HAL 9000 in Space Odyssey, Optimus Prime in Transformers, C3-PO and R2-D2 in Star Wars - ever imagine what it will be like to have a real conversation with a robot. Too far-fetched? Impossible? Believe it or not, it's now possible. There's no need to get an iPhone 5 or an iPhone 4S to have a hands-on experience conversing with an AI. Cleverbot is an experimental application that can communicate with humans with basic knowledge of social conventions.
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Editor's review
★★★
Acceptable.
The good: There's no need to spend a quid to get a smart phone or an iPad if the main purpose is only to talk to an AI. You can have a near Siri or Simsimi application for free on your computer. You can write (internet chat) or even speak to the AI. It can now replicate more affective reactions. It can talk about many topics. It is available on smartphones and tablets too.
The bad: Cleverbot functions by collecting and matching current conversation with its binary memory of encountered conversations. It learns from people. A drawback to this system is that it doesn't have any filter that can help the AI to determine between rude and appropriate responses. There might be a slight difficulty for the AI to understand other than American English especially British English. It can only understand English. No facial expression. It can be very misleading and frustrating if the AI fails to understand the underlying meaning of our sentences. It's not built in and depends heavily on the internet.
The bottomline: Students can learn to appreciate dictation and improve their social and a percentage of writing and speaking skills with an AI. It is going to be very interesting to see how students will use Cleverbot since chatting with 'bots' is the mainstream in technology. An example how AI is used in real life is in this 'Ask Anna' from the IKEA website. Another application like Cleverbot but it has a 'face' is Evie.
How to
This is going to be the easiest and fastest tutorial.
1. Type out your message in the chatbox and press enter or press the tiny 'mic' butoon to speak. Choose 'think about it' so Cleverbot will ask you and make you as a topic instead.
2. Choose 'thought so far' to see the transcription of the conversation. The rest is just similar to how any 'internet application works. Enjoy!
How might you use it to foster language learning
Introduction to great literature
A great way to introduce the notable literature work by Isaac Asimov's - "I, Robot". Cleverbot can help to activate students schemata. By the end of the lesson, teacher can explain the limitations to Cleverbot. Teacher can help to scaffold students' cognitive skill by asking 'directing questions'. Students wll eventually notice that no matter how perfect a human creation is, it's not flawless. One of it is that robots or AI cannot imitate feelings. They're synthetic.
Speak to AI
Set a topic to be discussed with the AI. Topic can be decided based on the majority vote in class. Instead of typing out the questions, students will have to say the questions. By the end of the class, students can compare each other's products to their conversation with the AI. They can self-discover and analysis their speaking skills. Students can actually notice how their speech actually looks like when transcribed by Cleverbot.
Rationale
Save
What I mean is that students don't have to give out personal details when using Cleverbot and less likely to be a victim to pervert internet stalkers. However, teacher should always remind students that they're not supposed to give out any personal information to strangers even if it's Cleverbot who's asking for it.Interactive and communicative
It is two way conversation whereby students will be responded by an actual audience. Students will see that even in a complete random conversation that there is always be a sense of purpose. It can speak about many topics and students can feel more laid-back when using it because Cleverbot employs conversational street English.
Individualistic
It is not a very good application to be used as a pari activity, whatmore as a groupwork activity. Though students can be engrossed by Cleverbot. The language class will be at risk of having a 'quite class'. There is only one-to-one conversation with Cleverbot.
Formative Assessment
When students are absorbed with what they can do with Cleverbot, teachers can play their role as monitors. Teachers can take note students' speaking or writing skills. Use the transcripts to help in further evaluation.
Listening Skill?
It will be more realistic if Cleverbot can speak. However, this is possible with Evie. It will be more interesting if Cleverbot can have a face because in speaking, body language and facial expression do effect how someone speaks. Some messages can only be interpreted through body gestures.
Chat lingo and inappropriate language
Though Cleverbot can be a very interesting aplication to replace human speakers, students might not benefit language learning by only through street language and chat lingo that is not academical. Students might also come across inappropriate verbal slurs.
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