Human beings instead of AI for Language Education

Human beings instead of AI for Language Education

How many of you are currently studying a foreign language? Have you ever become completely immersed in the process of learning one? More than thirty years ago, Maley, A. and Duff, A. observed in the field of language education that many foreign language syllabi were designed based on the assumption that language teaching and learning should mainly consist of vocabulary and key grammatical structures. Throughout my years of teaching English, I have strongly agreed with these scholars that language education involves far more than just intellectual components like grammar, vocabulary, and structural rules. Beyond these cognitive elements, greater attention should be given to developing sociocultural competence in the classroom. In language classes—particularly in ESL environments where students from diverse ethnic backgrounds learn together—we encounter individuals of different ages and life experiences, each with unique interests, beliefs, challenges, and personalities. Some may be outgoing while others are reserved; some may be dealing with personal difficulties, while others are thriving.

 A classroom where the teacher simply delivers information and students passively receive it overlooks a crucial aspect of language acquisition: meaningful learning. To create meaningful experiences in language education, students should be encouraged to discuss their own daily experiences and personal topics rather than relying solely on textbook scenarios filled with predictable questions and repetitive drills. When students speak about their real thoughts and feelings, they remain motivated to communicate their ideas as authentic individuals instead of merely repeating memorized phrases. For this reason, I continue to believe strongly in the value of learning and teaching a foreign language in a diverse and dynamic classroom environment where genuine interaction occurs between real teachers and real students. AI-based language learning today certainly has its strength of its own. However, it lacks the power of facing or sharing the stinky, stubborn, irritating, unpredictable, unfathomable, and inconvenient things with some sleepyheads, smart-alecks, class clowns, politically vocal activists, or stuck-up grammar Nazis in the classroom. It is simply because we are human beings working on communicating with other human beings.