19, no. 3 (April 1988): 4-5
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Introduction: Let's Guard Our Enthusiasm for Instructional Technology
James P. Pusack
TECHNOLOGY seems only a bandwagon in the educational parade. To those involved in exploring ways to improve language learning through computers and video, other vehicular metaphors come to mind: demolition derby cars after the derby; dogsleds without the dogs; oxcarts on the interstate. Gridlock, rather than progress, often prevails as we attempt to negotiate the traffic of changing methodologies, emerging technologies, inflexible bureaucracies, and skeptical faculties. To terminate the metaphor, I believe that we have reached a crossroads.
A decade ago, computing and telecommunications were largely experimental in our field and the available machines were not well suited to language learning. Five years ago, a new generation of hardware began to make the transmission, storage, retrieval, and display of linguistic and cultural information cost-effective and pedagogically promising. Today, sufficient examples exist to sway the skeptics. Practice with computers can improve the learner's efficiency; tutoring and remediation can address differences in learning styles and histories; simulations and problem-solving tasks can immerse learners in realistic contexts for language usage; intelligent tools for listening, reading, and writing can intensify and diversify traditional course work; satellite and video can deliver chunks of life abroad, authentic cultural situations, to our students' very doorsteps.
At the crossroads we have reached through these advances, we must decide whether technology implies a radical change in the organization of our curricula or whether, like many other innovations, it embodies only an incremental improvement. The answer is not clear, because it depends no longer on the machines but on individual faculty members, department chairs, deans, higher-level administrators, and even politicians. Many language departments will continue to offer exciting programs based on the individual efforts of highly motivated instructors performing in the traditional classroom environment. I contend, however, that these language teachers can accomplish far more in a curriculum that exploits technology to the fullest.
But let me guard my enthusiasm. I have already violated the cardinal rule of the technological pioneer: Let your results speak and see whether anyone listens. Those who have had some success in this field typically resist making momentous claims for any particular technology or specific application. The five articles included in this special section on advanced technologies are no exception. Without exhaustively treating the many experiments, projects, innovations, and applications of information technology to language learning, these widely differing vantage points from across the nation reflect the whole scope of the problem, presenting a valid cross section of developments in the field.
Nina Garrett leads off with a cogent survey of what role the computer ought to play in our field. Keeping in mind current discussions about students' knowledge about language versus their ability to use language, Garrett tackles the fundamental areas of grammar, vocabulary, speaking, listening, writing, and reading. Her thoughtful and balanced views will be a helpful guide for anyone embarking on the use of computer-assisted language learning (CALL). She concludes with an eloquent effort to place work in technology in its proper research context—a context critical to significant future developments in the field.
For many readers of these pages, John Underwood's tantalizing introduction to the concept of “hypermedia” as applied to interactive video will break new ground. Here, as in his respected book Linguistics, Computers, and the Language Teacher , Underwood carefully balances leading-edge possibilities of technology with the best available insights into language learning. His research embodies precisely Garrett's point about the research component of CALL development: without support for linguistically sound experimentation at the forefront of learner-machine interaction, our field will languish in back alleys with the cast-off teletypes. Fortunate indeed is the language department that can find, nurture, exploit, and retain faculty members who work at this level of scholarly and pedagogical expertise.
My colleague Sue Otto joins me in the third article of this section as we attempt to codify our insights from more than a decade of work in CALL. Combining our perspectives as language-laboratory director (Otto) and faculty member (Pusack), we aim our recommendations at departmental administrators and deans, with the hope of reassuring our colleagues that their problems are not unique. Our concern is less with the tangible benefits described by our fellow authors than with the administrative environment required to foster effective use of technology. In this discussion we echo some of Garrett's points and anticipate issues addressed in the following two articles.
The fourth and fifth articles in the section are case studies in how technology can be introduced. Project DISCovery, at the University of New Hampshire, presents a classic account of a large team-based project in CALL. The trials and tribulations of technology emerge in concrete narrative detail as the instructors take their initial steps, both attracted and frustrated by the state of the art; then confront the complexities of using off-the-shelf software in an established curriculum; embark on in-house development, with its massive demands on time and resources; and finally discover the cold reality of institutional constraints that threaten to limit the growth and success of their project. The article graphically illustrates many of the points from the administrative primer offered by Otto and Pusack.
The fifth contribution, by Claud DuVerlie, turns to a different technology, describing a first-generation model of French satellite-assisted instruction. DuVerlie's project exploits the use of domestic satellites to deliver timely and authentic French television features to language learners across the United States. The critical component of pedagogical support materials can be obtained through a computer bulletin-board system. The projected breadth of DuVerlie's supporting documents underscores video technology as only the starting point, not the ending point, in making authentic materials accessible to both teachers and students.
If one theme runs throughout these articles, it is a concern with the human component. Confident that technology will grow steadily to meet their rising expectations about good language teaching, the authors stress the role of the teacher in researching, developing, and implementing the opportunities that technology offers. Personal energy, time, knowledge, experience, creativity, and commitment must flow into the project stream. Enthusiasm of this type must be fostered, rewarded, and protected—in short, it must be guarded.
The author is Associate Professor of German and Director of the Project for International Communication Studies at the University of Iowa.
© 1988 by the Association of Departments of Foreign Languages. All Rights Reserved.
ADFL Bulletin 19, no. 3 (April 1988): 4-5 |
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