Category Archives: Ed Tech

What can we learn from the ELIZA effect?

Weinbaum’s experiments with ELIZA proved that when we know we aren’t being judged we are happy to talk about anything and even divulge personal information. The ELIZA effect as it is known, addressed the idea that we as humans presume that the behaviour of computers is as analogous as that of humans. Created as a psychotherapy chatbot ELIZA provided a disinhibited low-anxiety environment for patients to talk about their problems. With patients assuming that the computer programme was responding in a purely analogous fashion, and not in the pattern matching way that it actually was.

The ELIZA model has been repeatedly emulated with the creation of chatbot apps that provide virtual friendships and emotional support, such as Woebot, Replika, and Wysa. These therapy bots aim to help people combat depression and loneliness, and feel they have ‘someone’ to turn to. This demonstrates that our willingness to communicate (WTC) is enhanced when the interlocuter we are conversing with is unable to judge us.

This leads me to the main argument of this post. It would appear humans feel more comfortable communicating with chatbots that to date do not possess the AI capacities to fully understand and interpret human emotions. Therefore, the fear of being judged or losing face is drastically reduced. In the language learning classroom, we should therefore try to create a relaxed environment that facilitates learning and help promote WTC so learners feel more comfortable to interact orally and more confident to express their ideas. So while machines endeavour to hone their AI skills to perfectly emulate human behaviour, maybe we as teaching practitioners should try to emulate machine behaviour by encouraging a non-judgemental environment in the language learning classroom that promotes confidence among learners to speak and interact more confidently, especially in online environments where learners appear to feel more reluctant to speak up.

Is EdTech trying to reinvent the wheel?

I attended the Digital Learning Colloquium at Cambridge last week, and it was a fascinating insight into the future landscape of EdTech painted by a broad spectrum of attendees from different backgrounds: product development, research, academia, consultants, product design, and the odd ELT teacher and trainer.

While there were clear threads of discussion regarding the normalisation of the tech we are using today in ten years time, AR and VR to name a couple, there is one clear question that springs to my mind: Is EdTech trying to reinvent the wheel?

My opinion regarding the use of EdTech for teaching and learning is the same as it is for any activity a teacher or learner engages in: sound pedagogical reasoning. For me, it is not so much what is being done to learn something, but the rationale for how it reaches the learning objective. If an activity which incorporates an AR app really does improve the learning outcomes, or facilitate reaching the pedagogical goal of the lesson, then I’m all for it. I do, however, strongly believe that a lot of products and tools are trying to tap into the multi-billion dollar industry that EdTech has become.

Penny Ur (1996) claimed that there is a difference between a teacher with twenty years’ experience and one years’ experience repeated twenty times. I wholeheartedly agree with this, because I believe that teaching professionals need to learn, adapt and grow along with their experience, teaching context, and learner needs. So, yes, EdTech could well be a part of this growing and development as a teacher, but just because a tool looks good, doesn’t mean to say it actually is. The tool needs to achieve the learning goal that has been set, this can be by motivating learners, or improving interaction, but I reiterate, the main motivation for using any tool, digital or not, should be pedagogical grounds, and the tool must be exploited effectively.

The talk I gave looked at 3 simple tools I use in the classroom to promote interaction and provide learning solutions to some of the problems I encounter with learners in specific contexts. The tools were: Padlet; IM apps (Whatsapp & WeChat); and Dictaphone apps on smartphones. Gone are the days of recording ourselves on a TDKC90 cassette to see how we sound when we speak a foreign language, but this practice is so effective. The modern day version is a Dictaphone app which I regularly incorporate into my lessons, and encourage learners to record themselves out of class to playback and identify action points to work on with their pronunciation and speaking skills. I use IM apps for a range of collaborative tasks (more information to come in future posts!), and Padlet I use as a visual live collaborative tool both inside and beyond the classroom.

So, that said, the literature has been telling us for years what good pedagogical practice is, we just need to stick with that, and map it onto current language learning contexts.  

Ur, P. (1996). A course in Language Teaching: Practice and Theory. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.