Programed Instruction and Foreign Language Learning--Problems and Prospects (original) (raw)

Six years ago at a conference on foreign language learning aptly entitled "The Language Laboratory as a Teaching Machine," F. Rand Morton painted in bold strokes a futuristic language instruction scheme that would indeed make the language laboratory a teaching machine (Morton, 1960). Working with carefully programmed , le,. ironic equipment, students would acquire all language skills through auto-didactic activity. All learning would be achieved by the student working independently of the teacher; the latter's presence would be required only for occasional evaluation of student pronunciation and remedial guidance. No testing would be necessary and the student's achievement would be directly related to assiduity: no student would fail the course since "by both definition and procedure completion of the course guaranteed satisfactory proficiency on the student's part."