Letter from the Editors
Larry Udry, IELI Instructor, Divine Word College, Epworth, Iowa, USA
Michael Winans, Specialist in Applied Linguistics, Rochester Institute of Technology, New York, USA
Hello CALL-ISers!
Congratulations to the CALL-IS Chair Elect, Raquel Elisa Rosas Rivero, who will soon take over from our current Chair, Min Sun Kim. Both have written thoughtful letters worthy of a read. Min Sun lays out some important considerations for those attending the upcoming TESOL International Conference in Long Beach, which includes CALL-focused presentations, interest section collaborations, our open meeting, and a call to get involved. Raquel outlines her perspective as Incoming Chair, which sees the CALL-IS as a hub for innovation, emphasizes our role in keeping language teachers updated, and envisions the future of the CALL-IS as a guiding voice in contemporary language teacher education and professional development.
In line with professional development opportunities, Past Chair Nellie Deutsch, spearheaded free TESOL CALL-IS TechTalks for 2024-2025 for the community. From the link you can gain access to past recorded TechTalks, and you can register to virtually attend the CALL-IS Open Meeting, which will take place on Wednesday, March 19, from 3:30–4:30 pm in Long Beach (room TBD). Play to attend if you’re interested in getting involved with the TESOL CALL-IS.
Congratulations to the EVO ( Electronic Village Online) for 25 years!
Christine Christine Bauer-Ramazani invites all to attend the Best of EVO 2025, a free, two-day, online event for continued professional development of English teachers around the world. The event will take place on Saturday, March 8, and Sunday, March 9, 2025 at 9 AM US EST (time in your time zone: https://tinyurl.com/BestOfEVO25). Electronic Village Online (EVO) moderators and participants will showcase their five-week long EVO 2025 sessions in January and February 2025, the 25th anniversary of the founding of EVO as a project of the CALL Interest Section of TESOL. These sessions have explored weekly topics on integrating cutting-edge technology, in particular Artificial Intelligence (AI), into teaching and learning through online discussions and collaborative projects within a free learning management system (LMS).
💡Learn about the exciting sessions that were held as part of EVO25.
💡Meet global educators and experts passionate about innovative teaching practices.
💡Hear how moderators of EVO25 sessions incorporated AI into teaching and learning.
💡Gain insight into how EVO25 can inspire and enhance your teaching journey.
💡Connect with educators from around the world and discover how EVO sessions can empower your professional growth and take your teaching to the next level. Join us and REGISTER for both days at the link.
For teacher-focused content, Jasmin Cowin has written a thoughtful and useful text, entitled Precision in Practice, that gives solid advice on using artificial intelligence (AI). Many are talking and writing about AI, but few have taken the time, as Jasmin does here, to provide ideas and procedures for prompt engineering. These are important skills for reducing teacher workload while increasing the quality of the content we provide to students.
In this newsletter’s Making Connections, Larry Udry introduces us to a CALL-IS member who reveals some of their personal favorite tools, tips, and ideas for technology to support teaching and learning. Yousra Ferchichi is a Member-at-Large and serves as the Social Media Co-manager and Webinar Co-Host - check out Making Connections for more.
In a conference report for Arizona CALL (AZCALL), Marlene Tovar and Mohamed Almahdi, provide insights from this CALL-focused conference and give an overview of impactful take-aways. The theme was Transforming Language Teaching and Learning Through Technology Integration, and a plenary by Greg Kessler focused on Promoting Engagement through Immersive and Intelligent CALL Design, while Okim Kang presented Technology-assisted Pronunciation Teaching and Learning: Intervention, Feedback, and Assessment. These two talks were accompanied by Luke Polonsky’s presentation, Methodological Decisions Are Also Ethical Decisions: Exploring Questionable Research Practices in Applied Linguistics. Overviews of these talks and the conference report are worth a read, and if you’re in the area, worth considering for presenting CALL scholarship.
If you are in the Upstate New York area, you might also consider submitting a proposal to Upstate CALL to get feedback in preparation for a TESOL International presentation. The first conference is a free, single-day event, which will be held on Oct 25th, 2025.
If there is something that you would like to see in our newsletter, or if you’d like to join the newsletter team, please feel free to contact us.
Hoping to hear from you,
Larry & Mike
Larry Udry has worked at Divine Word College, a small Catholic seminary in Epworth, Iowa, since 2003. He has published the CALL-IS Newsletter and has served on the CALL-IS Steering Committee since 2009. Recently, he revised the second edition that has an accompanying app of an environmentally-themed ESL e-text with Kendall Hunt. Prior to his position at Divine Word College, he worked in UT Martin for eleven years, where he published the TNTESOL Newsletter.
Michael D. Winans has a Ph.D. in Linguistics and Applied Linguistics and is a Specialist in Applied Linguistics at the Rochester Institute of Technology in upstate New York. His research interests focus on language evolution at the intersections of globalization, technology, and language learning and teaching in an environment where social inequities continue to develop in increasingly multicultural and technological societies. He has been published by Second Language Teacher Education, Language Learning & Technology, CALICO Journal, RELC Journal, and TESOL Press, among others.