The Rise and Fall of the Language Lab: A Cautionary Tale for SALCs

John Larson, Kyoai Gakuen University

Abstract

Starting with their humble beginnings as phonographs and listening tubes, language labs were first an oddity, then an extravagance, then a necessity, and finally a relic of many schools’ language learning systems. Now that self-access language learning centers have the limelight, it is useful to look back at the evolution of language labs for hints at how to avoid the mistakes made in their development and implementation. This article will detail the beginnings, heyday, and depreciation of the language lab. It will then look for parallels between SALCs and language labs and offer appropriate advice for the evolution of SALC facilities.

Keywords: language laboratory, self-access language learning centers, SALC, evolution, obscurity

For more than 17 years, I was an English teacher at a Japanese public high school. Many of my classes were scheduled in the language lab. The room was a derelict of two dozen steel tables bolted to the floor, their beige surfaces yellowing and cracking. The embedded cassette players were filled with gum wrappers, eraser shavings, and other detritus of past generations of students. The headsets with fold-down mics tucked inside each two-person desk were used primarily as props for students pretending to be pilots and co-pilots. The teacher’s master control board sat there enigmatically, like a 1950s Soviet nuclear silo, mostly untouched from the time of its installation. The computer under the teacher’s desk ran DOS, the text-based precursor to more modern operating systems such as Windows 95. Most teachers were content to simply know the incantations required to play CD audio out of the room speakers, while others gave up entirely and bypassed the system by using their own portable stereos. Though my students and I did our best, the room ultimately proved unsuitable for active, face-to-face communicative activities. And though I knew how to use most of the language lab’s various functions, I found little value in them. Often, I wondered how such a complex and expensive collection of technology, the original purpose of which was to aid and even enable students to control their own language learning, could become so outdated as to not only be useless, but actually hinder the language learning process. It is my hope that by examining the evolution and devolution of the language lab, we can understand and perhaps prevent such a waste in the future. 

The 1880s: When Language Labs Began

Though they can hardly be called language labs, the first phonographs were such disruptive and groundbreaking language learning tools that any discussion of technology in the language classroom is incomplete without them. For our purposes, the important aspect of phonographs is that they were lighter and cheaper and ate far less than the previous source of native language pronunciation: native speakers. Phonographs were also much less prone to fatigue and did not complain no matter how many times they were asked to repeat themselves. Later advancements such as the flat, disc-shaped records that replaced the original cylinders improved sound quality and ease of access (Clarke, 1918). Using recordings of native speakers, and later more targeted language lessons with accompanying texts, students without the will or means to hire a personal tutor were able to listen to and repeat the language of native speakers. Moreover, learners no longer needed to follow a prescribed learning plan devised by said tutor and could set their own language learning goals and pace. Phonographs opened two very important doors towards autonomous learning for students: access and control.  

The 1920s: Audio Becomes Personalized

The first language laboratories as described by Waltz (1930) used phonographs but had two distinct advantages over simply listening to a recording and following a text. Classes of learners were separated into cubicles and used headphone-like devices, which Waltz calls “listening tubes” so they would not be distracted by other students practicing. One benefit of this system was an economy of scale, allowing multiple students to simultaneously train using the same expensive media. They also removed “the great burden of drill work from the shoulders of the teacher and place[d] the responsibility on the student” (Waltz, 1930, p. 27). Above and beyond individual lab use, these listening tubes allowed groups of language learners, overseen by a teacher, to join what can be called the first wave of language-lab-assisted classes. The ability for students to use these tools alongside other students allowed language labs to fit more easily into the classroom-based structure of schools, with both the assistance and impediments those structures entail.

The 1940s: The Spoken Word Gets Heard

Giving language learners the ability to listen to and record their own voice was the next huge leap in language lab tech. Headsets with headphones and microphones enabled students to listen to their own voices in one ear while listening to recording in the other. More sophisticated labs had dual-head tape recorders that allowed students to record their voices while keeping the original recording intact (Barrutia, 1967). This active, comparative style of language lab started on reel-to-reel tape, but quickly graduated to cassette tapes in the 1960s as they were cheaper, more durable, and portable. This combination of headset and cassette allowed a student to walk into a language lab with her own level-appropriate tape, sit down at a booth, pop on her headphones and drill baby drill—all without the need for class or teacher. 

The 1960s: Self Access and the Digital Revolution

Computers were introduced at this point in the history of language labs and things got even more complicated. The lab referred to in the autobiographical introductory section of this article was from this generation. Unlike CALL labs where students access language learning content individually in a lab filled with interconnected computers, computer-assisted language labs had only one computer, which only the teacher could access. These computers either served as digital switchboards themselves or acted as digital controllers for analog master control boards such as the one mentioned in the introduction. This computer was attached to media playback machines, enabled teachers to listen to student practice individually or connect private teacher-student or student-student conversations, and could even remotely control cassette playback individually, in groups, or for the entire class. Headset input and output routed through the computer allowed teachers the ability to assign pairs or groups, uncovering novel communicative aspects to the language lab just as the communicative language learning revolution was beginning. If this feature list sounds expansive and daunting, that’s because it was. The computer-assisted language lab enabled these features and many more, but this overabundance of features ensured I was the only teacher in my school to try and utilize it. 

1970s: Language Lab Implementation Wanes

Starting at the end of the 1970s, the waning implementation of the audio-lingual method, wider availability of personal computers, the continued rise of CALL labs, and the eventual domination of the internet made traditional language labs all but obsolete (Almaktary & Al-Kadi, 2017). Their yellowing fossils can be found in countless high schools and universities all over Japan and throughout the world. Around the same time as the language lab faded away, self-access language learning centers, aka SALCs, began to increase in number and continue to be used in supplementary language learning. SALCs and language labs are similar in that they both use technology to afford language learners with learning materials, but they differ in their implementation. SALCs employ a student-directed approach with help from peer tutors and learning advisors, whereas latter-day language labs were regularly integrated into ordinary language classes, highly structured, and teacher-led. Despite these differences, the story of language labs can still offer us instructive value. What lessons, then, can we draw from their rise, primacy, and eventual fall into obscurity? And what relevance do those lessons have for SALCs?

The Delicate Balance Between Functionality and Usability

In order to add features to a device or system, there is almost always a cost to be paid in the way of complexity. Simple single-user phonographs eventually evolved into language labs that offered so many functions and became so complex that even teachers shied away from using them (Barrutia, 1967). This was the unfortunate result of two failures: a failure of the manufacturers to understand the practical scope of their product, and the failure of the users to understand how to utilize the features available to them. These failures are germane to SALCs. With the focus on individual learners instead of methodologies (Morrison, 2008), SALCs offer many different kinds of resources and services. Just as complexity led to confusion regarding the use of language labs, so could the expansion of various SALC resources lead to possible confusion among users, teachers, and SALC facilitators as to the role SALC should play in student language learning. Take for instance the issue of academic integrity. SALC facilitators and teachers may have different ideas about how much and what kind of assistance is appropriate. On the other hand, a student who needs help on a writing assignment may not receive the kind of direct corrective feedback she was seeking. In their article detailing their experience integrating the SALC into their curriculum, Thompson and Atkinson (2010) felt their students needed guidance to SALC resources to “reduce their anxiety towards using the SALC” and that some students were “overwhelmed by too much choice” (p. 50). Aldred and Williams (2000) were surprised that increasing the variety of the activities in their SALC inadvertently created “too much choice” (p. 85) and confusion about what activities students should choose. These two examples show that some students find SALCs difficult to utilize, and that increasing complexity can exacerbate student confusion, just as increasing complexity was partially to blame for the eventual abandonment of the language lab. 

The Necessity and Feasibility of Upgrading Media

Language labs started with wax cylinders and ended with cassette tapes, and with each of these evolutions in technology, new media had to be purchased. School budgets are limited, and arduous procurement procedures often prevent schools from being on the cutting edge. Language labs suffered from this problem, and the language learning media found in a SALC is certainly not immune. A 2006 survey of technology available at SALCs conducted by Lázaro and Reinders found most SALCs provided roughly the same array of language learning tools and media: DVDs, CDs and books such as graded readers and textbooks. Castellano et al. (2011) showed that more than 90% of materials borrowed from the SALC at Kanda University of International Studies comprised these same four media types. Ten years later, in an analysis of one student’s evolving language study habits, Kashiwa (2021) followed a student’s use of SALC resources. Though this student’s use of the SALC increased as the study progressed, the media she used for studying English was entirely internet-based and most of this use happened at her home rather than at the SALC. This individual case is indicative of the general trend away from physical media and towards digital streaming. Sales of DVDs decreased 10% each year from 2013 to 2016, at which point their shrinking profits were surpassed by growing streaming subscription revenue (Yu et al., 2022), and the trend away from physical media continues to this day. SALCs find themselves in a situation similar to the one language labs faced throughout their implementation. They have invested funding in a certain type of media only to have more modern media delivery systems and capabilities evolve, rendering their library of learning materials outdated. While language labs were able to update their catalogs, transitioning from reel-to-reels to records to cassettes, the same transition might not be as straightforward for SALCs. 

The effects of the digital revolution are not confined to audiovisual media. The digitization of graded readers has begun, with services like Xreading and Oxford Reading Club offering students instant access to thousands of readers with embedded dictionaries and audio performances, and giving educators tools to check student progress, comprehension, average reading speed, reader level, and more. Companies such as Udemy provide institutional access to educational streaming video content, but unfortunately none of the big four streaming services: Netflix, Prime Video, Disney+, and Hulu, offer institutional accounts. Social networking media services such as YouTube can be an invaluable source of educational videos, but their inclusive and public nature makes it challenging to completely avoid inappropriate and counterfactual media. What is more, most streaming services are built around the premise that viewers will have their own personal accounts. Allowing multiple users to share one account is not only ethically and legally dubious, but it also removes one of the biggest value-propositions of these platforms: personalization. Likewise, confining the use of these services to computers or other devices in a SALC removes another advantage that has become table stakes in the digital era: portability. It seems clear that SALCs must adapt to the changing media landscape if they are to continue to be a vital source of entertaining and educational language learning material, and unlike language labs, adapting SALCs will likely not be as easy as swapping turntables for cassette decks.

Choosing Between Adaptation and Extinction

It is important to note that SALCs are quite often more than just media. Though most SALCs contain educational media and the means to utilize it, these centers also offer places for students to study and human resources to be utilized. MESS, as Everhard (2022) put it, the “Materials, Equipment, Staffing and Space” (p.21) make up the framework around which most SALCs are built. Staffing and space are generally more easily adaptable than materials and equipment. People can learn new techniques and furniture can be moved from one room to the next. Materials and equipment on the other hand have a certain permanence. A DVD of Die Hard will always be Die Hard, and a CD player will never be able to download podcasts. On the other hand, audiovisual equipment and media are an order or two of magnitude less expensive than employee salaries and building construction and/or renovation.

Some SALCs have taken advantage of the opportunity to shift their focus from materials and equipment to staffing and space. The SALC at Kanda University of International Studies (KUIS) is a prime example. In 2009, KUIS described their SALC as:

…a state of the art language learning centre filled with over 11,000 resources such as books, magazines, games, DVDs and CDs which offer opportunities for individualized learning for students. In addition to the large variety of materials, there are different areas and rooms within the SALC where students can carry out language learning. There are areas equipped with everything students need to use the materials such as CD, DVD and MP3 players, computer stations, speaking booths, group access areas and multi-purpose rooms (MPRs). The system is designed to enable students to learn in their own time and to develop language skills for the real world. Learning advisors and other staff are on hand to help users and the SALC offers various courses designed to promote learner autonomy. (Kanda University of International Studies, 2009)

A more up-to-date webpage describes it as:

…a learning community designed to help KUIS students to develop lifelong language learner autonomy. The SALC provides a social space to help motivate learners and to facilitate the development of fluency and confidence. The SALC is filled with resources in order to provide learning opportunities to suit all students. There are also different areas and rooms within the SALC where students can carry out language study or use. The SALC is designed to enable students to learn in their own time, in their own ways, and to develop language skills for the real world. Learning advisors and other staff are on hand to help users and the SALC offers modules and courses designed to promote learner autonomy. (Kanda University of International Studies, 2020)

The first description from 2009 showcased the materials and equipment available while the latter description focuses less on what resources the SALC has and more on what students can achieve there. Before, it was a center with resources, and now it is a learning community and social space. It has successfully adapted itself to modern students such as the one in Kashiwa’s study, those who don’t necessarily need access to materials, but who would benefit by having a place to study where experts can advise them. The SALC at KUIS and other successful, trailblazing SALCs that often appear in journal articles are obviously not the intended audience for this cautionary tale. They have adjusted both to the needs of their learners and to the times and will no doubt continue to do so. 

Smaller SALCs that still function mainly as repositories for learning materials, however, can find themselves between a rock and a hard place. On the one hand, students’ changing media consumption habits threaten to make their primary assets obsolete. On the other hand, adaptation to a new paradigm could create confusion for students, and perhaps even staff, as to the identity and purpose of the SALC. It was a very similar position that language lab facilitators faced almost a hundred years ago. Therefore, using language labs as a reference point, I propose three pieces of advice for SALCs that may prove useful if they find themselves in a similar situation:

1. Keep moving forward. Speaking with native speakers was, and continues to be, an excellent way to improve communicative competence for most students. However, when devices which enabled easy recording and playback became available, some language learners and educators saw in these devices a chance to dramatically increase student exposure to native pronunciation. It was these first steps that, in part, enabled the audio-linguistic approach to flourish and eventually led to the proliferation of more advanced language labs. Had these early adopters of machine-based language learning been content with the status quo of native speakers as the sole producers of language pronunciation models, had they stood still, then it is likely that none of the important technical and pedagogical progress detailed in the first half of this article would have occurred.
2. Design your own SALC. As alluded to earlier, and as is common in any research community, projects that are successful and on the cutting edge are naturally more frequently featured in articles and publications. It is easy, then, for staff of all SALCs to regard the features and designs of these more advanced centers as goals to be sought after. It is vital to remember, however, that each school’s SALC should be shaped by the needs of the students, the capabilities of the staff, and the resources available. When schools adapted state-of-the-art language lab equipment, these language labs became too complicated and started to outstrip the ability of teachers and students to utilize them, thereby decreasing their usefulness. Therefore, newly implemented SALC facilities should be usable by teachers and staff, new resources should be useful and applicable to students, and all changes should be accompanied by proper instruction to all stakeholders.
3. Failure is an option. Please recall the introduction and my experience with my language lab. Not only was I the only teacher in the school who made any use of it, and not only was its technology cumbersome and outdated, but its simple existence was a hindrance to my classes. The large, immovable desks with hulking CRT monitors impeded group and pair work. Its headsets, buttons, and dials were a constant distraction to students. Its mere presence, its considerable monetary value, and the obvious efforts made to set it up and maintain it through the decades filled me with a sense that it should be used, and that to not do so would be a horrible waste. The failure was not my language lab’s slow slide into obsolescence. The failure was instead the inability or unwillingness to realize that it was no longer useful. It is said that it is always easier to destroy a thing than to create it, but in this case the opposite is true. The people, property, and processes that accompany any established institution have a weight and inertia, and the MESS that make SALCs possible are no exception. There inevitably comes a time when an institution has not only lost its usefulness, but also has become a hindrance to current and future possibilities. At that point it is prudent to look at different possible uses for the time, effort, space, materials, and personnel associated with it.

Ghosts From the Past

I recently visited my old high school. The language lab was still there, and communicative English classes were still scheduled in it. It was this visit that, in part, spawned the creation of this article. I saw the bolted-down desks and the headsets. I remembered the lengths to which my classes and I went in order to use it. Some of the modifications I had made to the hardware still remained. I felt a strange sense of pride at having taken part in this language lab, making it, if not useful, then at least useable. I think that if I had, upon my recent visit, instead found the language lab gone and replaced with a different sort of classroom or different facilities, I would have felt a sense of loss. I suppose such feelings of attachment are only human, but sentimentality and institutional inertia are insufficient reasons to utilize resources that may be put to better use elsewhere. 

Notes on the Contributor

John Larson is an assistant professor at Kyoai Gakuen University in Maebashi, Japan. He has taught students at every level from elementary to university in his decades-long career as an English teacher in Japan.

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