Computer-Assisted Language Learning Authoring Issues

Computer-assisted language learning (CALL) authoring refers to a wide variety of creative development activities using software tools that run the gamut from simple templates (easy-to-use predefined forms into which content is typed) to complex authoring environments (flexible but harder-to-use systems, requiring advanced skills and a great deal of time and resources). Authoring choices range from generic tools (productivity software, course management systems, general-purpose authoring systems) to authoring templates and courseware authoring/management systems specifically for foreign languages. Good CALL authoring tools enable teachers to produce software specific to the needs of language teaching and learning, meeting high standards of suitability, interactivity, use of media, record keeping, ease of use, and accessibility. Teachers face significant barriers to CALL development: brief life span of software and lack of time, resources, training, and professional recognition. A shift in CALL authoring away from traditional tutorial CALL programs has taken place with the evolution of the Web, which has given rise to many services and applications that facilitate online communication, collaboration, information sharing, social networking, and virtual simulations. In a future when most instructional activities involve some form of computer/digital technology, we may well abandon the terms CALL and authoring for other more nuanced designations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

[1]  Mike Levy,et al.  Teacher education in CALL , 2006 .

[2]  Dorothy M. Chun.  L2 Reading on the Web: Strategies for Accessing Information in Hypermedia , 2001 .

[3]  Philip Hubbard,et al.  Another look at tutorial CALL , 2004, ReCALL.

[4]  Trude Heift,et al.  Context-sensitive Help in CALL , 2006 .

[5]  Noriko Nagata,et al.  An Experimental Comparison of Deductive and Inductive Feedback Generated by a Simple Parser , 1997 .

[6]  Mike Levy,et al.  Computer-Assisted Language Learning: Context and Conceptualization , 1997 .

[7]  Dorothy M. Chun,et al.  RESEARCH ON TEXT COMPREHENSION IN MULTIMEDIA ENVIRONMENTS , 1997 .

[8]  S. Bax.  CALL—past, present and future , 2003 .

[9]  Bryan Smith,et al.  The Evaluation of Scholarly Activity in Computer-Assisted Language Learning , 2009 .

[10]  Lloyd P. Rieber,et al.  Teaching with Technology , 2011 .

[11]  N. Garrett.  Technology in the Service of Language Learning: Trends and Issues , 1991 .

[12]  R. L. Politzer,et al.  Foreign language Learning , 2006 .

[13]  Paul Gruba,et al.  Towards model-driven end-user development in CALL , 2006 .

[14]  Joy Egbert.  CALL essentials : principles and practice in CALL classrooms , 2005 .

[15]  Dorothy M. Chun,et al.  What Makes Students Click: Working Memory and Look-Up Behavior , 2004 .

[16]  Trude Heift,et al.  Corrective feedback and learner uptake in CALL , 2004, ReCALL.

[17]  Ken Beatty,et al.  Teaching and Researching Computer-Assisted Language Learning , 2003 .

[18]  Noriko Nagata,et al.  Intelligent Computer Feedback for Second Language Instruction , 1993 .

[19]  Rebecca W. Black,et al.  Second Language Use, Socialization, and Learning in Internet Interest Communities and Online Gaming , 2009 .