ELT 3.0: Working with Artificial Intelligence (A.I.)

An online paper presentation by

�Janpha Thadphoothon

​

Faculty of Arts, Dhurakij Pundit University (DPU), Bangkok, Thailand

21 Jan (Friday), 4.00-4.30 PM Room 10 (TELL)

Outline

• Aim
• What is ELT 3.0?

AI - why it really matters in ELT

• AI-related applications
• Research findings and Case Studies
• Moral and ethical issues
• Qs and As

​

Aim

• To propose an intellectual framework where humans and artificial intelligence (machines) work together to improve performance

What has been said and predicted?

Founder of Microsoft, �Bill Gates:

​

"[In areas like] speech recognition or image recognition, the performance levels are phenomenal. If you compare human speech recognition with computer speech recognition, the computer is slightly better and that’s mind-blowing. "

Source: https://youtu.be/bZP4VXpCk6A

Sundar Pichai, Google CEO:

“You can imagine us being able to naturally converse Maybe a few years down the line, particularly with the AR you can imagine with your child, say, you know you’re interested in learning about T-rex, you can ask for T-rex. You can pull it up in your room and you can have a conversation with T-rex.”����“Signal 2021 - Sundar Pichai, Alphabet” from https://youtu.be/frGb32TL7M8

From Star Trek’s scenes

• Good for learning history & geography
• Good for practicing conversations

Credit: https://intl.startrek.com/news/7-times-star-trek-took-us-to-history-class

Learning in the Metaverse

Meta’s CEO Mark Zuckerberg

• "While most other tech companies focus on how people interact with technology, we focus on building technology so people can interact with each other."

Credit: https://hypebeast.com/2021/10/facebook-meta-metaverse-plans-vr-ar-what-is-it-next-steps

“We are already cyborgs.”

• Recode. (2019, August 28). We are already cyborgs | Elon Musk | Code Conference 2016[Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZrGPuUQsDjo

• https://youtu.be/j0z4FweCy4M

If a robot can drive a car, it can do almost anything a human can do.

Closer to Home - Language Education

“They (AI) could be very good, ..but doing it differently.”- - Linguist David Adger

�Rose Luckin: "We should embrace AI. We should want it to help us. But we should be wise, careful, and judicious."

​

​

​

Source: Cambridge University Press ELT (2019, August 6). Rose Luckin - Language and AI: What should be done now to ensure learners and teachers benefit Available online at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2mQOoFWdMbM

Three Stages of Life (3.0) by Max Tegmark (2017)

B-C-T Stages

​

• Tegmark, M. (2017). Life 3.0. Penguin.

“A major breakthrough in 2016”

What do I mean by

ELT 3.0?

Technology Use in ELT

English is the language of science and technology as well as the language of business.

ELT 1.0: The Age of Sound Labs

• Books, tape cassettes ,radio programs, TV programs

​

ELT 2.0: The Age of Computer Labs

• Computers, Software CDs, Web 1.0, Blogs
• Emails, Mailing lists, Traditional Chatbots (Pandora Bots)
• Multimedia CALL on CD-ROM and DVD

​

​

Computer-assisted Language Learning (CALL)

1980s, 1990s, early years of the 21^st century

​

• How to use technology

​

​

• How it affects learning and the new roles of teachers

​

​

Ref: Hanson-Smith, E. (2001). “Computer-assisted Language Learning” In The Cambridge Guide to Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (Edited by Ronald Carter and David Nunan)., pp. 107-113). Cambridge University Press.

​

ELT 3.0: The Age of A.I. in ELT (2016)

• Social Media (Line, FB, YouTube)
• Smartphones or other devices – wearable and mobile
• AI, AI Chatbots, Augmented Reality (AR) / Metaverse
• Machine translation/ Speech recognition
• Virtual classrooms (ZOOM, Google Meets)

​

​

Working with machines that exhibit human intelligence (AI Partners, AI Tutors, AI teachers in either a real setting or virtual one.)

​

​

​

English in the Metaverse

What ELT activities can be made available in the Metaverse?

Conceptual Framework

H

M

M

H

What is A.I.?

According to Lexico.com:

“The theory and development of computer systems able to perform tasks normally requiring human intelligence, such as visual perception, speech recognition, decision-making, and translation between languages.”

​

https://www.lexico.com/definition/artificial_intelligence

​

John McCarthy –

First Use of the Word AI

• In 1956 – with a group of researchers from a variety of disciplines including language simulation, neuron nets, complexity theory and more to a summer workshop called the Dartmouth Summer Research Project on Artificial Intelligence to discuss topics around AI.

Bernard Marr: AI works differently

• …the bulk of the AI development happening today by industry leaders falls under the third objective and uses human reasoning as a guide to provide better services or create better products rather trying to achieve a perfect replica of the human mind.

​

• https://www.forbes.com/sites/bernardmarr/2018/02/14/the-key-definitions-of-artificial-intelligence-ai-that-explain-its-importance/?sh=282469334f5d

​

IN ELT, acquisition requires a great deal of effort.

With AI - Less effort

​

Ideas - Time & Effort - Reality

Why AI matters in ELT?

• Language is a sign of human intelligence – the last frontier

​

• ELT involves remembering a lot of information, answering questions, doing tests, drilling, pronunciation, translation – these tasks and activities are very AI friendly

​

• English is AI-friendly

​

ML models -Mainly in the English language

GPT-3 Model by OpenAI

Most of the datasets (arranged or sequenced texts) are in the English language

​

​

​

​

​

​

Harrod, J (2020, Dec 15). Is OpenAI's GPT-3 Overhyped? | GPT-3, Six Months Later. Youtube: https://youtu.be/yUmVMURR3Ew

Use of AI-related Applications

Did you know?

• GPT-3 – blowing up English texts (Teg Mark and Kai Fu Lee)
• Grammarly –correct your writing, feedback plus explanation
• Speech recognition (Bill Gates and Kai Fu Lee)
• AI Chatbots/Conversational Agents – Keep getting better
• Social Media -> Metaverse (early development)
• Translation (New algorithms)
• Neural Voice Cloning - Avatars

Grammarly

The capability of a machine to imitate intelligent human behavior.

Grammarly is a Ukrainian-origin American-headquartered cross-platform cloud-based writing assistant that reviews spelling, grammar, punctuation, clarity, engagement, and delivery mistakes.

It uses AI to identify and search for an appropriate replacement for the mistake it locates.

Source: Wikipedia

​

Live Transcribe

Live Transcribe is a smartphone application to get realtime captions developed by Google for the Android operating system. Development on the application began in partnership with Gallaudet University. It was publicly released as a free beta for Android 5.0+ on the Google Play Store on February 4, 2019.

Source: Wikipedia

Neuralink

• Neuralink Corporation is a neurotechnology company developing implantable brain–machine interfaces and founded by Elon Musk and others. The company's headquarters is in the Pioneer Building in San Francisco sharing offices with OpenAI. Neuralink was launched in 2016 and was first publicly reported in March 2017. ��Source: Wikipedia

infotech + biotech

The merger of infotech and biotech

​

We can be hacked!

Different types of humans?

GPT-3

• The text generation API is backed by a large-scale unsupervised language model that can generate paragraphs of text. This transformer-based language model, based on the GPT-2 model by OpenAI, intakes a sentence or partial sentence and predicts subsequent text from that input.

​

• Reference

https://deepai.org/machine-learning-model/text-generator

​

Research & Innovations

• ��������Source: https://deepai.org/machine-learning-model/text-generator

I have no money, so…

Output

I have no money, so I'll go to this place where there is only cash and I think you guys did it to get your hands dirty and you really got dirty hands." He grinned. "You have to fight my mom who keeps doing stuff for me. It hurts."

�"I think every f***ing dollar on this website gives me a f***ing paycheck; I really have to put [edited by the author]

Chatbots/conversational agents

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

����Source: https://www.chatbots.org/chatbot/mike2/

​

Working with AI - What does it mean?

A Case Study

Basic Conversations/Functions

• Greetings
• Thanking
• Asking for help
• Apologizing
• Promising
• Giving advice
• Borrowing

Previous Studies

Twenty-six students participated in this study, aiming to find out about the use of chatbots for English language learning. Ten tasks were given to each student to complete. Each was required to use their smartphone to chat with English-X. Each of them was required to write a report about their chatbot experience. The experiment was conducted in August 2020. It was found that about one-third of the students rated their experiences as ‘satisfactory’ and ‘useful’.

​

​

​

Ref:

Thadphoothon, J. “Bot Chatting Experiences and Perceptions of Thai University Students”. Paper presented at the 17th Annual CamTESOL Conference, themed ‘Actions and Innovations in Teaching and Learning’, 5 – 7 February 2021, Phnom Penh, Cambodia

​

Previous Studies

• The two AI groups improved their speaking performance after the experiment.
• The AI voice-chatting pairs outperformed in terms of their speaking performance task (expressing an opinion) compared with the face-to-face and AI text chatting groups.

​

Ref

Hea-Suk Kim, Na Young Kim, & Yoonjung Cha. (2021). “Is It Beneficial to Use AI Chatbots to Improve Learners’ Speaking Performance?” in THE JOURNAL OF ASIA TEFL, Vol. 18, No. 1, Spring 2021, 161-178 DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.18823/asiatefl.2021.18.1.10.161

​

My Own Study - Key Findings

Bot Chatting Experiences and Perceptions of Thai University Students

Method

• A small school in the central region of Thailand
• Participants – 43 students
• Forty-three students participated in the study (Grade-11 (20) and Grade-12 (23)
• Zoom sessions + self-learning
• Two sessions ( a week-long) in June, 2021 (2 hours)
• After the intervention, students were asked to answer the online questionnaires.

1.

1. Low-Anxiety Learning

​

English-X offers students low –anxiety environment.

​

English-X makes learning the English language fun and enjoyable.

​

It has the potential to lower the affective filter. Students have time to process the input (Krashen, 1982). �

Shy students can privately practice the conversation.����Ref:

Krashen, S. (1982). Principles and practice in second language acquisition. Oxford: Pergamon Press

2

2. Exposure to Language Use (Immersive Learning)

​

Lack of opportunities to interact with native speakers or other language users.

​

• “You can have a chat with the agent, just like talking to a native speaker of the language.”

Exposure to the target language use helps reduce processing time, promoting language acquisition (Ellis, 2002).

​

�����Ref: �Ellis, R. (2002). Second Language Acquisition. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

​

3.

​

������

3. Anytime & Anywhere

​

4. Scaffolding - Interaction

​

Conversation is necessary for language acquisition – conversation builds syntactic form in learning �(Hatch, 1978).�

Interaction serves as scaffolding (Long and Sato, 1984).

​

Ref: �Long, M. and Sato, C. 1984. 'Methodological issues in interlanguage studies: an interactionist perspective' in A. Davies, C. Criper and A. Howatt (eds.) Interlanguage. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.

Hatch, E. 1978. 'Discourse analysis and second language acquisition' in E. Hatch (ed.) Second Language Acquisition: A Book of Reading. Rowley, Mass.: Newbury House

​

​

�

​

5

5. Creative Elements

�Students are given opportunities to construct their own stories. Their autonomy / agency is enhanced.��New stories - narratives��

Moral Issues / Big Questions

• Chatbots (AI) may dehumanize us humans.
• Access and equity

​

Moral Issues / Big Questions

• A slave or a master?
• Replacing or enhancing?

Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt on the Rise of AI

“We do not think people understand what this (growing role of AI) will do to society, both the good and the bad. ”

​

​

​

Bloomberg Technology (2021, Nov 5). Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt on the Rise of AI [YouTube channel]. Retrieved Nov 28, 2021 from https://youtu.be/yTPbHtBOcQk

​

​

�Rights of AI entities such as humanoids and robots

AI will transform human society. In fact, it is happening!

Evolution of Writing & Reading

Henry David Thoreau- “Walden”

“If we live in the Nineteenth Century, why should we not enjoy the advantages which the Nineteenth Century offers?

Why should our life be in any respect provincial?”

So…

What are we going to do about it?

Thank you.

Please cite as:

Thadphoothon, J. “ELT 3.0: Working with Artificial Intelligence”. Paper presented at The 41st Thailand TESOL International Virtual Conference, 21-22 January 2022

(Online Conference)

​

Email: janphadpu@gmail.com