Presentation EAPRIL2025 AI and Teaching listening

• Engels
• WO
• Studiejaar 1

Using AI to facilitate lesson design and making English lessons more Task-Based.

• Willem Boom
• EFL teacher in secondary school in The Netherlands
• Applied Linguistics at University of Oxford

Listening part 1

Why may this listening material not support students' understanding?

RQ1: How can a teacher implement listening task principles

RQ2: Can AI shorten preparation time?

Literature: 

What is Task Based Language Teaching?

Task examples are: Creating a mind map / email / poster / labelling (e.g. buildings on a map), selecting (e.g. choosing a film from three trailers), drawing (e.g. symbols on a weather map), form filling (e.g. a hotel registration form), completing a grid.

Long (1985, 2015), Willis (1996), Willis and Willis (2007), Skehan (1996, 1998, 2014), Ellis (2003, 2017)

Literature: 

What is TBLT? cont.

Literature: authentic listening

Ramachers, S, et al. (2020), Nunan, D. (2002), Lam, W.Y.K. (2002). 

Prompting

Prompt example:

(step 3c) - Create: Design a task for students conforming the definition of a task in the source file. Task examples are: Creating a mind map / email / poster / labelling (e.g. buildings on a map), selecting (e.g. choosing a film from three trailers), drawing (e.g. symbols on a weather map), form filling (e.g. a hotel registration form), completing a grid. Give 3-5 criteria for students when making the task. One to three of the criteria should be directly linked to the lesson goal.

AI tools and lesson creation

2HV Hastings 1066

Classroom try-outs

Primary

Group 7-8

10-12 years old

Secondary

Class 1-2

12-14 years old

Results from observation

Observers (sit in / from video):

Male (35 years of experience, MA, EFL teacher)

Female (25 years of experience, PhD in methodology, teacher educator)

Primary Education

• "Natural speech (uhm, oh, pause)"
• "speech is slow/adapted to age and level"
• "different idiolects for each speaker"
• "students stay visibly engaged while listening. Body language: head up while listening, head down and writing when an answer is heard"
• "Half the class raise their hand --> students show motivation to complete the task" 

Secondary education

• "Materials: Good AI usage returns excellent content and exercises"
• "you use really meaningful sentences, though they are AI-generated"
• "AI-generated listening runs smoothly"
• "Nice and attractive video with high-qualitity + authentic input"
• "Great lesson with more didactic processing and increased efficiency than the regular coursebook (name coursebook)"

Conclusion and discussion

“AI can support teachers in creating more authentic, task-based lessons — if we remain critical, skilled, and reflective users.”

RQ1: How can a teacher implement listening task principles

RQ2: Can AI shorten preparation time?

Willem Boom

[e-mail]

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• How much professional knowledge should teachers be expected to have in order to integrate AI into lesson design responsibly?
• Where should we draw the line between AI-generated lesson materials and teacher-designed materials?
• What happens to schools or teachers who can’t afford advanced generative tools—does AI risk widening the gap between privileged and disadvantaged learning environments?