A Critical Look at How Lecturers in Linguistics Can Leverage Generative Artificial Intelligence in Enhancing Teaching Proficiency and Students’ Engagement

This paper focused on how lecturers in linguistics can leverage GenAI to enhance their teaching proficiency and student engagement. The paper used a quantitative approach, including 293 university lecturers teaching linguistics. The TPACK theoretical model was adopted, wherein two main segments of the theory, namely technological knowledge (TK) and technological content knowledge (TCK), were used to explore the importance of leveraging GenAI to enhance teaching proficiency. The results indicated that these tools greatly enhanced the linguistics lecturers’ teaching proficiency. The study revealed that a significant majority of lecturers acknowledged using Quizizz for test and exercise generation in linguistics, followed by a substantial portion who utilized the ChatGPT series for teaching and learning enhancement without compromising academic integrity. Additionally, many lecturers reported frequent usage of Education Copilot for lesson planning and student record tracking, as well as Google Bard (now Geminin) for teaching enhancement and increased student engagement. The study also found high acceptance rates among lecturers for the effectiveness of ChatGPT, Bard, Quizizz, and Educational Copilot in translation courses, with similarly positive responses for discourse analysis courses, teaching proficiency enhancement, and student engagement across various pedagogical areas. Thus, these tools can enhance teaching and learning at the university level and students’ engagement when the lecturers have the Tk and the TCK.