English And Technology

4 Learning English 20.01.06 The learner of the future debate: where once technology contributed to inequalities in language education, it is now evolving as a complex but unifying environment inviting communication for all

Wiring English into our technological world Mark Warschauer I have a small family blog related to the development of my son, Danny, who has Down’s syndrome. The blog receives relatively few visitors, mostly family members and friends. Imagine my surprise then when several Iranian medical students started visiting and posting comments. It turns out that an English class at Tehran University’s Medical School had discovered the blog. The future doctors were posting comments as a way of honing their communicative skills in English while sharing ideas with the international community about health and human development. The medical students’ comments — and my subsequent interaction with their instructor, Samaneh Oladi, who was writing her master’s thesis on blogging and language learning in Iran — drove home to me how three stereotypical divides don’t exist any more, or at least not in the ways we traditionally have perceived them.

The ESL/EFL Divide The ESL/EFL divide refers to the differences between English language learners in countries such as Britain, the US, and Australia, where they are exposed to English as a Second Language (ESL) on a daily basis, and in countries such as France, Iran or China, where English as a Foreign Language (EFL) is studied. Sociolinguist Braj Kachru took this categorisation a step further, dividing English use between an inner circle

of English-speaking countries, an outer circle of countries such as India or Nigeria where both local languages and English are used, and an expanding circle of countries where English is taught as a foreign language. However, with the advent and worldwide diffusion of digital media, and with English emerging as the default lingua franca for global communication online, the clear borders between these circles no longer exist. Simply put, there are millions of people in traditional “English as a foreign language” countries who now use English on a daily basis on the internet as part of their professional, academic and personal affairs. And much if not most of this communication is with other non-native speakers of English, rather than with people from Englishspeaking countries. This change has several concomitants for English language teachers. First, we need to rethink how we teach many elements of language, especially pronunciation but also syntax, vocabulary and pragmatics. In each of these areas, it is more important for language learners to be able to accomplish their goals in specific contexts than to mimic

Making use of the internet demands different types of language skills

native speaker standards of correctness. We also need to rethink the relationship between language and culture. As a Taiwanese educator asked at an English teachers’ conference in Taipei: “Why is it that our students learn in their English classes to talk about the British parliament but not about our local government institutions?” In short, in the era of technologyenabled worldwide communication, we need to rethink who owns English.

The digital divide The digital divide refers to the gap between those who have access to computers and the internet and those who don’t. According to this concept, there is a bipolar split between the information haves and have-nots, the connected and the disconnected. Thus, stereotypically, learners in rich countries have access to expensive computer labs, whereas learners in poor countries forego computer-aided instruction due to lack of technological access. The notion of a digital divide was always problematic in that there are many degrees of access to information technology. Though only a minority of the world’s population owns a computer, many other people have access to shared computers at home, work, school or in their community. Thus, rather than a bipolar divide, there is a continuum of computer and internet access. The computer-student ratio in Iran is certainly lower than that of Britain

or the US, but the medical student bloggers mentioned above were all able to gain sufficient access to take part in international discussions, whether at home, the university or an internet cafe. A blurring of the so-called digital divide will only accelerate with the proliferation of lower-cost computers (a $100 laptop is now under development), the use of cell phones or other alternate devices for internet access, and the spread of low-cost wireless networks. So we need to rethink previous views about who has access to technology.

The technology divide Teacher trainers in computerassisted language learning have long stressed that the computer is merely an optional tool to assist the language learning process, but that technology doesn’t transform the end goal of what is to be learned. While the sentiment is understandable — that we should focus on the content and not the underlying tool — the fact is that language and technology are highly intertwined. Making effective use of computers and the internet demands different types of reading, writing and communication skills than those required in other realms. Being able to find relevant websites and rapidly scan and skim them; use word processors and computer-based tools (such as spelling and grammar checkers) to write and edit quality papers; interpret, design and publish multimedia material; and effectively participate

in online communication media (email, discussion forums, blogs). Not all our students will need these skills, but those who do will benefit from an opportunity to learn them in an English class. Our goal should be to help students not only use technology as an instructional aid, but also master technology as a medium of communication, research and knowledge production. We can no longer think of English as existing independently from the internet, as it is one of its main realms of international use. An English teacher in Egypt recently expressed the exact opposite of the conventional wisdom, telling me that, for him and his students, “English is not an end in itself, but just a tool for being able to make use of information technology.” While I understand the teacher, I would suggest that both English and information technology are tools — to allow individuals and communities to fully participate in global society. If we bear this fact in mind and think creatively beyond divides, we can judiciously combine language and technology to best prepare our students for life in the 21st century. Mark Warschauer is Associate Professor of Education and Informatics at the University of California, Irvine Guardian Weekly and OneStopEnglish are staging a debate on technology and language learning, “Meet the Learner of the Future”, at the 2006 Iatefl conference on April 11. For information go to www.onestopenglish.com