Learn English » English Learning Programs

Learn English with Google products

admin — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 13:34:27 +0000

In one of my previous articles I wrote how you can learn English using Internet, but today I am going to attract your attention to Google products which can help you to learn English in the most effective way. Google is my favorite search engine, I really love googling in Internet but Google has also lots of great products which can be useful for those who learn English as a foreign language. If you are ready, I am happy to present you a brief summary on these products:

Not long ago I found some interesting material (I will write about it next time) how to learn English reading original articles in English. And it’s really great as it can help you to improve your English and learn the latest news online. Google News http://news.google.com will help you. Just search for the news in any sphere you like and read them.
If you have any difficulties with translation or you don’t know the meaning of the words, it is very comfortable to use Google Online Translation Service http://translate.google.com/. It’s very easy to use, just choose your language, enter a word you want to be translated and get a result in less then a second. You can get a translation of a paragraph or a webpage but the quality of this translation will be rather poor, still it can help you to understand the meaning of the text.
If you want to communicate in English on various topics you like, you are to use Google Groups http://groups.google.com/ where you can find lots of different sections and topics. Choose any group you like, join it and communicate. It’s a great way to improve your English written skills and it’s very user-friendly as you can get notifications about new messages to your email box. I also plan to open a new Google Group for this site to help you to learn English more effectively.
The other tool I recommend you to use is called as Google Language Tools http://www.google.com/language_tools. Here you can enter any keywords in your native language and get correct search results in English. It’s very convenient if you have just started to learn English and your vocabulary is poor.
The last Google Tool I want to tell you about is Google Scholar http://scholar.google.com/. You can search for articles, books and educational materials using it.

If you know any other Google products, write about them in comments to this article and I will add them to this list.

Let’s continue learning English

admin — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 09:31:47 +0000

Hello, my dear ”Learn English” readers. It’s autumn now and I am ready for new knowledge and new experience. This summer I visited Greece and had a great time there with lots of wine, fun and handsome guys who were ready to make all my dreams true. I had a wonderful opportunity to improve my English while communicating with native speakers.
I hope that you also have had a great time and now it’s time to continue learning English. Visit my blog for more English tips.
By the may do u know any English classes ratings? This rating of foreign language courses in Russian.
Thank you for your help in advance.

Is it easy to learn English

admin — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 11:29:08 +0000

Many clever students need loads of easy English input, not hard science and math. Plenty of research internationally shows that hard content subjects taught in English are NOT the best avenue for most pupils, and can even be counter-productive – best to learn these in your first home language. That ensures best cognitive development.

Too many learners here are being pushed too quickly up the “Everest” of complex academic English without really mastering the most common 1,500 words and the basic structures of English “plain talk”. Malaysians learning English, especially outside the largest urban areas, need to have loads more easy “comprehensible input” – mainly through lots and lots of voluntary lighter reading and extensive listening for fun, largely outside the classroom. This can also improve writing and speaking. There’s a lot of research to support this (see www.ijflt.com ).

“Easy” means you already know about 98% of all the words you’re reading or listening to.

One great resource for all learners is Voice of America Special English, on shortwave and now online (www.voaspecialenglish.com ), cost-free. Every day, there is 10 minutes of world news,

followed by two feature reports in 14 categories, all kinds of topics – from development and economics to health, exploration, agriculture, science, music, education and a kind of American “mosaic” of culture. Entertaining and informative stuff.

Special English is based on a 1,500 headword basic vocabulary. Sentences are short, averaging 14 words. Lots of repetition. There are few adjectives and almost no idioms. One “idea” per sentence. The speed of delivery is 90 words per minute, about 25% slower than “normal speaking tempo, great for improving listening and pronunciation. For all reports, you can both read the text and listen to the audio.

Shelley Gollust, the director of Special English, recently commented: “It’s almost like Hemingway. You can write something easy and direct, and it’s more powerful that way.” There’s a huge online archive, thousands of articles. Many feature articles are a kind of “English for Science Lite”, adding some technical vocabulary. Though run by the US government, this is not a propaganda channel. Its coverage is very balanced.

For extensive listening of easier material, another superb site is www.eslpod.com . Check it out. Also pretty easy, many average learners will love it. Stick to massive input of “plain talk”. It can work wonders.

Most children and adults learning English in Malaysia should first try to master and “over-learn” a simpler English, through lots and lots of easy reading and listening. The trick is recycling grammar and basic vocabulary. Then, if you like, trek on up the mountain of complex English, your legs (and self-confidence) will be much stronger.

Easy way to learn new English words using Google services

admin — Mon, 05 May 2008 10:12:48 +0000

When you learn English abroad and have no chance to take classes with native speakers or communicate with then in everyday life it is very difficult to learn new English words which are used nowadays. That’s why sometimes our English is more like Hindi as we use old words and expressions which are nit used by native speakers or have another connotation at present. As for me I found a great way out. You know that Google is the biggest search engine in the world and this company has other services which can be useful for those who learn English. So let’s start:

• Talk (Windows 2000/Windows XP/Server 2003/Vista)
Chat with native speakers (the same as ICQ)
• Reader
Read different blogs for English students
• FeedBurner
Find feeds to add them to your Reader.
• Gmail (Also known as Google Mail)
Write emails to your panfriends to master your language.
• YouTube
Watch different videos to learn spoken language
• Book Search (Previously Google Print)
Find educational books to learn English
• Language Tools
Collection of linguistic applications, including one that allows users to translate text or web pages from one language to another, and another that allows searching in web pages located in a specific country or written in a specific language.
• News
News in English – the best way to learn new words.
• Scholar
Search engine for the full text of scholarly literature across an array of publishing formats and scholarly fields. Today, the index includes virtually all peer-reviewed journals available online.
• Answers
Question and answer service, allowing users to pay researchers to answer questions.