OAILL podcast in Book Slam #2

What is a podcast doing in a book slam? We asked and they allowed us in. Who is they? The colleagues of the Mid-Atlantic Association for Language Learning Technology (MAALT) were so kind to include Phil and me in their second Book Slam. What did we do on that evening in August? We talked about what we do every other week: we podcast on “Opening AI for Language Learning.” At the time of writing this, 15 episodes have dropped and have received more than 1,500 downloads. We are happy that this works so well. And we are grateful to the colleagues in MALLT, our podcast listeners, and of course to the readers of the Paanta Rhei blog. We were hoping the word would get out there and we would reach language teachers, teacher educators, language learners, and language enthusiasts … who might want to know a little bit more about what is happening in the world of GenAI and AI in general.

So, listen to the Book Slam #2. With a number of other interesting contributions. As they say: Ideas. Inspiration. Impact. In 5 to 10 minutes. And I don’t think Phil and I talked for that much longer.

I am not sure how 1,500 downloads sound to you. I compare them to the numbers the publisher – Routledge – send me for the frist few years after publishing – still – the only monograph on language learning and AI, which I wrote with Trude Heift before 2007. If I remember right, it was 200 after about three years, mainly by university libraries. That’s when my mother gave up her dream that I would make money with a book. 😂 😇 According to Google Scholar, the book Errors and intelligence in computer-assisted language learning. Parsers and pedagogues received 430 citations, many of which happened in the last four years.

Of course, AI was different then. I knew nothing about statistical natural language processing, machine learning, artificial neural networks, and –never mind – large language models. We had a parser (hence the title), focused on symbolic natural language processing (wrote grammar rules by hand; I am a linguist, after all) and expert models. We programmed a student model that inferred information about the student using the program. And wrote a grammar checker for students of German for my PhD. It was a proof-of-theory, research prototype that only ever had one user – me.

In any case, we reached very few people then. The community of people working on Intelligent Computer-assisted Language Learning (ICALL) – the intersection of CALL and AI – was very small. We all knew each other.

Now more language teachers are interested in AI and its application, and there is also a genuine “hunger” for information that is neither profitable hype nor cashable gloom. Although I am still writing, I believe with a podcast we are reaching more people than we ever could with academic books or articles, which both Phil and I are also still doing to keep ourselves fresh, informed, and honest.

And what can you do to help us reach more language teachers? (Just to be clear that is neither about money or fame. Phil and I have been doing this work for quite a while, we are not after more recognition. And we are surely not after money, we don’t put ads in the podcast (your provider might have).) You can help by subscribing to “Opening AI for language learning (OAILL)” on your favorite platform.