This webinar will outline strategies and best practices for incorporating generative AI into the Russian language classroom. Presenters will share resources and activities that draw on the affordances of AI to enhance students’ classroom experience. They will also consider the efficacy of using AI chatbots to provide students with task-based conversation practice outside the classroom. The presentation will include samples of student work alongside students’ reflections on their experience using AI to complete Russian assignments. In addition to exploring the benefits of incorporating generative AI into language instruction, presenters will discuss potential risks and drawbacks of AI usage, as well as tips for encouraging students to engage responsibly, ethically, and effectively with AI as they progress in their language learning. Specific topics to be covered include prompt engineering, AI as a tool for providing feedback and assessment, the ethics of AI usage, and the impact of AI on students’ experience and perceptions of language learning. 

Kit Pribble is an Assistant Professor of Russian at Wake Forest University. Her areas of research are second language acquisition with an emphasis on digital learning technologies, as well as the development of Romantic prose forms in Russia in the 1830s and 40s. Dr. Pribble has published and presented widely on topics within 19th-century Russian literature, Romanticism, and L2 pedagogy, including projects on using Slavic folklore and digital social reading in the L2 classroom. She teaches Russian at the elementary, intermediate, and advanced levels alongside courses on literature and culture. 

Doina Grecu is a PhD candidate studying TESOL and World Language Education at the University of Georgia. Her research interests focus on teacher language ideologies and their influence on classroom practices, as well as the decolonization of the Russian as a Foreign Language classroom. She is currently teaching Russian at the intermediate level and has previously worked with students at the elementary, intermediate and advanced levels as part of the Russian Flagship Program at UGA.