CALL, Technology. Language Learning
CALL, Technology. Language Learning
WHAT IS CALL?
BEGINNING OF CALL
The idea of using the computer in teaching language dates back to the 1950s.
However, the first real application of the computer in teaching language was in the 1960s and 1970s.
In the 2000s different types of technology were presented besides computers and the Postcommunicative approaches to teaching and learning effected the advance of TELL (Technology Enhanced Language Learning).
NATURE OF CALL
of CALL is essentially a tool that helps teachers to facilitate the language learning process. It can be used to reinforce what has been already been learned in the classroom or as a remedial tool to help learners who require additional support. The design of CALL materials generally takes into consideration principles of language pedagogy and methodology, which may be derived from different learning theories (e.g. behaviourist, cognitive, constructivist) and second language learning theories.
CALL dates back to the 1960s, when it was first introduced on university mainframe computers. The PLATO project, initiated at the University of Illinois in 1960, is an important landmark in the early development of CALL (Marty 1981).
The advent of the microcomputer in the late 1970s brought computing within the range of a wider audience, resulting in a boom in the development of CALL programs and a flurry of publications of books on CALL in the early 1980s.
Behavioristic CALL
Structural CALL Restricted CALL
Communicative CALL
Integrative CALL
In the late 1970s and early 1980s, behavioristic CALL was undermined by two important factors.
First, behavioristic approaches to language learning had been rejected at both the theoretical and the pedagogical level. Secondly, the introduction of the microcomputer allowed a whole new range of possibilities. The stage was set for a new phase of CALL.
The first CALL software in this phase continued to provide skill practice but not in a drill format, for example: paced reading, text reconstruction and language games, but the computer remained the tutor. In this phase computers provided context for students to use the language, such as asking for directions to a place, and programs not designed for language learning such as Sim City, Sleuth and Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego? were used for language learning. Criticisms of this approach include using the computer in an ad hoc and disconnected manner for more marginal aims rather than the central aims of language teaching.
The third phase of CALL, Integrative CALL, starting from the 2000s, tried to address criticisms of the communicative approach by integrating the teaching of language skills into tasks or projects to provide direction and coherence. It also coincided with the development of multimedia technology (providing text, graphics, sound and animation) as well as Computer-mediated communication (CMC). CALL in this period saw a definitive shift of the use of the computer for drill and tutorial purposes (the computer as a finite, authoritative base for a specific task) to a medium for extending education beyond the classroom.