A Survey of Robot-Assisted Language Learning (RALL) <s> Speaking <s> This research explores feasibility of using intellectual robots as a language instruction tool for young children. Since the intellectual robots have several sensors which can recognize status of the other parties, it can perform various bi-directional interaction strategies. This study verified how such bi-directional interaction using intellectual robots affects the improvement of linguistic ability. The subjects were 34 4-year-old children, 17 of whom were in the traditional media-assisted reading program, and 17 of whom were in the Robot-assisted reading program. The results indicated that the children in the robot-assisted groups improved significantly compared with media-assisted groups in linguistic ability (story making, understanding, word recognition, PPVT (Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test)). Furthermore, the benefits and limitations of using Intelligent Robot in linguistic education are discussed. <s> BIB001 </s> A Survey of Robot-Assisted Language Learning (RALL) <s> Speaking <s> This study introduces the educational assistant robots that we developed for foreign language learning and explores the effectiveness of robot-assisted language learning (RALL) which is in its early stages. To achieve this purpose, a course was designed in which students have meaningful interactions with intelligent robots in an immersive environment. A total of 24 elementary students, ranging in age from ten to twelve, were enrolled in English lessons. A pre-test/post-test design was used to investigate the cognitive effects of the RALL approach on the students??? oral skills. No significant difference in the listening skill was found, but the speaking skills improved with a large effect size at the significance level of 0.01. Descriptive statistics and the pre-test/post-test design were used to investigate the affective effects of RALL approach. The result showed that RALL promoted and improved students??? satisfaction, interest, confidence, and motivation at the significance level of 0.01. <s> BIB002 </s> A Survey of Robot-Assisted Language Learning (RALL) <s> Speaking <s> In this study, the researchers attempted to extend the concept of learning companions from the virtual world to the real physical environment and made a breakthrough in technique development of tangible learning robots. The aim of this study was to explore an innovative way by combining the speech recognition technology with educational robots in the hope that the state-of-the-art technology could provide learners with more opportunities of bi-directional language learning in the English class settings. The quasi-experimental design was adopted in this study and a total of 63 Taiwanese students in the fifth grade participated in the experiment. The results reveal that using the tangible learning companions in learning had positive effects on learners' learning motivation, confidence and engagement especially for the lower-achievement learners. Two learning methods were identified in the study, co-discovery and peer tutoring method. The co-discovery method enhanced the lower-achievement learners' learning involvement and their English speaking ability. Students perceived the tangible learning robots as friendly learning toys or ever like a patient instructor for practicing English conversation. Both English instructor and students agreed that uses of the tangible learning companions effectively improved the class atmosphere, and raised their and positive attitude toward learning English. <s> BIB003 </s> A Survey of Robot-Assisted Language Learning (RALL) <s> Speaking <s> Children's oral language skills in preschool can predict their success in reading, writing, and academics in later schooling. Helping children improve their language skills early on could lead to more children succeeding later. As such, we examined the potential of a sociable robotic learning/teaching companion to support children's early language development. In a microgenetic study, 17 children played a storytelling game with the robot eight times over a two-month period. We evaluated whether a robot that "leveled" its stories to match the child's current abilities would lead to greater learning and language improvements than a robot that was not matched. All children learned new words, created stories, and enjoyed playing. Children who played with a matched robot used more words, and more diverse words, in their stories than unmatched children. Understanding the interplay between the robot's and the children's language will inform future work on robot companions that support children's education through play. <s> BIB004 </s> A Survey of Robot-Assisted Language Learning (RALL) <s> Speaking <s> Introduction Anthropomorphized robots are found beneficial when they are implemented in education due to their advantages of executing verbal and nonverbal communication with teachers or students in classrooms (Johnson, 2003). For example, some research studies have used autonomous humanoid robots in English classrooms to play the role of native speakers that are able to carry on conversations with pupils in natural language (Lee et al., 2011; Hyun et al., 2008; Movellan et al., 2009; Park et al., 2011). Research studies have confirmed that this type of interaction between robots and humans not only improves teaching effectiveness but also learning motivation because students are less anxious and more cheerful (Papert, 1993). Therefore, more and more applications of robotic technology are now trying to develop activities that can be helpful for teaching and learning English as a foreign language (EFL). This current trend of using robotics to assist language instruction is now known as Robot-Assisted Language Learning (RALL) (Han, 2012). Despite the great benefits of using robots in language teaching and learning, the current application may be limited because of the two major reasons. First, autonomous robots have complex artificial intelligence and are so expensive that normally schools cannot afford them. Moreover, the interaction scenarios between pupils and robots must be pre-programmed by robotics developers, so educators who are not robotics professionals may find it difficult to design or alter the interaction scenarios. Therefore, an alternative to solving the above problems is to buy robots with simple autonomous functions and remote controlled body movements from the supermarkets, or toyshops. These robots are mostly developed in a small size and at a low-cost. Meanwhile, they could be simply controlled by instructors to perform pedagogical missions and teaching materials in the classroom activities. This type of robots is often used as an instructional tool for facilitating learners' engagement and oral interaction. Research has found that interacting with a tangible robot increased more engagement than with a video (Xie, Antle, & Motamedi, 2008). For instance, ROBOSAPIEN, a low-cost remote controlled robot that can be purchased from a toyshop, has been used to be an instructional tool for EFL class at an elementary school (Chang et al., 2010a; Chang et al., 2010b; You et al., 2006). Although there was a breakthrough in terms of reducing the cost of using robots in language teaching and learning, those commercial robots were still not well developed into education because normally instructors had to take much time and effort to interlink robots with instructional materials and classroom activities. In order to expand robot-assisted language teaching, Han (2012) suggested that the system frameworks of RALL combine robot hardware, robot applications and visual instructional contents and help instructors easily design their robot-assisted instruction. Furthermore, the design of the system frameworks should take the language learning goals into account. In our previous research studies, a RALL system framework has been implemented. The developed framework provides an authoring tool for instructors to script teaching materials that can easily add external multimedia resources as well as to script presentations of anthropomorphized robots. Moreover, a material display system can also be found in the framework. Therefore, the present study is, first, to provide a practical study of creating an EFL course using the framework to design robot-assisted instructional materials. Then, it shows the empirical evidence of the designed instructional materials based on students' learning outcomes. Finally, it presents the impact of students' learning motivation because motivation is a critical element to sustain students' attention and engagement in the learning process. In our current study, two groups of the fifth-grade elementary students were targeted to make the comparison. … <s> BIB005
Improvements in speaking ability are consistently reported. Teachers have reported such improvements in their students  , and improvements have also been recorded after experimental testing. In Lee et al., after using a robot for conversational practice, both beginner and intermediate students showed marked improvements in overall speaking ability, which was measured as a composite of pronunciation, grammar, vocabulary, and communicative ability BIB002 . In addition, robots were deemed as more effective than computers in advancing the speaking skills of four-year-olds BIB001 . Robots may also offer advantages to having students simply converse with each other BIB003 . In Wang's study, this was especially significant for learners in the bottom third of the class; it is possible that students in the top third of the class did not improve as the material taught was not difficult enough for them, but the reason is unclear. However, children of higher ability do improve more when taught by a robot that is matched to their skill level BIB004 . Additionally, the effect of using a robot to aid teachers has also been explored BIB005 . Though no differences were seen in speaking ability compared to a control classroom without a robot, significant differences were discovered in listening and reading skills.