From AI Conversations to Real-World Speaking Skills: Gen AI Roleplay Educative Game to Learn French

This presentation will introduce NautilIA, an interactive generative-AI roleplay game build through Google AI Studio designed to support French language learning through immersive, voice-based interaction. The presentation will first showcase the platform and its main features, including Gemini-generated narratives and visuals, voice-based interaction, speech recognition, text-to-speech narration, and built-in language-learning supports.
This talk will then discuss how NautilIA was integrated into a French as a Foreign Language course and illustrate how learners interacted with the game across multiple classroom sessions. Preliminary findings from an ongoing mixed-methods study will be presented, drawing on learner performance data, gameplay telemetry, and participants’ perceptions. These findings will highlight emerging patterns related to oral proficiency—including fluency, intelligibility, and comprehensibility—as well as learner engagement and interaction with the AI-mediated environment. The talk will conclude by considering the pedagogical affordances and current technical and instructional limitations of generative-AI roleplay games for language learning, with particular attention to how emerging AI technologies can be leveraged to create more interactive and personalized language-learning experiences.