english regional dialects

Summary

Yolango is a new (free!) site for learning English through online videos complete with transcripts and level divisions. It provides users with loads and loads of real video content from all over the Web. Those with an account can keep track of the videos they have watched recently and mark their favorite videos. It also maintains a scoreboard for user score rankings.

Many things are cool about this approach. It is straightforward, allows users to learn through content that they enjoy and can relate to, find other content based on keyword tags and expose themselves to literally thousands of videos on hundreds of topics all in one place. In addition to using tags, they've made it possible to further filter a keyword tag by "Category" (Music, Film, Travel, News & Politics...) or "Scenarios" (Transportation, Education, Dating and Relationships, Scandal and Gossip!...). The added transcripts are a boon to any English learner to improve not only listening comprehension, but also reading comprehension and, thus, writing skills.

Also available through the site are a series of activities for each video - pretty cool! You can choose activities such as fill in the blank, questions and definitions. (In order to do so, you have to have an account and be logged in.)

Yolango does a great job leveraging the immense volume of online videos and filtering them for the users to jump in and start learning. A great idea and an excellent execution. The site design is clean and lively, loads quickly and it would appear that there's a bright future for this hard-working team. Bravo Yolango!

From Website

Yolango.com is a new way for English language learners from around the world to immerse themselves in a wide variety of authentic and interesting videos. What makes Yolango different from other sites, however, is that all of our videos have been carefully transcribed and captioned. What’s more, Yolango captions are clickable, enabling users to receive definitions, usage examples and world level translations in 13 different languages for words they don’t know or would like to study further. Every video at Yolango also offers several challenging interactive games that build users’ listening, vocabulary, spelling and comprehension skills. Users compete to earn points and rise to the top of the Scoreboard.

Yolango.com is currently in Alpha release. Many, many more videos as well as powerful new features and communication methods are planned for the future.

Visit Yolango.com

Summary

ECPod is a booming site that has lots of different things all in one place. Mainly, the site offers a place for members of the community to upload and share videos that help others to learn Mandarin Chinese and English. Topics for the videos on the site range from Grammar to Humor to Kids to Whatever. There is a large variety of videos available on the site, and growing daily.

The site also offers a way to facilitate finding language partners for exchange and practice.

All in all, the site seems to be growing quickly into a vast repository of video materials for both English and Mandarin Chinese learners and teachers. Bravo!

From Website

Welcome to the ECpod community, where members from all walks of life in China and abroad teach each other Chinese or English and so much more. ECpod prides ourselves on the intrinsic value of not just book-learning but all the other qualitative factors that come from cultural exchange. You might learn the language, but we bet you will also learn cultural innuendo and colloquialisms. And guess what? It's free!

ECpod stands for "English Chinese Podcast" where our website's video clips are "Video Podcasted" by our members. While ECpod began as an English-and-Mandarin-only website, by popular demand we now accept clips in other Chinese dialects as well (for eg: Cantonese, Hakka, Hokkien and etc). We realized cultural exchange wouldn't be complete without the inclusion of a rich variety of Chinese dialects which tend to be characteristic of different parts of Chinese populated-areas. Furthermore, some dialects will be extinct within one or two generations. Preservation of Chinese culture and history is nothing if it does not also preserve the dialects spoken by some of the ancient families of yore.

Website Objectives

ECpod's main objective is to offer excellent interactive teaching tools for members to learn Chinese and English language. Other objectives of ECpod include:

* build a community of individuals with similar interest of learning a foreign language,
* bring the world closer together and allow members to meet and interact with people from different cultural background,
* to promote chinese cultures to the world,
* to promote English cultures to the world,
* most importantly, we strive to make education FUN and FREE !

Why learn Chinese?

(the reasons can be endless but here are some......)

Napolean Bonaparte said, "China is a sleeping giant. Let her lie and sleep, for when she awakens she will astonish the world." Little did he know......

* China with its 1.5 billion people has the world's fastest growing economy and effectively Chinese/putonghua is used by almost one third of the world's population.
* Now most foreign companies cannot resist not entering China to set up factories that tap a seemingly endless supply of cheap labor or to partner local Chinese companies for distributing their products in China. Whether you are looking to set up factories in China, pitching cross-border IPO mandates or lobbying with the Chinese government for business licenses, it always helps to speaka-the-language!
* Even if you are living on the other end of the planet, you can't escape China. China's affluent ranks are among the fastest growing in the world and these individuals are quickly upgrading their lifestyles and vacationing all over the world. Wherever in the world you are, you will probably be swamped by at least reasonably wealthy Chinese tourists willing to spend. It can only be to your advantage to sell your products or services to them in Chinese.
* Your company is expanding into China and will consider sending you there to run the show......No harm picking up the language now.
* And also the first step to understanding the beauty of the chinese ancient culture is to learn the language.

Why learn English?

(not difficult to understand why English is so important in today's information age......)

* Nearly a quarter of the world's population speaks some English. That includes around 400m who speak it as their mother tongue and about the same number who speak it fluently as their second language. (Source: The Economist, Dec 2006)
* Even though it does not have the greatest number of speakers in the world (as compared to Chinese), it is the most widely used language in the world, and it will be used by more people in the future.
* English is the major language of news and information in the world. It is the language of business and government even in some countries where it is a minority language.
* Three quarters of all telex messages and telegrams are sent in English. 80% of computer data are processed and stored in English.
* English is very important for international travel. Travel more easily and communicate with people wherever you go — English is spoken in more than 100 countries.

Visit ECPod.com

Summary

If you don't know about Wikipedia, now is the time to find out! Especially since it is so useful in learning languages.

Wikipedia is the "Free Encyclopedia", a collectively-authored, dynamic, online encyclopedia that is free not only as in price, but also as in freedom. This means that the content you find anywhere on Wikipedia is free and open in the Public Domain. You can reproduce, redistribute and rehash the information there. This is empowered by the GNU Free Documentation License. This same license protects and empowers the content on Free Language! (How?)

This particular resource links to the Wikipedia entry on the English language. This entry contains loads of information for the curious reader as well as for the serious English language learner, including historical and linguistic data.

Use this resource to become familiar with the English language and its context in today's world, to discover facts and linguistic data about English and its many varieties, access further information about and resources for learning English, and much more.

From Resource

English is a West Germanic language originating in England, and the first language for most people in Australia, Canada, the Commonwealth Caribbean, Ireland, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and the United States of America (also commonly known as the Anglosphere). It is used extensively as a second language and as an official language throughout the world, especially in Commonwealth countries such as India, Pakistan and South Africa, and in many international organisations.

Modern English is sometimes described as the global lingua franca. English is the dominant international language in communications, science, business, aviation, entertainment and diplomacy. The influence of the British Empire is the primary reason for the initial spread of the language far beyond the British Isles. Following World War II, the growing economic and cultural influence of the United States has significantly accelerated the spread of the language.

Because a working knowledge of English is required in certain fields, professions, and occupations, English is studied and spoken by up to a billion people around the world, to at least a basic level. English is one of six official languages of the United Nations.

Visit "English Language" on Wikipedia.

License

GNU Free Documentation License