An Interactive Language Learning System in the Web

Due to recent technology advances, an increasing number of applications are being ported to the Web at rapid pace. Such applications include Web Phone, Web Fax, Web BBCall, to name a few. Among others, network education has emerged as an important Internet application. It not only avoids the limitation of physical learning locations but also keeps the flexibility of teaching time. In this paper, we develop an interactive language learning system on the World Wide Web. By using this system, students are able to learn languages everywhere and anytime as long as a Web interface is provided. The language learning system we developed in the Computer and Network Center at National Taiwan University is in essence a two-tier client -server architecture, and is divided into two components, namely (1) the language learning player at the client-side and (2) the course content provider at the server side. Explicitly, the language-learning player runs at the client side and provides a user interface to access the course materials. Using an authentication mechanism, the player is able to verify the user identification via the Web and to provide different user interfaces for students and teachers, as one form of personalized service. On the other hand, the course content provider is a database manager in the Web. This database manager employs the PHP script language to access the MySQL database and to response the client’s requests. The PHP script language is used after our evaluation due to its efficient access to many databases, and also its capability of processing the Web requests. In this system, we put not only the description of the course content but also the corresponding audio files in order to support a multimedia-teaching environment. By using this language learning package, we can automate the procedures for preparing audio course materials, conduct data mining on student behavior, and achieve the teaching quality that a network language learning system is expected to provide.