Episode Transcript
[00:00:06] Speaker A: I see multiple futures and in many ways they are kind of conflicting.
[00:00:12] Speaker B: There isn't only one platform that's going to solve everything.
So I need that explorer mindset. I need to try things out.
[00:00:19] Speaker A: Being in a position of some kind of existential crisis is not a very good position because it shows less agency trying to figure out what are the new skills and how do we need to be teaching languages so they are relevant.
[00:00:39] Speaker B: I find it quite helpful. Game is to put myself in the heads of my students in 10 years time, what's the world they're living in? 5 years time, what's the kind of job they'll be doing? What's the kind of skill set that they need?
[00:00:52] Speaker A: The more you engage with this world of technology and digital and digital literacies, the more you understand that it is about embracing change.
Teacher is not very familiar or tech savvy.
[00:01:07] Speaker C: They should start small universities that position their English language program as an internationalization program.
So they say what we're doing is turning our students into international students.
[00:01:20] Speaker B: That's really nice because you could include cultural stuff about the many challenges of different cultures to communicate and collaborate, different approaches to time and different approaches to politeness.
[00:01:31] Speaker A: Generative AI. It is a really disruptive technology.
I totally understand why so much hype and hyperbole and, you know, moral panics and fears. But I expect that in the near future this will settle which is positive.
[00:01:52] Speaker B: That has to be the trend that we're most unsure about and it's most likely to influence us. But nobody's quite sure exactly how we
[00:02:01] Speaker A: teach for the future.
[00:02:11] Speaker C: Welcome back to episode four. And I think this time we're going to look a bit more at the future.
In. In many ways we're not going to try and predict the future, but we're going to try and think. If people are preparing for the future, they're trying to think where things are going. How can we help or share our own experience or knowledge in this area.
So I think first of all, I would say do you feel that there are certain trends that are things that are happening that may be useful to point out to teachers in the use of technology in language learning?
[00:02:48] Speaker A: I think may. I think that what we have been experiencing over the last four years with Generative AI, which by the way has been around for years, but now it's been available to people. So it is a really disruptive technology. And in a way I totally understand why so much hype and hyperbole and moral panics and fears. But I expect that in the near future Perhaps in five years this will settle, which is positive, I think. I don't know what you think.
[00:03:34] Speaker B: Yeah, I think that that has to be the trend that we're most unsure about and it's most likely to influence us, but nobody's quite sure exactly how.
So. Yeah, I think that's absolutely unavoidable.
[00:03:47] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Other areas.
[00:03:50] Speaker A: Yeah. I think basically I see multiple futures, not just one. And in many ways they're kind of conflicting and I, I make these assumptions from the trends that I see now. For example, in some countries in Europe, in Sweden, I think Finland, Denmark, there is a re digital breathing. Yeah. So they are going back to analog after, you know, they invested a lot of money some years ago on Digital 1st ye and devices and everything. Now they are going back to papers and also paper books. And also we see across Europe countries banning devices one after the other in the classroom. This in the classroom.
[00:04:44] Speaker B: And under 16.
[00:04:45] Speaker C: Under 16, yes, that's true.
[00:04:47] Speaker A: Yeah. So this will have an impact in five years and I'm not extremely optimistic with regards to that because if we, if we take the devices from the classroom doesn't mean that students won't be using them secretly or they won't be using them at home and then how will they be using them? I mean we are missing on opportunities to teach very valuable skills in the context of learning.
So this will have impact in a few years. And then we have governments that are investing a lot of money on AI like the UK for example, or China. And then we have digital strategies in other countries, for example Kazakhstan and elsewhere, that there is a mandate.
So teachers have been asked, this is part of a national strategy, have been asked to use AI in every lesson.
So all these are current trends that are going to lead us to different impacts in the future.
[00:06:03] Speaker B: With regards to the whole language teaching industry is had some foundations are wobbling a bit because AI gives you very, very good functional tools for on the spot translating. I can go into pretty much any different country language area using very available apps to do live trans.
I can speak, you can speak, we can see. I can engage in reasonably okay ways. I can translate videos, I can literally have the lips re syncing with the new soundtrack.
So a lot of the functional aspects of language of different languages and speaking different languages kind of are disappearing or becoming less and less important and that challenges. What's the purpose of learning a second language?
[00:06:53] Speaker A: Exactly.
[00:06:54] Speaker B: I'm optimistic about learning second languages but. But I, I think that functional base layer will just collapse.
[00:07:01] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:07:02] Speaker B: And so it means you need to be doing something above and beyond to justify the effort of learning your second and third languages.
[00:07:08] Speaker A: Yeah, absolutely. And also what. Sorry, what we really. What changes and what we need to be teaching. And being in a position of some kind of existential crisis is not a very good position.
It shows less agency. But trying to figure out what are the new skills and how do we need to be teaching languages so they are relevant? Because they are. They are still relevant. For example, intercultural communication.
I mean, how can I be here and speak English via an app, if you know what I mean?
So I could understand you, but not in the same way that I do now that I speak the language.
[00:08:01] Speaker B: When I was at Babel, we were very worried about what changes now that you can get sort of functional translation, because reasonable amount of who we thought were buying our app were people who were traveling and wanted to speak Spanish for their traveling.
And so we asked the millions of people who signed up, why are you learning? What's the purpose? And some of it was for work. It was clearly a sort of functional thing. But you imagine in a workplace you probably don't want to be translating via an app.
[00:08:32] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:08:32] Speaker B: A large number of the rest was about some kind of family or romance or personal thing. You know, my. My partner comes from Spain and I want to talk to her family or my. You know, I'm in love. I'm in love with that German guy.
[00:08:46] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:08:46] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:08:47] Speaker B: And those things were great because it was. It was this real human connection part of language rather than the functional exchanging of information.
[00:08:54] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:08:54] Speaker B: And it shifted our whole thinking. We then structured more of our learning around the human connecting side of stuff.
[00:09:00] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:09:01] Speaker B: But so I. That was a really nice reality check for me. Wow. There is a risk, but it just changes. It's just the kinds of people who want to learn language are looking for something deeper. The more human connect parts.
[00:09:12] Speaker A: Absolutely. And people. And this is a very nice way of looking at language learning. It's not just.
We don't just teach languages for people to function anymore, but perhaps we should be looking at teaching languages for people to connect.
[00:09:32] Speaker B: So it does mean. It does mean giving you. Giving you a challenge of buying a bus ticket is a bit lame because that's what you can do on your app. Whereas actually having a political argument with somebody that's more useful thing to learn.
[00:09:44] Speaker A: Exactly.
[00:09:45] Speaker C: I think the kind of the market or the target situation where it's probably going to disappear is teaching people in service industries like taxi drivers, etc. How to communicate. So usually when there's an Olympics in somewhere there's a whole learning program for all the service industries. That kind of thing probably not needed anymore. But I mean, it's interesting that I was working with a group of people who were developing language apps for learning Japanese, Chinese and Korean. And the motivations there were largely family and romance, but also an interest in the culture.
You know, manga comics or something like that. And it's something we kind of lose a little bit in English because English is really a lingua franca.
[00:10:33] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:10:33] Speaker C: It's not really language culture specific.
[00:10:37] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah.
[00:10:37] Speaker C: So people tend not to learn because they want to learn about the uk.
[00:10:41] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:10:42] Speaker C: Or the US I mean, some do, but that's not the main motivation.
[00:10:45] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:10:46] Speaker C: And that reminds me of conversations we've been having with universities about what makes successful language programs at universities. And one of the insights that came through was universities that position their English language program as an internationalization program.
So they say what we're doing is turning our students into international students.
So the language bit is part of that, but it's also about bringing in international perspectives, understanding what other people from other cultures think, which I thought was. Yes, you know, that's maybe a direction that we need to be thinking.
[00:11:23] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. It's a direction that is worth exploring.
[00:11:27] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:11:28] Speaker B: That's really nice because you could include in. In the language class just sort of cultural stuff about the many challenges of different cultures to communicate and collaborate, different approaches to time and different approaches to politeness and.
[00:11:42] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's right.
[00:11:43] Speaker B: That's great. I like that.
[00:11:45] Speaker C: Yes. I remember working with a international airline industry that was part British, part French.
[00:11:53] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:11:54] Speaker C: And the cultural differences were the kind of the real. It was supposed to be about language, but actually it was about dealing with the differences between how French engineers see themselves and British engineers see themselves and how they communicate. So, yeah, often it's not about language.
[00:12:11] Speaker B: So this section is about predicting the future or trying to think about the future. And I think one thing that I.
One constraint that we all have when we think about the future is we're constrained by our expertise in today.
We know today. And we try and think of a forward path that's quite anchored by today.
And I think that's actually a constraint in imagining the future. So I find it quite helpful. Game is to put myself in the heads of my students in 10 years time.
What's the world they're living in? 5 years time even. It's all moving very fast. What's the kind of job they'll be doing? What's the kind of skill set that they need and then try and think, all right, how do I help prepare them for that? Because if I start from today, I start from the constraints of my textbooks or this current exams or that they're preparing for, or an app that probably won't help them in the world that they're inhabiting. But if they're going to be this international student living in another culture and country working there, how do I help them succeed? Then of course I'm embracing AI and I'm using these different tools and I'm trying to prepare them for a totally different world.
So I find that a helpful framing. Just throw yourself, leapfrog, leapfrog your the today, jump into the future, jump into your students worlds.
[00:13:26] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:13:27] Speaker B: And then try and think how do I prepare them for that?
[00:13:29] Speaker A: Absolutely. And also trying to prepare them to use AI or whatever tools. Well and for this to happen, we need to help them to develop their digital literacies and their criticality. And this is not straightforward.
It is not straightforward. It needs to be embedded. It is not. This is one skill and this is another skill. So it needs to be embedded in whatever we do.
[00:13:56] Speaker B: But the scary thing is we can't predict that future.
We could some rough guesses. We can't really predict it.
What we do today can help shape it a little bit because nobody's predicting it accurately. So the choices we make today on which of those skills we are helping to shape the future that they're going to have.
So it makes it all the more important that we have that explorer mindset and we're actively learning new things and trying out new stuff and evolving how we're teaching and evolving the tools that we're using.
[00:14:26] Speaker A: Absolutely. And the more. Sorry, the more you engage with this world of technology and digital and digital literacies, the more you understand that it is about embracing change and also being able to manage uncertainty.
So this is part of the digital as well. Hi there, Sophia here. We'll get back to the conversation shortly. But if you're finding this discussion useful, you might want to explore these ideas further in Oxford University Press's new position paper on digital pedagogy. It looks at what it really means to use digital tools in a reflective, intentional way where pedagogy leads, the choices we make, and the technology follows. The paper goes into detail on how digital tools can enhance learning, but also how they reshape the relationship between teachers and learners.
And it encourages us to pause, ask key pedagogical questions and evaluate tools based on how they support meaningful learning rather than how new or exciting they are. You'll also find practical guidance on the opportunities and risks involved, along with ideas for implementing digital pedagogy in ways that are purposeful, inclusive, and adaptable. You can download the full paper using the link in the description. Thank you.
[00:16:02] Speaker C: I think early in one of the episodes, we talked about the reflective use and developing those reflective skills, and it feels like that's a key thing here. Why. Why am I using this tool? And why. Why is it useful? And what's. What purpose is it serving? Is this helping? So both students and teachers are asking themselves that question.
[00:16:21] Speaker B: There's kind of a loop because you reflect it and then you adapt what you did based on the reflection, and then you go and share it with some other teachers to say, hey, I learned this thing. Yeah, and then you kind of go again. So I think there's this reflect, adapt, sort of share it out, try again loop. That's very helpful when you've got that slightly more explorer mindset.
[00:16:40] Speaker A: Yeah. And it's a cycle. And. And another useful way is to be able. That we teach for the future. Sometimes we don't do that. We teach in a way that we learned 10 years ago, 20 years ago.
So once we teach what students need today, we are. We will be better able to experiment with perhaps more innovative ways and think about the future. Yeah, we cannot think about the future if the way we teach, if our pedagogies, for example, are pedagogies of the past. So I think that it is much more sustainable for teachers to make sure that they teach what students need today.
And once I feel that, you know, I can do that. Yes, I can do. I'm helping them, I'm responding to that, then it's, you know, it's something that will happen.
I will be better able to think about the future.
[00:17:44] Speaker B: I like the phrase you used there, teach for the future. I think that's a nice. That's a nice way of framing it.
[00:17:48] Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:17:50] Speaker C: I mean, again, any teachers listening will be thinking, but my reality is I'm preparing my students for an exam which they need as a gateway to get to the next stage of their education or to get to a job, etc. So trying to manage that kind of restrictive.
And that exam is quite likely to be based on assumptions which were made five, 10 years ago.
So how do they manage that plus teach for the future?
It's an easy question.
[00:18:23] Speaker B: I always feel, you know, these sort of cowboy movies where everybody's pointing a gun at somebody else. It feels a bit like that because everybody, you know, there's this sort of. The exam sets what gets taught, but the exam is based on a bunch of research from multiple years ago. And then there's a curriculum which connects to the exam, but it was actually set separately. And maybe there's textbooks which come from a different source and they're all. Would like to evolve faster but depend on the other ones. And the teacher's stuck in the middle of this world. So it is a really difficult position to be in. And I think it can't just be the teacher that sorts this out. I mean, we have to rethink how the exams work or allow for some additional piece of the exam which is about embracing these new tools. And you have an additional module on AI usage that the kids get assessed on.
We need to stop breaking at all of those points. You need to not be constrained by that textbook, but also using some new approaches. So I think each of these, each of these entities holding a gun at the others needs to relax, the put their gun down or support, relent, give up a little bit of control.
[00:19:27] Speaker A: Yeah, absolutely. And also we need to be pragmatic.
When, to go back to your example, when we teach exam classes, are we teaching the language or are we teaching students to pass an examination?
That's an interesting question and we need to answer it. I mean, teachers know their context better than anyone else. And I'm not saying that one is better than the other. I mean, I'm pragmatic. I know that some teachers teach students to pass the test because this is what they have to do.
But this is a phase, this is a stage.
So if this is the aim, it is a very real aim. And in many ways it may be a good aim because if the students need to pass this exam, Ielts. I don't know if I can name an exam. No. Okay, sorry.
So if, if, if the students need to pass an exam to go to university and to move on with their lives or whatever, this is not a bad examination thing to aim for.
So it is about being pragmatic. I'm teaching students to pass a test, so perhaps preparing them for the future might be in the future, or it might be. I can't prepare students to pass the test for five years.
It is the last six months, if you know what I mean.
[00:20:56] Speaker C: No, and I don't want to distract too much with that kind of point because I know we all face this challenge as teachers. We have accountability and we have particular needs, but we don't constrain ourselves just to the exam preparation. We all know that there is more that our students need than is tested in the exam. So we're always trying to balance those two things. We're looking at ways of making, you know, doing activities which prepare you for the exam, but also develop your critical thinking skills and other things like that.
[00:21:32] Speaker A: Absolutely.
[00:21:33] Speaker C: So I think it's the same here. There may be constraints on us in terms of what an exam requires, but that doesn't stop us being imaginative about what future skills are needed, etc.
So when. So, so we're thinking about digital pedagogy and we're thinking about teaching with digital tools and we're thinking about what that future is. And in some ways we almost went in two different directions. One, one direction was that maybe, you know, basic language skills are not the most important thing in the future. Maybe a lot of that could be automated.
But also there is this movement against too much technology in the classroom, kind of the digital rethink.
What, what should teachers do if they're thinking about their future in 5 years time? How should I think about the way that I will use technology? What skills should I be developing as a teacher to be prepared for the next five years?
[00:22:44] Speaker A: It depends on the context.
It definitely depends on the context. It depends on the teachers teach the literacies. So if the teacher is not very familiar or tech savvy, familiar with, they should start small. They should start from one tool, just one, a simple one. We talk about time and we sometimes say that teachers use easy tools. Sometimes for the busy teacher, the easy tool is a pedagogical decision.
Because if the teacher needs to spend 10 hours to familiarize themselves and then 10 hours to train the students, this will have an impact and negative impact on their teaching and students learning. So sometimes choosing a simple technology is a very good pedagogical decision.
So it depends on the teacher, it depends on the context, it depends on the aims. It always depends on the aims. But looking ahead, because I mean, the question was about five years time, start small and take it from there.
[00:24:03] Speaker C: Okay, that's lovely.
[00:24:04] Speaker B: Nice, nice advice. I think I would probably suggest two related things.
The one is about maybe building on the start small, but then what Next I would be not locking in on only one tool. I would be recognizing that the future of language teaching with technology probably is lots of different tools. It's understanding what TikTok is and how you can use AI for writing tasks and how this one app might be good for speaking tasks. And so it's this mindset of there isn't only one platform that's going to solve everything.
So I need that explorer mindset. I need to try things out.
So something about the explorer mindset and it being sort of a mixed bag of interesting tools, tools that keep evolving.
[00:24:51] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:24:52] Speaker B: And on the other side, it's, I think you referred to the pedagogy of trust, but it's the helping build a learner autonomy, build a trusting relationship with your learners, that you are no longer the king of all the things that happen, that we're together learning about how to improve language, using tech better. So it's sort of building learner autonomy. And so I think those two things do come together because you sort of, you need to be a bit of an explorer and you need to help learners build the autonomy and build some trust with them.
And so for me, it's those two things are skill sets to be working on.
[00:25:25] Speaker A: But I would say totally understand where you're coming from. But when the teachers hear that you need many tools, many of them get very overwhelmed, that they need to catch up.
So, yes, they may need exposure to different technologies because many things are happening and we want teachers to be updated and we want teachers to have to know how, how to guide students.
But
[00:25:57] Speaker C: so start small but with the
[00:25:59] Speaker A: understanding with an explorer, as Jeff said, mindset, and take it from there.
[00:26:06] Speaker C: Okay, lovely. Thank you both so much. I think it's been really interesting to dig into this topic. Thank you very much.
[00:26:14] Speaker A: Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Jeff.
[00:26:17] Speaker C: Well, what a fantastic series of talking about elt. I really enjoyed that one. We hope it has given you fresh perspectives, practical ideas, and greater confidence in approaching the use of digital tools in your own teaching. A big thank you to our guests, Jeff and Sophia for sharing their expertise, experiences and insights into teaching and learning in a digital world. If you'd like to explore these ideas further, you can download the Oxford University Press Digital Pedagogy position paper using the link in the description. And if you've enjoyed this series, don't forget to follow or subscribe so you don't miss an episode of Talking elt.
Thanks for listening and we'll see you next time.
