Innovation in Language Learning

Language teachers are now expected to teach more than simply language. The Companion Volume to the CEFR (2020) [1] clearly outlines one of the roles of teachers as encouraging and nurturing social awareness and skills, both in the language classroom and beyond. The author agrees that language teaching lends itself naturally to this laudable aim, but recognizes its inherent difficulty. The challenge has become even more complex with the advent of AI – chatbots are a potential gamechanger in education, but pose enormous questions as regards learning strategies, the tasks we set our students, the kinds of testing we employ. Although practical activities exploiting AI have already been suggested in literature (e.g. Levy and Albertos, 2024) [2], we suggest that little theoretical work has been done to establish just how it can transform language learning and assessment. Whether it comes to homework and essays being produced by bots rather than the human hand, or real-world uses of language which are greatly changed from ten years ago, there is an urgent need to adapt our language teaching theory to underpin our learning objectives, and all this while bearing in mind that what we do in the classroom will contribute significantly to the future lives and opportunities of our learners. The paper offers some suggestions as to areas where language and social skills intersect, in particular in helping students navigate an increasingly complex digital environment. Where technology can encourage passivity, a plurilingual, lexically and pragmatically aware approach may enrich students’ opportunities to learn. The assumption is that AI will predominate in many transactional and professional situations, but that an ability to monitor, understand and control semi-automated communication will be indispensable. Advanced linguistic skills such as subtle pragmatic awareness and nuanced comprehension will be more significant than traditional productive activities, but will also be harder to assess fairly. The paper concludes that AI poses no real existential threat to the teaching profession, but presents us with an obligation to transform our subject and approach.