Another issue, related to vertical domain restriction, is standardization and comparability between systems. Most of the ITSs reported in literature do not use some generalized framework of ability reference (such as CEFR or ILR scale) to define the level of learner proficiency for which the learning content of the ITS is intended, but specify such a level in terms of school grade or educational level only (e.g., college freshmen course). This significantly affects learner mobility between different ITSs, mostly because learners are unable to
objectively assess how appropriate the language learning system is for their proficiency level. Furthermore, the results of using an ITS for language learning should be observable as a shift in the proficiency level, quantified in familiar terms, and available for analysis for third parties. Aligning the content with any of the internationally set and verified standards for language learning proficiency levels can be a way to successfully address such issues.
Designing learning materials that will be presented to a learner during the educational process involve several issues that need to be acknowledged. The most notable among those is the issue of interactivity of learning materials. When using languages for communication, learners are engaged in an interactive process of sending and receiving messages through a number of communication channels. In certain cases, the meaning of messages cannot be fully grasped simply on the basis of the sum of words and their meanings, but other elements, such as tone of voice, gestures and body language, and contextual information, need to be taken into consideration. Hence, learning materials should reflect real world communicative situations, which is possible to achieve through the use of multimedia. Another issue related to learning materials is how to keep learners motivated during the learning process, and how to actively involve them to work with materials at hand. One possible way is to give small-scale task to the learner, such as “click on the right word” or “translate a particular word”, which can also serve as indicators of learner knowledge and progression through the learning domain.
Feedback module design should deal with the issue of selecting or generating appropriate feedback once the learners have finished interacting with the system and the computer has evaluated their response. The feedback message in language-learning environments needs to be beyond a simple correct-incorrect statement: it needs to be able to point out the source of the linguistic problem and offer appropriate scaffolding towards obtaining correct knowledge. Additionally, the degree of feedback explicitness should depend on the already discussed level of language proficiency: more explicit feedback for lower- ability learners, and less explicit for higher-ability ones.
The final issue we point out here is how to model language teacher competences and their teaching strategies. For some time now, there seems to exist a strong tendency towards socio-cultural and socio- cognitive approaches to language learning, where the communicative function of language is strongly emphasized. As explained in [27], such an approach underlines two key concepts, namely tasks and interaction: language users and learners are seen as “social agents” who use their “communicative language competences” in numerous “language activities” to exchange meaningful messages as they try to accomplish a particular “task” at hand. The role of the language teacher in such a model seems to be the one of support, providing the learners with tasks appropriate to their level of knowledge and skill, observing their performance during the communicative act, and offering appropriate feedback. Additionally, based on the existing evidence (usually in the form of previous performance results), the teacher decides upon the best action to follow, be it a
remedial task or a task involving the acquisition of new knowledge. ITSs can be considered a technology capable of successfully taking over the responsibilities of the language teacher. In order to do so, an ITS needs to be designed specifically for language learning purposes: sound pedagogy and language teaching methodology, supported by what is known from FLA or SLA theory, represents the basis on which to design an intelligent computer assisted language learning system.
The issues reflected upon above do not make up a definitive list of all the possible issues that may arise during language-learning ITS design, but they represent situations often encountered in practice. Moreover, these issues contribute to the discussion on the complexity of the process of conceptualizing an intelligent system for language learning which is one of the topics addresses in this paper.