The scope of CALL education

1. Introduction
-growth in the development of course work to prepare language teachers to
use the technology
-considerable disagreement in this field
-a useful approach to describing expertise: in terms of roles played by the
individual within the field, (as it is the individual that we are ultimately
educating)

2. The state of CALL teacher education

1) 4 general trends in CALL education
(1) the production of training and support materials directly oriented toward
classroom teachers
-16 online training modules aimed at in-service teachers
-providing free materials equivalent to a good-sized textbook.

(2) a small but growing literature in CALL teacher education itself at the
levels of both research and practice
-growing production of research and practice articles aimed directly at
teacher educators.

(3) frameworks that attempt to define CALL practice on the basis of

principles derived from particular language teaching approaches, especially
those supported by SLA research
-given language teaching approach
-connections between SLA theory

(4) the use of online collaborative learning techniques in CALL teacher

education with a growing interest in the quality of the transfer of skills
and expertise from formal courses to the language classroom.
-Collaborative learning and communities of practice
-Real conditions can be very different, and trainees need to engage with
 some of the complexities and tensions that often exist

2) About this book

-Descriptive, not prescriptive = open and flexible
-allow for development and comparison among various approaches.

3. A role-based framework for CALL education

1) Starting points
(1) Across the field of CALL, not limited to classroom language teachers
(2) Embrases not only classroom, workshop, online courses but community of
practice, mentoring, apprenticeship, courseware-based settings, didactic
settings

2) Functional roles
(1) Practicioners
-apply their knowledge and skill directly in the performance of their
institutional roles
*two points
-as consumers, teachers need to be informed and critical
-required to be beyond practitioner

(2) Developers
-actively engaged in the creation of something new or revision or adaptation
of existing work

(3) Researchers
-attempt to discover new information relating to CALL or to pursue
evaluation of the success of a CALL initiative.

(4) Trainers
-acting to build CALL knowledge and skills in others, rather than just
language knowledge and skills.
3) Institutional roles
(1) Classroom teachers
use the computer in some way to promote, manage, or assess their students’
learning.
-pre-service teachers vs in-service teachers
↓
-can provide a context
-have experience in the teaching role
-are often not learning CALL in a degree or certificate program

(2) CALL specialists

a CALL pronunciation specialist would ideally inherit the characteristics of
a pronunciation specialist in general and have additional skills and
knowledge relevant to CALL.
*expert specialists: with a primary attachment to language learning and
teaching
*adjunct specialists: somewhat nebulous category meant to accommodate
someone with deep knowledge and an elaborated skill set

(3) CALL professionals

-broad underꠓstanding of CALL as a whole, with a knowledge base and
skill set
-relatively deeper knowledge and more elaborated skill sets in multiple
areas, most likely with one or more demonstrated specializations
-a clear commitment to CALL as a primary area of professional
development as evidenced by knowledge of the history and literature in the
field, and/or activity in CALL conference presentaꠓtions and publications
outside of a single specialization
4. Filling in the matrix
Technical Pedagogical
understanding of the computer
understanding of ways of
CALL system, including peripheral
effectively using the computer in
knowledge devices, in terms of hardware,
language teaching.
software, and networking.
use technical knowledge and
experience both for the use knowledge and experience to
operation of the computer determine effective materials,
CALL skill
system and relevant content, and tasks, and to monitor
applications and in dealing and assess results appropriately.
with various problems.