Language Learning with GenAI: Bridging the gap OR Burning the bridge
What impact will Generative AI have on language learning? I talked about this for an hour last summer, using a personal angle. The methodology I employed is called ‘autoethnographic study’. I began by constructing a narrative of my professional life as it pertains to language learning, teaching,…
Ai, ai, ai, … where did all the languages go?
By training, I am teacher of German and Russian. Starting in 1986 as a student teacher, I have taught German. First, to kids with German as their first language. Since 1991, to university students as their second language. When I started, I thought German would always be…
Thinking about AI
Hey, Friend, Still thinking about AI. Every week, when I post here, when I work on a paper or a workshop for work, when I prepare for a podcast. The post below is a little over two years old, and I thought it might be interesting to…
Computer-assisted language learning and AI
Artificial intelligence (AI), in particular the areas of natural language processing and student modeling (Heift & Schulze, 2007; Schulze, 2008), have played a role in CALL – this sub-area is commonly referred to as Intelligent CALL or ICALL – for almost 50 years. For a small group of researchers,…
I did not know this about GenAI …
Now I don’t know whether GenAI is powerful because it could find a remote and small village, when a manual search could not. Or has it become so dominant that you can find a village in Iran only by looking far down in the search results. Genai…
Learner Agency and GenAI
Motivation is only a small part of a student’s agency (Knight & Barbera, 2018). Agency plays an important role in all teaching-and-learning processes, as students are the learning subject, setting their own goals and/or accepting or rejecting goals set by others for them. Of course, students do…
GenAI stuff you need to know now (part 1)
Learning about GenAI? Phil and I talk about the first four (of ten) knowledge areas and skills language teachers should aim to have now: prompting, ethics, chatbots, and translation. Combining practical examples with theoretical insights, we discuss these knowledge areas and skills in more detail than we…
What the LLM?
What the LLM? Have you been wondering about that? What is an LLM? A large language model? If you have been following this blog recently, you will have seen posts on a position paper on Sustained Integrated Professional Development for GenAI I co-wrote with Phil Hubbard. We…
Interview on GenAI and language learning
In July 2025, I was fortunate to be invited to the JALTCALL conference in Tokyo. JALT is the Japan Association for Language Teaching and JALTCALL is its (very large) special interest group in computer-assisted language learning. Michael Hofmeyr, the local organizer and brilliant host of JALTCALL 2025…
Assessment and GenAI
Often assessment focuses on the product and not the process; the submitted essay gets graded and not the process of writing it. Students can generate these material results of an assessed activity – a short essay, presentation, poster, or audio or video recording – more quickly and with a…
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