The document discusses several pedagogical advantages of computer-assisted language learning (CALL) materials, including nonlinearity, multimedia, empowerment of learners, monitoring of learning behavior, authenticity, feedback, and new types of activities. It also covers how technology can enhance reading, writing, grammar, vocabulary, and spoken language practice. Several examples are provided of CALL resources and websites that support language learning.

1. Computer Assisted
Language Learning
Peter Beech
peter@peterbeech.com

2. Pedagogical advantages of CALL materials
Nonlinearity
 Students can access information as and how they want
to, rather than in a predetermined sequence
 This is an advantage only if:
 Students know how to find the information they need
 Students have strategies to learn with hypermedia
 The quality of the linked resources is of a sufficiently high
standard

4. Pedagogical advantages of CALL materials
Multimedia
 Different modalities appeal to different learning styles and
multimedia results in an enriched learning environment

6. Pedagogical advantages of CALL materials
Empowerment
 CALL offers:
 Easier access to materials
 Greater control for learners
 Opportunities for the development of metacognitive skills
and learner autonomy

8. Pedagogical advantages of CALL materials
Monitoring of learning behaviour
 CALL programs can record and monitor learners’
behaviour and progress and dynamically alter input or
make suggestions to the learner

10. Pedagogical advantages of CALL materials
Authenticity
 CALL materials aid in the development of more authentic
materials by allowing selection of content based on
actual language use, e.g. through use of corpora
 CALL resources resemble the types of resources
especially younger learners use in everyday life. The use
of educational games is an example of ways in which
materials developers have attempted to mimic learners’
out-of-class activities

12. Pedagogical advantages of CALL materials
Feedback
 Immediate feedback is possible with CALL materials

14. Pedagogical advantages of CALL materials
New types of activities
 CALL materials can include activities that are difficult or
impossible to achieve using other learning materials,
such as moving objects across the screen (matching),
recording one’s voice etc.

16. Pedagogical advantages of CALL materials
Interaction
 CALL materials facilitate interaction and language use

18. Spoken English
Spoken language practice has also become much easier to
organise with individuals or groups of learners being
encouraged to communicate with other individuals or
groups of learners around the world.

20. Speaking and pronunciation
This website from Cambridge
University Press presents
entertaining animations to reinforce
individual phonemes and sound
patterns.

22. Speaking and pronunciation
 How useful do you think this site is?
 What assumptions does it make?

23. Listening
Podcasts can be:
Audio-based content (a sound file)
Enhanced content (inclusive of audio,
visuals and text)
Video

25. Listening
Podcasts can be:
Audio-based content (a sound file)
Enhanced content (inclusive of audio,
visuals and text)
Video

27. Listening
Podcasts can be:
Audio-based content (a sound file)
Enhanced content (inclusive of audio,
visuals and text)
Video

29. Listening
The accessibility of video clips has
increased enormously with the
advent of web 2.0 applications used
on such sites as YouTube

31. Listening
There are listening materials that are
structured specifically for language
learners, using audiovisual content that
is either
 Authentic
 Semi-authentic (i.e., modified or
simplified)
 Custom-made

33. Listening
Support can be provided through captions,
vocabulary activities, annotations and
transcripts

35. Listening
 The Virtex project uses digital video clips
depicting real-life scenarios to prepare
foreign language students for work
placements in hotels and catering
 After watching the video, the students
can access background information,
transcripts, learning tips, isolated audio
playback, cultural notes or lists of
idiomatic expressions

37. Listening
The BBC series six minute English takes a
current news item and reworks it for
learners of English, including
comprehension activities and audio
podcasts

39. Reading
One of the most obvious benefits of the Internet
for language teachers is the unprecedented
access to a copious supply of authentic reading
material such as
 Newspaper reports
 Stories
 Recipes
 Craft activities
 Geographic information
 Journal articles

41. Reading
Technology can be used to teach students
strategies for comprehension …
Roll-over prompts can be inserted into the text at
key points, encouraging the reader to predict, or
to guess from context, or to use skimming and
scanning skills, or to attend to topic sentences,
or to refer to a relevant image

43. Contributions to language learning
Enhancing reading through electronic media
 Even a simple word processing program can be used to
advantage by focusing students’ attention on significant
recurring patterns by highlighting, animating, deleting,
changing font and type size, and so on
 More powerful programs (e.g., Flash, Director) can be
used to help the reader notice syntactic units by
highlighting these (appropriately ‘chunked’) as the
student listens to the text being read aloud

45. Contributions to language learning
Making reading easier
 Hypermedia makes it possible to build into a single page
a number of clickable options to support the L2 reader.
These devices, such as pop-ups, rollovers, links to other
pages, menus and so on, are unobtrusive and only
activated when a reader decides to access the
information
 Words can be explained by
 linking to dictionaries
 providing a definition of the word in context
 Providing a photo or animation

47. Contributions to language learning
Enhancing writing through electronic media
A well-designed writing program will lead the writer through
all the phases of the writing process, providing as much
support as needed along the way

49. Contributions to language learning
Enhancing writing through electronic media
Once the student starts to draft a text, the computer
becomes a powerful resource. The advent of word
processing has revolutionized the writing of text. And yet
it is still surprisingly underexploited in the L2 classroom.

51. Writing and composing
For language learners, blogging
provides an opportunity to participate
in the composing process without the
pressure to produce a whole text
independently

53. Writing and composing
Likewise, wikis allow multiple writers to
contribute towards the development of
a text

55. Grammar and vocabulary
 The BBC news website has a number
of vocabulary activities based on
current news stories

57. Grammar and vocabulary
 One area in which digital technology
has been used to achieve previously
impossible outcomes in relation to
vocabulary and syntax is the
development of language corpora
 By using a concordancing tool, it is
possible to retrieve innumerable
examples of any particular word
together with its immediate context

59. Coursebook support
websites
For each of the following websites,
consider:
 What type of material is provided
 How engaging and motivating it is
 How fully it exploits the possibilities of
multimedia