design and objectives, it may include a substantial interactive element especially when CALL is integrated in web-based format. It may include the search for and the investigation of applications in language teaching and learning. [1] Except for self-study software, CALL is meant to supplement face-to-face language instruction, not replace it.[2]
CALL has also been known by several other terms such as technology-enhanced language learning (TELL), computer-assisted language instruction (CALI) and computer-aided language learning but the field is the same. [3] For further information see the ICT4LT website, especially Section 1 of Module 1.4, headed "What is CALL?": Mobile Assisted Language Learning (MALL) is a subset of both Mobile Learning (m-learning) and Computer Assisted Language Learning (CALL).
Computers have been used for language teaching ever since the 1960s. This 40-year period can be divided into three main stages: behaviorist CALL, communicative CALL, and integrative CALL. Each stage corresponds to a certain level of technology and certain pedagogical theories. The reasons for using Computer-assisted Language Learning include: (a) experiential learning, (b) motivation, (c) enhance student achievement, (d) authentic materials for study, (e) greater interaction, (f) individualization, (g) independence from a single source of information, and (h) global understanding. The barriers inhibiting the practice of Computer-assisted Language Learning can be classified in the following common categories: (a) financial barriers, (b) availability of computer hardware and software, (c) technical and theoretical knowledge, and (d) acceptance of the technology.
Introduction
[edit] History
CALL’s origins and development trace back to the 1960’s (Delcloque 2000). Since the early days CALL has developed into a symbiotic relationship between the development of technology and pedagogy.
Warschauer (1996) divided the development of CALL into three phases: Behavioristic CALL, Communicative CALL and Integrative CALL (Multimedia and the Internet)[1]. Bax (2003) perceived the three phases as Restricted, Open and Integrated - and there have been several other attempts to categorize the history of CALL: see the ICT4LT website (Section 3 of Module 1.4)].
Behavioristic CALL is defined by the then-dominant behavioristic theories of learning of Skinner as well as the technological limitations of computers from the 1960’s to the early 1980’s. Up to the late 1970’s, CALL was confined to universities where programs were developed on big mainframe computers, like the PLATO project, initiated at the University of Illinois in 1960. Because repeated exposure to material was considered to be beneficial or even essential, computers were considered ideal for this aspect of learning as the machines did not get bored or impatient with learners and the computer could present material to the student as his/her own pace and even adapt the drills to the level of the student. Hence, CALL programs of this era presented a stimulus to which the learner provided a response. At first, both could be done only through text. The computer would analyze errors and give feedback. More sophisticated programs would react to students’ mistakes by branching to help screens and remedial activities. While such programs and their underlying pedagogy still exist today, to a large part behavioristic approaches to language learning have been rejected and the increasing sophistication of computer technology has lead CALL to other possibilities.
Communicative CALL is based on the communicative approach that became prominent in the late 1970’s and 1980’s. In the communicative approach, the focus is on using the language rather than analysis of the language, teaching grammar implicitly. It also allowed for originality and flexibility in student output of language. It also correlates with the arrival of the PC, making computing much widely available resulting in a boom in the development of software for language learning. The first CALL software in this phase still provided skill practice but not in a drill format, for example, paced reading, text reconstruction and language games but computer remained the tutor. In this phase, however, computers provided context for students to use the language, such as asking for directions to a place. It also allowed for programs not designed for language learning, such as Sim City, Sleuth and Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego? to be used for language learning. However, criticisms of this approach include using the computer in an ad hoc and disconnected manner for more marginal rather than the central aims of language teaching. It usually taught skills such as reading and listening in a compartmentalized way, even if not in a drill fashion.
Integrative/explorative CALL, starting from the 1990’s, tries to address these criticisms by integrating the teaching of language skills into tasks or projects to provide direction and coherence. It also coincides with the development of multimedia technology (providing text, graphics, sound and animation) as well as computer-mediated communication. CALL in this period saw a definitive shift of use of computer for drill and tutorial purposes (computer as a finite authoritative base for a specific task) to a medium for extending education beyond the classroom and reorganizing instruction. Multimedia CALL started with interactive laser videodiscs such as “Montevidisco” (Schneider & Bennion 1984) and “A la rencontre de Philippe” (Fuerstenberg 1993), all of which were simulations of situations where the learner played a key role. These programs later were transferred to CD-ROMs, and new RPGs such as Who is Oscar Lake? made their appearance in a range of different languages.
In multimedia programs, listening is combined with seeing, just like in the real world. Students also control the pace and the path of the interaction. Interaction is in the foreground but many CALL programs also provide links to explanations simultaneously. An example of this is Dustin’s simulation of a foreign student’s arrival in the USA. Programs like this led also to what is called explorative CALL.
More recent research in CALL has favored a learner-centered explorative approach, where students are encouraged to try different possible solutions to a problem, for example the use of concordance programs. This approach is also described as data-driven learning (DDL), a term coined by Tim Johns. See Module 2.4 at the ICT4LT site, Using concordance programs in the Modern Foreign Languages classroom.
[edit] CALL and computational linguistics
CALL and computational linguistics are separate but somewhat interdependent fields of study. The basic goal of computational linguistics is to “teach” computers to generate and comprehend grammatically-acceptable sentences… for purposes of translation and direct communication with computers where the computer understands and generates natural language. Computational linguistics takes the principles of theoretical linguistics with the aim of characterizing a language with computational applications in mind. [2]
A very simple example of computers understanding natural language in relation to second language learning is vocabulary drill exercises. The computer prompts the learner with a word on either the L1 or target language and the student responds with the corresponding word. The computer “understands” the input word by comparing it with a stored answer and gives feedback to the user. Cloze tests work on a similar principle, where the computer compares the words/phrases provided by the learner to a database of correct answers. [2]
On a superficial level, the core issue for humans and computers using language is the same; finding the best match between a given speech sound and it corresponding word string, then generating the correct and appropriate response. However, humans and machines process speech in fundamentally different ways. Humans use complex cognitive processes, taking into account variables such as social situations and rules while speech for a computer is simply a series of digital values to generate and parse language. [2] [3] For this reason, those involved in CALL from a computational linguistics perspective tend to be more optimistic about a computer’s ability to do error analysis and other pedagogical tasks than those who come into CALL via language teaching. [4]
The term Human Language Technologies is often used to describe some aspects of computational linguistics, having replaced the former term Language Engineering. There has been an upsurge of work in this area in recent years, especially with regard to machine translation and speech synthesis and speech analysis. The professional associations EUROCALL (Europe) and CALICO (USA) have special interest groups (SIGs), respectively devoted to Natural Language Processing (NLP) and Intelligent CALL (ICALL). See Module 3.5 at the ICT4LT website for further information.
[edit] Theoretical basis for CALL instruction design
Computers have become so widespread in schools and homes and their uses have expanded so dramatically that the majority of language teachers now think about the implications. Technology brings about changes in the teaching methodologies of foreign language unless they are used simply to automate fill-in-the-gap exercises. [5] The use of the computer in and of itself does not constitute a teaching method, but rather the computer forces pedagogy to think in new ways to exploit the computers benefits and work around its limitations. [1] To exploit computers’ potential we need language teaching specialists who can promote a complementary relationship between computer technology and appropriate pedagogic programs. [5]
A number of pedagogical approaches have developed in the computer age, including the communicative and integrative/experimentative approaches outlined above in the History of CALL. Others include constructivism, whole language theory and sociocultural theory although they are not exclusively theories of language learning. With constructivism, students are active participants in a task in which they “construct” new knowledge based on experience in order to incorporate new ideas into their already-established schema of knowledge. Whole language theory postulates that language learning (either native or second language) moves from the whole to the part; rather than building sub-skills like grammar to lead toward higher abilities like reading comprehension, whole language insists the opposite is the way we really learn to use language. Students learn grammar and other sub-skills by making intelligent guesses bases on the input they have experienced. It also promotes that the four skills (reading, writing, listening and speaking) are interrelated. [6] Sociocultural theory states that learning is a process of becoming part of a desired community and learning that communities rules of behavior. [7]
What most of these approaches have in common is taking the central focus away from the teacher as conveyor of knowledge to giving students learning experiences that are as realistic as possible where they play a central role. Also, these approaches tend to emphasize fluency over accuracy to allow students to take risks in using more student-centered activities and to cooperate, rather than compete. [5] The computer provides opportunity for students to be less dependent on a teacher and have more freedom to experiment on their own with natural language in natural or semi-natural settings.
[edit] Role changes for teachers and students
[edit] Teachers
Although the integration of CALL into a foreign language program can lead to great anxiety among language teachers, [8] researchers consistently claim that CALL changes, sometimes radically, the role of the teacher but does not eliminate the need for a teacher altogether. Instead of handing down knowledge to students and being the center of students’ attention, teachers become guides as they construct the activities students are to do and help them as students complete the assigned tasks. In other words, instead of being directly involved in students’ construction of the language, the teacher interacts with students primarily to facilitate difficulties in using the target language (grammar, vocabulary, etc.) that arise when interacting with the computer and/or other people. [6] [5]
Elimination of a strong teacher presence has been shown to lead to larger quantity and better quality of communication such as more fluidity, more use of complex sentences and more sharing of students’ personal selves. [6] However, teacher presence is still very important to students when doing CALL activities. Teachers should be familiar enough with the resources to be used to anticipate technical problems and limitations. [5] Students need the reassuring and motivating presence of a teacher in CALL environments. Not only are they needed during the initial learning curve, they are needed to conduct review sessions to reinforce what was learned. Encouraging students to participate and offering praise are deemed important by students. Most students report preferring to do work in a lab with a teacher’s or tutor’s presence rather than completely on their own. [6]
[edit] Students
Students, too, need to adjust their expectations of their participation in the class in order to use CALL effectively. Rather than passively absorbing information, learners must negotiate meaning and assimilate new information through interaction and collaboration with someone other than the teacher, be that person a classmate or someone outside of the classroom entirely. Learners must also learn to interpret new information and experiences on their own terms. However, because the use of technology redistributes teachers’ and classmates’ attentions, less-able students can become more active participants in the class because class interaction is not limited to that directed by the teacher. [6] Moreover more shy students can feel free in their own students'-centered environment. This will raise their self-esteem and their knowledge will be improving. If students are performing collaborative project they will do their best to perform it within set time limits.
[edit] Use of CALL for the four skills
A number of studies have been done concerning how the use of CALL affects the development of language learners’ four skills (listening, speaking, reading and writing). Most report significant gains in reading and listening and most CALL programs are geared toward these receptive skills because of the current state of computer technology. However, most reading and listening software is based on drills. [5] Gains in writing skills have not been as impressive as computers cannot assess this well. [6]
However, using current CALL technology, even with its current limitations, for the development of speaking abilities has gained much attention. There has been some success in using CALL, in particular computer-mediated communication, to help speaking skills closely linked to “communicative competence” (ability to engage in meaningful conversation in the target language) and provide controlled interactive speaking practice outside the classroom. [3] Using chat has been shown to help students routinize certain often-used expressions to promote the development of automatic structure that help develop speaking skills. This is true even if the chat is purely textual. The use of videoconferencing give not only immediacy when communicating with a real person but also visual cues, such as facial expressions, making such communication more authentic. [6]
However, when it comes to using the computer not as a medium of communication (with other people) but as something to interact with verbally in a direct manner, the current computer technology’s limitations are at their clearest. Right now, there are two fairly successful applications of automatic speech recognition (ASR) (or speech processing technology) where the computer “understands” the spoken words of the learner. The first is pronunciation training. Learners read sentences on the screen and the computer gives feedback as to the accuracy of the utterance, usually in the form of visual sound waves. [3] The second is software where the learner speaks commands for the computer to do. However, speakers in these programs are limited to predetermined texts so that the computer will “understand” them. [5]
[edit] Multimedia language centers
During the 1960s, language laboratories with cassette players and headphones were introduced into educational institutions. The use of this kind of center grew rapidly in the late 1960s and 1970s, but then went rapidly out of fashion."[9] Later, “digital language labs” were introduced, still following the traditional language format, such as teacher monitoring. What made them new was that they incorporated new technologies such as video. The term multimedia was originally used to describe sets of learning materials which included a book, audiocassettes and/or videocassettes. However, with the advent of computer-based materials, such packages tend to be called multiple media or mixed media - although there is not absolute consensus on this point. Nowadays multimedia refers to computer-based materials that can perform more varied tasks then the purely-audio mixed-media. Not only can such play pre-recorded audio and video material, it can create new audio and video recordings. It also has the capability of integrating the four basic skills of listening, speaking, reading and writing, as well as giving immediate, if limited, feedback to the student. However, like its predecessors, multimedia centers run the risk of being underutilized due to poor management. [10]
While multimedia computer-based materials can be used directly in the classroom, because of costs, such resources are usually found in a multimedia language center, fulfilling the role of the previous cassette-based and digital language laboratories. However, managing such a center requires knowledge of a wide range of equipment and the increasing expectations of such equipment from administrators, language teachers and students. Administrators often have the mistaken belief that buying hardware by itself will meet the needs of the center (often devoting 90% of a center’s budget to such and ignoring software and training needs) and will cut down on the number of teaching staff needed. [11]
While multimedia offers many opportunities for language learning with the availability of text, images, sound and video as well as interactive activities, the problem is that these opportunities have not been taken advantage of well. Most multimedia computer programs tend to be strong on presentation but weak as far as pedagogy and even interaction. One of the main promises of CALL is the ability to individualize learning, but like with past language laboratories, use of the facilities in many cases have devolved into rows of students all doing the same drills. The only advantage to the multimedia in these cases has been better sound and color images. Most modern language learning theories stress the importance of teacher guidance rather than control, giving students control over what they do, how fast they do it and even the ability to find and correct their own mistakes.[11]
Managing a multimedia language center properly requires not only knowledge of foreign languages and language teaching methodology, it also requires a certain amount of technical know-how and budget management ability as well as the ability to combine all these into creative ways of taking advantage of what the technology can offer. Often a center manager needs assistants for technical problems, for managing resources and even the tutoring of students. Multimedia centers lend themselves to self-study, and potentially self-directed learning, but such is often misunderstood. The simple existence of computers in a laboratory does not automatically lead to students learning independently. Significant investment of time is essential for materials development and creating an atmosphere conducive to such.
Self access language learning centers or independent learning centres have emerged partially independently, and partially in response to these issues. In self-access learning, the focus is on developing learner autonomy through varying degrees of self-directed learning, as opposed to (or as a complement to) classroom learning. In most centres, learners access materials and manage their learning independently, but have access to staff for help. Many self-access centres are heavy users of technology and an increasing number of them are now offering online self-access learning opportunities. Some centres have developed novel ways of supporting language learning outside the context of the language classroom (also called 'language support') by developing software to monitor students' self-directed learning and by offering online support from teachers (cf. [12])
Center managers and support staff need to have new roles defined for them to support students’ efforts at self-directed learning. In fact, a new job description has emerged recently, that of a “language advisor”[13].
[edit] Advantages of CALL
[edit] Motivation
Generally speaking, the use of technology inside or outside the classroom tends to make the class more interesting. However, certain design issues affect just how interesting the particular tool creates motivation. [6] One way a program or activity can promote motivation in students is by personalizing information, for example by integrating the student’s name or familiar contexts as part of the program or task. Others include having animate objects on the screen, providing practice activities that incorporate challenges and curiosity and providing a context (real-world or fantasy) that is not directly language-oriented.
For example, a study comparing students who used “CornerStone” (a language arts development program) showed a significant increase in learning (compared to students not using the program) between two classes of English-immersion middle-school students in language arts. This is because CornerStone incorporate personalized information and challenging and imaginative exercises in a fantasy context. [14] Also, using a variety of multimedia components in one program or course has been shown to increase student interest and motivation. [6]
One quantifiable benefit to increased motivation is that students tend to spend more time on tasks when on the computer. More time is frequently cited as a factor in achievement. [6]
[edit] Adapting learning to the student
Computers can give a new role to teaching materials. Without computers, students cannot really influence the linear progression of the class content but computers can adapt to the student. [5] Adapting to the student usually means that the student controls the pace of the learning but also means that students can make choices in what and how to learn, skipping unnecessary items or doing remedial work on difficult concepts. Such control makes students feel more competent in their learning. [14] Students tend to prefer exercises where they have control over content, such as branching stories, adventures, puzzles or logic problems. With these, the computer has the role of providing attractive context for the use of language rather than directly providing the language the student needs. [5]
[edit] Authenticity
“Authenticity” in language learning means the opportunity to interact in one or more of the four skills (reading, writing, listening, speaking) by using or producing texts meant for an audience in the target language, not the classroom. With real communication acts, rather than teacher-contrived ones, students feel empowered and less afraid to contact others. Students believe they learn faster and better with computer-mediated communication. [5] Also, students learn more about culture in such an environment. [6] In networked computer environments, students have a conscious feeling of being members of a real community. In situations where all are learners of a foreign language, there is also a feeling of equality. In these situations students feel less stressed and more confident in a language learning situation, in part because surface errors do not matter so much. This works best with synchronous CMC (e.g. chats) as there is immediate feedback but email exchanges have been shown to provide most of the same benefits in motivation and student affect. [5]
[edit] Critical thinking skills
Use of computer technology in classrooms is generally reported to improve self-concept and mastery of basic skills, more student-centered learning and engagement in the learning process, more active processing resulting in higher-order thinking skills and better recall, gain confidence in directing their own learning. This is true for both language and non-language classrooms. [6]
[edit] Problems and criticisms of CALL instruction
The impact of CALL in foreign language education has been modest. [3] Several reasons can be attributed to this.
The first is the limitations of the technology, both in its ability and availability. First of all, there is the problem with cost[1] and the simple availability of technological resources such as the Internet (either non-existent as can be the case in many developing countries or lack of bandwidth, as can be the case just about anywhere). [5] However, the limitations that current computer technology has can be problematic as well. While computer technology has improved greatly in the last three decades, demands placed on CALL have grown even more so. One major goal is to have computers with which students can have true, human-like interaction, esp. for speaking practice; however, the technology is far from that point. Not to mention that if the computer cannot evaluate a learner’s speech exactly, it is almost no use at all. [3][1]
However, most of the problems that appear in the literature on CALL have more to do with teacher expectations and apprehensions about what computers can do for the language learner and teacher. Teachers and administrators tend to either think computers are worthless or even harmful, or can do far more than they are really capable of. [8]
Reluctance on part of teachers can come from lack of understanding and even fear of technology. Often CALL is not implemented unless it is required even if training is offered to teachers. [8] One reason for this is that from the 1960’s to the 1980’s, computer technology was limited mostly for the sciences, creating a real and psychological distance for language teaching. [15] Language teachers can be more comfortable with textbooks because it is what they are used do, and there is the idea that the use of computers threatens traditional literacy skills since such are heavily tied to books. [15] [16] These stem in part because there is a significant generation gap between teachers (many of whom did not grow up with computers) and students (who did grow up with them).
Also, teachers may resist because CALL activities can be more difficult to evaluate than more traditional exercises. For example, most Mexican teachers feel strongly that a completed fill-in textbook “proves” learning. [16] While students seem may be motivated by exercises like branching stories, adventures, puzzles or logic, these activities provide little in the way of systematic evaluation of progress. [5]
Even teachers who may otherwise see benefits to CALL may be put off by the time and effort needed to implement it well. However “seductive” the power of computing systems may be[5], like with the introduction of the audio language lab in the 1960’s, those who simply expect results by purchasing expensive equipment are likely to be disappointed. [1] To begin with, there are the simple matters of sorting through the numerous resources that exist and getting students ready to use computer resources. With Internet sites alone, it can be very difficult to know where to begin, and if students are unfamiliar with the resource to be used, the teacher must take time to teach it. [5] Also, there is a lack of unified theoretical framework for designing and evaluating CALL systems as well as absence of conclusive empirical evidence for the pedagogical benefits of computers in language. [3] Most teachers lack the time or training to create CALL-based assignments, leading to reliance on commercially-published sources, whether such are pedagogically sound or not. [1]
However, the most crucial factor that can lead to the failure of CALL, or the use of any technology in language education is not the failure of the technology, but rather the failure to invest adequately in teacher and the lack of imagination to take advantage of the technology's flexibility. Graham Davies states that too often, technology is seen as a panacea, especially by administrators, and the human component necessary to make it beneficial is ignored. Under these circumstances, he argues, "it is probably better to dispense with technology altogether".[9]
Rody Klein, Clint Rogers and Zhang Yong (2006) studying the adoption of Learning Technologies in Chinese schools and colleges have also pointed out that the spread of video games on electronic devices, including computers, dictionaries and mobile phones, is feared in most Chinese institutions. And yet every classroom is very well equipped with a desk imbedded computer, Internetconnexion, microphone, video projector and remote controlled screen to be used by the teacher for multimedia presentations. Very often the leaders prefer to ban completely Learning Technologies for students at the dismay of many foreign ESL teachers. Books and exercise books still prevail. In order to enhance CALL for teaching ESL and other languages in developing countries, it would be also crucial to teach students how to learn by themselves and develop the capacity to practice self evaluation and enhance intrinsic motivation. Tests and quizzes should be designed accordingly to encourage and enhance students autonomous practice. Teachers using CALL should be computer literate and trained continously. Ideally each Foreign Language Department using CALL should hire an experienced Computer Scientist who could assist teachers. That expert should demonstrate dual expertise both in Education and Learning Technologies.
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