Detmar Meurers: 25 Oct. 2022, 15:00 (IST)
Digital Tools and AI Methods

How do digital tools and AI methods add real value to language teaching?

Language: German

While the use of digital tools and artificial intelligence in education has been discussed a great deal in recent years, one question gets asked surprisingly seldom: What purposes should these tools actually serve in everyday classes and on the basis of which research findings about teaching and learning? This paper explains how adaptive AI-based systems can support foreign language teaching and how these tools build on research findings: from language-based search engines that enable a systematic search based on both content and approximate language to intelligent tutoring systems that can complement classroom-based teaching by providing customized support for individual learners in the form of exercise sessions with tutorial feedback.
 

Detmar Meurers is a professor of computational linguistics at the University of Tübingen, where he’s actively involved in the Machine Learning for Science “Cluster of Excellence”, and serves on the board of the LEAD Network for Educational Research. As head of the ICALL Research Group, his work focuses on the use of computational linguistics in educational and language acquisition research. Building on interdisciplinary basic research, his team develops intelligent language tutoring systems as well as methods for automatic evaluation of answers to reading comprehension questions, and assess the linguistic complexity of textbooks and school-leaving examinations.