Tuesday’s Plenary - The AI factor have we figured it out?

The development of AI has become a huge challenge. Predictions abound about how it will affect not just ELT, but the world in general. After a whole year of fast-moving advances in AI development and available tools for a variety of uses within the ELT field, we are still working out what it means for have been learning what it is and what we can use it for, from lesson planning to image creation and automated language learning. But there is more!We have also been trying to elucidate its positive and negative aspects, though it is all quite subjective. Reducing a teacher’s workload, marking learners’ work, planning a marketing campaign can be placed in different parts of the positive-negative continuum. What seems apparent is that it is changing the ELT landscape. But how? What are the implications for different stakeholders in the language learning industry? And how are we coping withthe challenges it poses? Becoming aware of AI’s functioning so that we can detect biases and work together towards an ethical use of AI seems to be a logical pathway, which we will explore together in this talk.