Mobile apps are becoming part and parcel of our daily lives. Hence, this study examined the differential effects of app modes on listening comprehension and recognition. From a pool of Egyptian EFL sophomores, 107 students were randomly assigned into 3 groups practicing mobile-assisted listening in 3 modalities: Unimodal (n = 35), Bimodal (n =…

Looking at human communication from the perspective of semiotics extends our view beyond verbal language to consider other sign systems and meaning-making resources. Those include gestures, body language, images, and sounds. From this perspective, the communicative process expands from individual mental processes of verbalizing to include features…

The acquisition of Chinese characters has been widely acknowledged as challenging for learners of Chinese as a foreign language (CFL) due to their unique logographic nature and the time and effort involved. However, recent advancements in instructional technologies demonstrate a promising role in facilitating the teaching and learning of Chinese…

This study investigates the effectiveness of a computer-assisted pronunciation training (CAPT) system on second language learners' acquisition of three grammatical features. It presents a CAPT system on top of a phoneme-based, fine-tuned speech recognition model, and is intended to deliver explicit, corrective feedback on the pronunciation of the…

The purpose of this article is to set out the design principles and architecture of a second language (L2) learning voice chatbot. Building on L2 acquisition theories and chatbot research, in this article, we report on a South Korean government-funded longitudinal project in which we designed and developed a chatbot called "Ellie".…

In order to develop pragmatic competence in a language other than our own (L2), it is important to have enough knowledge of the cultural norms of the target language and enough opportunities to interact with a wide range of speakers to deploy different speech acts, registers, levels of politeness, conversational moves, and the like. The…

Based on a study of the digital literacy practices of immigrant Filipino students in Vancouver, this paper focuses on how learners with unequal access to resources engage with different tools to locate information and find opportunities for language learning online. Data was collected through interviews and observations of participants as they…

English as a foreign language (EFL) students' use of artificial intelligence (AI) tools that generate human-like text may enhance students' written work. However, the extent to which students use AI-generated text to complete a written composition and how AI-generated text influences the overall writing quality remain uncertain. 23 Hong Kong…

Despite the growing body of research regarding the effectiveness of MALL (mobile-assisted language learning) technologies on foreign language (FL) learners' speaking skill development, a comprehensively quantitative meta-analysis regarding the effect sizes of these studies is still lacking. To solve the problem, this study reported results based…

The advance of educational technologies and digital devices have made computer-assisted language learning (CALL) an active interdisciplinary field with increasing research potential and topic diversity. Questions like "what topics and technologies attract the interest of the CALL community?," "how have these topics and technologies…

This study investigated how learners' motivation to improve their pronunciation (i.e., pronunciation-focused motivation) influences their L2 pronunciation achievements. This relationship was explored separately in an online (n = 28) and a face-to-face (F2F) (n = 49) learning environment with beginner learners of German. In the online learning…

Previous research has established that phonetics has been marginalized within language teaching, proving to be particularly challenging for learners in EFL contexts. This paper presents EPSSML (https://www.usc.gal/multimlab/), an e-learning platform designed within Mayer's (2008, 2009) Cognitive Theory of Multimedia Learning to instruct English…

Grounded in the three-tiered transdisciplinary SLA framework of the Douglas Fir Group (2016), we explore how the concept of 'semiotic resources' may be integrated into CALL activity designs. Starting at the macro level, we discuss how language ideology may influence where to situate semiotic resources within initial design considerations. We next…

This study addresses the issue of automatic pronunciation assessment (APA) and its contribution to the teaching of second language (L2) pronunciation. Several attempts have been made at designing such systems, and some have proven operationally successful. However, the automatic assessment of the pronunciation of short words in segmental…

In the 20th anniversary issue of this journal, Reinders and White (2016) describe the relationship between computer-assisted language learning (CALL) and autonomy as having become "both more complex and more promising" (p. 143). This is, they assert, in large part due to the rise of informal language learning online, with an accompanying…