Learning English Online: Research for Course Design was the theme of the 19th Annual Technology for Second Language Learning Conference—the first hybrid-format conference—held by the applied linguistics and technology program in the Department of English. There were four keynote speakers:
- Amy Nunamaker, from FHI360, and Kate Bain, from the Online Professional English Network (OPEN) in the Office of English Language Programs of the U.S. Department of State, Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs.
- Regine Hampel, Professor of Open and Distance Language Learning at the Open University in the U.K.
- Carolyn Penstein Rosé, Professor of Language Technologies and Human–Computer Interaction in the School of Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon University
The program also hosted close to 30 other presentations by language researchers and educators who are animated by the richness of the possibilities presented by today’s powerful technologies, the quality and quantity of information they access, and the global reach they afford to students. The presentations spanned issues in theory, research, and practice that engage with the issues of our time. Presenters represented the Department of English at Iowa State University in addition to other states and countries around the world, such as Canada, Chile, China, South Korea, and Croatia. Of the 336 registrants, both in-person and online, 136 represented a total of 45 countries outside the U.S.
Congratulations to Nadezhda Dobrynina for winning the Best Paper Award for “Automatic Enrichment of Word Lists with Morphological Derivatives for Computer-Assisted Learning of Vocabulary: Design-Based Research.”
You can visit the conference’s website to see what was presented.