What Does It Mean to Be a Competent Language Teacher in the Age of AI?
Teacher AI competence is about more than mastering tools. How can language teachers use AI critically while responding to learners’ diverse linguistic and cultural backgrounds and learning needs? Participants will explore changing teacher–AI relationships and take away innovative ideas for using AI.
Dr Huixin Wang
Sat Nov 7th 11-12.30 GMT
Online Via Zoom
Registration is free (via our website or here: https://canva.link/
Abstract
What does it mean to be a competent language teacher in the age of AI, beyond knowing how to use the latest tools? In this interactive session, I will invite participants to explore this question through their own teaching experiences and perspectives. Drawing on our recent study published in the Journal of Research on Technology in Education, I will introduce a framework for critical multilingual and multimodal AI competence that foregrounds the linguistic and cultural dimensions of English language teaching. Through guided discussion and classroom-based examples, we will consider how AI competence takes different forms across linguistic, cultural, institutional and classroom contexts.
Together, we will explore how teachers can critically evaluate AI-generated materials across languages and modes, respond to learners’ diverse needs, and negotiate the respective roles of teachers, learners and AI. Particular attention will be given to teachers’ professional agency and the question of epistemic authority: who decides what counts as trustworthy and appropriate knowledge in the classroom? By reflecting on their own contexts and exchanging perspectives with colleagues, participants will take away innovative ideas for using AI in their language teaching, alongside practical questions to guide more critical, inclusive and context-sensitive practice.
Speaker biography
Dr Huixin Wang is a Boya Postdoctoral Fellow at Peking University. She completed her PhD in Education at the University of Edinburgh, where she also worked as an Associate Tutor and dissertation supervisor in Language Education. Her research explores language teacher and learner agency, motivation, and critical AI competence, with a particular focus on designing and researching AI-supported English language teaching systems. She has also advanced a 3D model of Directed Motivational Currents to understand sustained motivation in language education. Her work has appeared in international journals including TESOL Quarterly, the Journal of Research on Technology in Education, and Language and Education. Her research on AI-supported language learning received BAAL/Cambridge University Press funding in 2025. Alongside her research, she has helped organise international academic conferences and academic talks.