UK professor pushes for technology-assisted language teaching

PEOPLE have been learning a second language through technology-assisted interaction with different people across the globe, a UK professor said at a conference last week. Filipino students can do the same.

Huw Jarvis of the University of Salford called this technology a Mobile Assisted Language Use (MALU).

Jarvis pushed for the adoption of the MALU concept at the Pan Asian Consortium-Philippine Association of Language Teaching (PAC-PALT) Conference on Language Education hosted by the University of San Jose-Recoletos.

Digital literacy “is grounded on the notion of connectivism,” he said.

Teachers, he said, should “encourage the students to be responsible in using digital technology.”

He said adopting MALU is necessary, adding that 70 percent of learning happens in less formal settings, like talking to somebody via a second language.

“The proposed MALU framework will not only provide learners with tutorial packages but also enable students gain access to information and interact with the world,” he said.