The Language Teacher
September 2000

JALT CALL

Ali Campbell

Chair JALTCALL 2000

and Kevin Ryan


Computer-assisted language learning (CALL) is becoming increasingly popular in language teaching programs across Japan. The Special Interest Group (JALT CALL SIG) is a group of about 300 teachers within JALT who are interested in using computers to promote language learning. We exchange information through presentations at the annual JALT conference, our internally produced books (4 titles currently available), our newsletter C@llingJapan, our website located at <jaltcall.org>, and our electronic mailing lists. Most important of all, however, is our annual four-day SIG conference, now in its fifth year.

Last year, the event reached an unprecedented peak at Kyoto Sangyo Daigaku with the conference, CALLing Asia, featuring over 100 sessions and, for the first time, attracting a significant number of delegates from overseas. The challenge this year was to maintain momentum and capitalize on the previous conferences, to broaden the appeal, and make it more international and more accessible to both "newbie" and "guru" alike.

Tokyo University of Technology hosted JALTCALL 2000 in June. This is an institution well endowed with computer facilities: online classrooms, Windows and UNIX labs, a 400-seater fully wired auditorium, and a futuristic gathering place known as the Media Lobby. The campus, located just south of Hachioji, is also vast and strikingly beautiful.

Such was the location for JALTCALL 2000 and although the university's natural charms were shrouded in drizzle for the entire weekend, this did not prevent 200 participants, including 30 from overseas, from attending 60 presentations, workshops and poster sessions with themes ranging from "Making Online Quizzes" to "Bringing Efficiency to Testing through the Use of Microsoft Excel" to "Virtual Reality Applications and Second Language Acquisition." The conference ran a Beginners' Workshop ("All you ever wanted to ask about computers and CALL") for the first time in the hope of attracting CALL newcomers to the event. Registrants who had submitted their queries online in advance received their answers in this session. Although fewer newbies than anticipated turned up this time, the session will be repeated in future years.

The conference gave prominence to an expo of the most important materials and service providers in CALL today. Participants were thus able to view a full range of newly published books and training options, and come to grips with many types of software and web-based learning. The coffee and chocolate biscuits served in the same area proved perhaps to be an even bigger draw, however, and showed once more that for many people the attraction of a conference is the chance to meet socially with others involved in the same field and facing the same kind of challenges. Indeed, the networking reception (a.k.a. conference party) on the Saturday evening was extremely well attended, and as at CALLing Asia, the generosity of our corporate sponsors enabled us to stage a Grand Prize Draw.

Since many of the people attending JALTCALL 2000 had traveled a long distance -- not just from Hokkaido and Kyushu, but also Canada, New Zealand, the UK, the Philippines and India to mention but a few examples -- pre- and post-conference sessions were organized. On Friday, three practical workshops ran parallel for different levels of expertise, and on Monday, delegates visited the nearby Tokyo Metropolitan Institute of Technology to observe their world-class CALL facilities in use.

JALTCALL 2000 was thus a showcase for the SIG and for the state of computer-assisted language learning in Japan. It is clear that the annual conference is now a notable fixture on the international calendar of CALL events. The CALL SIG finds strength both in its membership and in its access to technology and facilities of which most visitors from outside Japan are rightly envious. Two areas which illustrate the excellent health of our organization in particular are the wide variety of research activities being carried out nationwide, and, allied to this, the contribution of our membership to a number of publications which have gained a solid reputation amongst CALL practitioners/researchers around the globe.

The conference also celebrated the launch of two new CALL SIG publications. Recipes for Wired Teachers containing eighty practical ideas for using computers in language learning is now available to all at the JALTCALL webpage. Members got a special discount at the conference and may still receive one on the webpage. A huge collection of papers from CALLing Asia conference was given away free to any CALL member at the conference. You can order both using a bank transfer or credit card through our website.

You can join the CALL SIG if you are a member of JALT by sending in the fiuikae at the back of the TLT. For more information and to contact people in the SIG, visit our website at <jaltcall.org>.



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