Language Apps: do they work?
An interview with Zach Sporn, co-author of the study “The effectiveness of app-based language learning for developing receptive linguistic knowledge and oral communicative ability”
Welcome to the ALMAR blog, Zach. As someone who is interested in research related to language learning, who lives in Spain, who has neglected his Spanish for several years, who has experimented with various language apps, you can imagine my surprise when one of my former colleagues drops a study that he has co-authored into my Facebook newsfeed about language apps, a study which just so happens to have used Spanish as the basis for its experiment. You’ve obviously been busy since we left Budapest. Tell us a little bit about how you got involved in this study.
Well, that pretty much comes down to my current role and affiliation. Since 2017 I have worked for the language app Babbel as Senior Communications Manager for Research and Pedagogy. My role is rather unique: I facilitate and oversee collaborations with external academic researchers on applied research projects examining our app’s efficacy and the vast trove of data generated by our millions of language learners worldwide. I see myself as a kind of nexus between Babbel’s language experts and linguists in the world of academia, through which expertise, insights, data and impressions flow both ways.
I think this idea of a nexus or bridge is really important. The reason I started this blog was to explore the gap between research, particularly Second Language Acquisition research, and Language Pedagogy, (i.e. what goes on in the classroom). Few teachers are regular consumers of research, and while there may be good reasons for this, it’s still a concern. On this blog, I’ve talked about how ideas like so-called Learning Styles can be twisted and find their way into education systems without any real scientific scrutiny. How do you view this gap between research and the classroom — is it something we should be concerned about, and if so, what can be done about it?
I completely understand why many language teachers don’t engage with scholarly publications on the topics of SLA and computer assisted language learning (CALL). Especially for freelance language instructors, it often comes down to lack of time and proper compensation for professional development. However, I also see issues with approachability and accessibility of the studies themselves.
Approachability: Depending on the teacher’s qualifications and academic experience, the jargon, statistical methods and analyses and other conventions of empirical research found in SLA case studies and articles can seem intimidating and abstruse. Most research reports require a solid theoretical grounding in the topic. I believe SLA and CALL researchers can maximize the impact of their research on classroom praxis if they make an effort making the implication of their findings easily comprehensible for a wider audience of classroom practitioners. These efforts might include presenting at conferences or professional meetups, blogging about their work and research interests, sharing tips on social media for a more generalized audience of classroom teachers and also language learners.
It’s also partly a question of accessibility: much of this research is a) published only in English, regardless of where the study was conducted, and b) published in academic journals locked up behind paywalls. Full reports of Babbel’s research collaborations with linguists at MSU and Yale are available for free on Babbel’s website, as we want to make this data available for anyone interested, but the peer-reviewed version of the MSU study manuscript containing a more detailed literature review and additional insights into qualitative data we collected from participants, behind a paywall in the journal Foreign Language Annals.
I would like to see more democratic access to research reports for teachers lacking institutional affiliations with University libraries. Teachers’ professional development plans might include training in how to find and access free academic articles, as well as attending conferences and professional meetings where they can discuss these topics.
So the findings are there for everybody to access, but there’s also a paywalled version for those who want more detail or who are conducting experiments of their own. That all sounds very fair. You mention ways to find free academic articles — could you give us a few tips?
When I’m researching a new applied linguistics topic or interest of mine, I’ll typically start my search on Google Scholar, using broad search terms like “language attrition” or “pronunciation accuracy.” Just viewing the available abstracts helps you orient yourself and get the “lay of the land”, and discover extant bibliographies research into a particular research question. Google scholar is particularly useful as you can filter by date of publication to make sure you have the most up-to-date research into a topic.
To get a broad overview of a topic it can be useful to add the search term “meta-analysis.” A meta analysis combines and often synthesizes the results of dozens of empirical studies on a particular subject. A good example would be this recent meta-analysis of the efficacy of Mobile-assisted ESL/EFL vocabulary learning, published in the peer-reviewed journal Computer Assisted Language Learning. This and other articles might be provided for free by the publisher, Routledge as a downloadable .pdf.
If I find, however, that an article I want to read is behind a journal’s paywall, there are two good ways to proceed. One is to check whether any of the authors have a personal website. Often they’ll link to .pdf versions of their articles in the bibliography and publications subsection of their sites. Another way is to simply contact the author directly, explain the nature of your interest in the publication, and ask if they’re willing to send a copy for review. I’ve typically had a very positive response to this interest.
That’s really helpful, thanks. I’ve also had positive responses after contacting authors directly, which brings us nicely to the paper you’ve co-authored. The study you and your colleagues conducted was focused not only on receptive knowledge, (i.e. how many grammar and vocabulary questions they could answer in a written test) but also on their oral proficiency. Why was that important?
When I started at Babbel, I dove into the existing academic literature on computer assisted language learning (CALL) and mobile assisted language learning (MALL). I noticed there was a dearth of empirically sound and methodologically robust research into how using the app — or indeed any language learning app — could lead to oral proficiency, or the ability to communicate in a foreign language (L2). Most language learners using mobile apps don’t want to just learn grammar rules by rote, or gain some basic vocabulary knowledge — they want to interact with proficient speakers of their chosen target language. I believed that it’s important to demonstrate some proof of concept for learners, evidence that it does what it says on the tin, that you really can learn a language online. This is especially important for a premium subscription based app. From the perspective of motivating learners to actually try a program like Babbel and, even more crucially, stick with it long enough to see positive results, it’s really essential we provide this.
My co-authors on the study, lead investigator Dr. Shawn Loewen and Dr. Daniel Isbell had worked on a previous study investigating the suitability of the language learning app Duolingo for native English speakers to learn Turkish. In that study 9 participant researchers journalled about their experiences using that app. Shawn and Dan shared my interest in doing an empirically sound and methodologically rigorous study looking at how effective app-based learning is at improving learners’ productive skills, specifically speaking. Some studies in the literature had already demonstrated that Babbel, and other apps, facilitate learners gaining explicit, procedural knowledge and increase their vocabulary in an L2; what was less clear before our study, was whether using Babbel could lead to measurable improvements in conversational abilities. As Babbel’s main aim is to quickly enable learners to have real-life conversations, it was essential we investigate this aspect of their language acquisition.
The test we used, ACTFL oral proficiency interview computer-version (OPIc), is double-rated by trained assessors and widely seen as a valid and reliable measure of a learner’s second language skills. It is used, for example, by American school districts to screen the language skills of foreign language instructors
Can you tell us a little bit about the results? They appear to be quite conclusive.
Babbel is designed to get learners speaking their new language quickly and efficiently. In order to establish our app’s effectiveness at instilling real-life conversation skills and to provide transparency about learning outcomes following short periods of dedicated use, Babbel recently collaborated on two academic studies with applied linguists at Michigan State University (MSU) and Yale University. This research showed that Babbel is effective at improving learners’ practical spoken ability in a foreign language.
- The research team at MSU found that among the 54 undergraduate participants who completed the study, nearly all made statistically significant gains in oral proficiency, grammar knowledge, and / or vocabulary knowledge of Spanish.
- Furthermore, both true novices and more experienced Spanish learners made gains in their speaking ability-
- Babbel’s collaborative study with researchers at Yale University focused more specifically on complete beginners of Spanish, recruiting a diverse cohort of 117 learners from across the U.S. The research team at Yale University corroborated that Babbel is effective in developing conversational skills among novice level language learners: all participants gained some measure of oral proficiency in Spanish by the end of the project.
- Finally, 91% of participants reported enjoying the app, while 95% found that Babbel made it convenient to learn a new language.
¡Olé! I’ve been enjoying using Babbel myself, but as I had to google to check whether “olé” had an accent mark over the “e” or not, I clearly belong in the novice category… As a language teacher who follows the communicative approach and whose students often value speaking above all else, the study seems especially relevant to me. Did you ever use language apps with students to support your classes when you were teaching?
I don’t teach languages anymore, unfortunately. I really wish I had time to keep a hand in with it, especially with teaching beginners and near-beginners, as I found this very motivating and rewarding! However, I do actively try to foster new ideas and approaches in the classroom. I think that many apps lend themselves to use in class, while some benefit learners by granting them ubiquitous access to opportunities to practice their skills. One method I support is “flipping the classroom” and using app-based lessons or other digital resources to adequately prepare learners to use and further develop communicative competence — especially listening and speaking skills — during live or online class sessions in small groups or one-to-one. Language instructors can embrace principles used by instructional designers, assigning relevant material before class sessions take place.
By curating resources like app-based language lessons, digital exercises, vocabulary games and authentic content for students to use autonomously, at their own pace, instructors can devote valuable classroom time to communicative practice, task-based activities and discussion.
There is plenty of evidence to support that language apps like Babbel can be integrated into “traditional” face-to-face language courses, as a supplementary tool or in place of a traditional coursebook. For example, two University level language instructors in the Netherlands have used Babbel as part of blended learning curricula. I am also setting up a collaboration between Babbel and the Munich Volkshochschule to offer beginner-level Italian courses and intermediate-level conversation courses based on Babbel’s curriculum.
Haha, ok, I’ll put that down as a “no comment”. But I take it that if you were to go back to the classroom now, you would be more inclined to use language apps?
Absolutely :)
Finally, thinking about the relationship between technology and the classroom, I remember when electronic whiteboards first arrived, and there was this feeling of, “Wow, this is the future of teaching!”. But they very quickly joined that pile of technologies which never really took off (I like to picture them sitting in a junkyard next to a Minidisc players, HD DVDs, and Betamaxes). Instead of being predominantly in the teacher’s hands, classroom technology moved very quickly to the student’s hands, mainly through smartphones and tablets. How important do you think this shift is and what role does it play in learner autonomy?
I think introducing a flashy new technology for learners to use in or out of the classroom is not, in and of itself, of any pedagogical value. It’s important for course facilitators and instructors to note that learners typically need scaffolding and support in using a new technology in order to benefit from them. This holds true for VR headsets, apps, podcasts and youtube videos or even online games. However, I think making learners aware of opportunities to learn outside of the classroom, when and where they choose, can be empowering. In the best case scenario, language teachers will take the time to incorporate any new technology into some kind of structured plan and not just throw it out there. While the novelty factor can be motivating at first, I think the ultimate success of any new technology comes down to how well language teachers can incorporate it into their courses in a pedagogically sound way.
Zach, thank you very much for your time. I hope others will feel encouraged to experiment with incorporating language apps into their own teaching. If anyone has any questions for Zach, the study or his work with Babbel, they can contact him at zsporn@babbel.com.
