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Infinite English App supplements ESL speaking, listening skills
Using Infinite English to practice reading text, passages aloud
“For the things we have to learn before we can do them, we learn by doing them.”
Do your students use phone apps to learn English? For those looking to sharpen their speaking, pronunciation and listening skills, Infinite English from Vocefy Inc. could be a viable option. As demoed by this YouTube video, the app takes in any block of words–from a text, document or online article–and allows students to practice with it. They can record themselves reading it and get instant feedback; words they pronounce incorrectly will pop up in red and words that could be better pronounced come up in yellow. Afterward, they can listen to their recording and then have Vocey, the app’s “tutor,” read the passage. The app can also translate the text and define words within the text, making it accessible to 64 different types of native speakers.
In its introductory video, Infinite English emphasizes that Vocey’s effective tutoring capabilities. Additionally, the video highlights the fact that users will not feel embarrassed to get feedback from this virtual entity. Though Vocey should not replace human resources like teachers, tutors or even classmates, she could help beginning English learners ease into speaking and listening. Vocey’s feedback may be accurate and instantaneous, but it lacks real human response that is crucial for students to learn from, in order to become better conversationalists.
Infinite English sells for $9.99 in the iTunes Store, a bit pricey on the app side, but perhaps a sound investment if students improve their English speaking and listening abilities. It’s also worth nothing that students can use the app “infinitely,” because any chunk of text can be copied and pasted and processed by Vocey. For students that are new learners, shy or on-the-go, Infinite English could supplement their learning.
What other apps do your students use to learn English?
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Create Compelling Conversations.
Visit www.compellingconversations.com
Between life and death: Zombie nouns privilege pretentious vocabulary at the expense of simple clarity
Photo source: TedEd ScreenshotThe nominalization of nouns creates abstract, dry and often misleading language
“Simplicity is the glory of expression.”
Sometimes, it’s fun to play with the English language and transform its adjectives, adverbs and nouns into more complex-sounding words. Playing with word forms can both emphasize a key concept and add an academic tone. Like many other English teachers, I continually emphasize the many advantages of deploying a strong academic vocabulary and maneuvering through different word forms.
This act of nominalizing words, however, can be dangerous. Helen Sword, author of Stylish Academic Writing, coined the phrase “Zombie Nouns”, which also appeared in her New York Times article. Zombie Nouns tack on suffixes like “ity,” “ism” or “tion,” instantly creating larger words–think idealism, deviation or even antidisestablishmentarianism. There’s even a TedEd on the subject based on her article that English teachers should appreciate.
Many academics and graduate students love incorporating zombie nouns into their writing because the tone becomes more intellectual, more sophisticated. Yet, sometimes, too much of a good thing can become a real problem. Zombie nouns often lose powerful verbs and ideas along the way, and sometimes what they say comes out as gibberish. Sometimes this hyper-abstract language can also encourage sloppy, vague, and distorted thinking. Sword provides several powerful examples of how nominalizations make it possible to cut out subjects, ignore context, and leave behind a rather indigestible statement like:
“The proliferation of nominalizations in a discursive formation may be an indication of a tendency toward pomposity and abstraction.”
Each italicized word, or zombie noun, is not particularly difficult on its own to understand. Nevertheless, the overall impact of all these nominalizations renders the sentence useless. Yes, students should be encouraged to manipulate language, but we want to clarify and not obscure concepts. This far too-common mistake may be a higher-level good mistake, but the consequences can be quite severe. Sword, evoking the spirit of Orwell, explores several variations of awful academic writing in her lucid 2012 “Stylish Academic Writing” which provides practical pointers and elegant expressions.
THE TEACHERS’ ROLE
It still behooves English teachers, especially working in English for Academic Purposes programs, to demonstrate word forms to their students. How else will philosophical ideas like individuality or equality enter their vocabulary? When simpler words can be used, however, and communicating clearly supersedes sounding intellectual, zombie nouns should be avoided. Instead, juicy verbs and descriptive nouns should fill up a student’s sentence – especially if writing for non-specialists.
Sword also directs readers to a fun, potentially useful tool: Writer’s Diet. Users can paste in a writing sample and the test generates a number based on how “fit” or “flabby” the writing is. A side note–this article, minus Sword’s nominalized sentence, scored lean or fit in all categories. This site seems particularly valuable for English language learners and young academics.
How do you teach both teach academic writing and avoid excessive reliance on zombie nouns?
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Biscuit: mobile app to recall, learn, explore vocabulary words
Innovative technology allows students to absorb new vocabulary
“The limits of my language means the limits of my world.”
Have you ever found a word you don’t know, jumped to your dictionary, tried to remember the spelling, typed it in, gotten the definition and promptly forgotten it? For avid language lovers and learners alike, this frustrating process is all too familiar. That’s why Brent Warner from EdTechTV poses these questions in his professional YouTube review of Biscuit, a mobile app for English language learners and word mavens.
As Brent describes, the app works simultaneously with other apps–simply highlight the word of interest and Biscuit pops up a banner on the top of the screen with its definition. Tap the notification to view the word, modify the definition and sort it by viewing the sidebar. Under the settings tab, students can choose a variety of languages to translate from, making the tool accessible to English language learners from several backgrounds.
Other tech-savvy components should appeal to English language learners. For instance, you can set up “Word Reminders” that send push notifications of certain words to jog their memories. You can also indicate how familiar they are with particular words through highlighting, dimming and sorting. Moreover, Biscuit contains an “Image to Text” feature–though like Brent, I have yet to find it in the actual app itself. “Image to Text” allows users to snap pictures of books and other publications and the app will extract the words captured in the photo and present them in list format.
WHY I LIKE BISCUIT
For students adept with technology, Biscuit serves as a powerful, flexible modern tool for learning self-chosen vocabulary words. After all, the site asserts that Biscuit is “faster than a dictionary [and] easier to use than traditional flashcards of word lists.” I also see students pulling out their phones while reading newspapers, magazines and menus to store new words in order to learn them later. By creating an efficient, approachable mobile app, Biscuit has the power to generate persistent and effective vocabulary learning.
Another great thing? Biscuit can be found for free in the Apple iTunes store or Android app store. I’m adding it to the recommended resources list for my international graduate students.
What tools do you use to learn new vocabulary? What other mobile apps help you and your students learn?
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Teachers and Tutors Should Know About Compelling Conversations
English teacher and tutor Joan V reviews Compelling Conversations
“We all like to be recognized not for one piece of fireworks, but for the ledger of our daily work.”
Sometimes you just have to smile.
Praise, especially from an experienced colleague, on a difficult project feels satisfying. In the last week, I’ve received three emails from Joan V., an ESL teacher and tutor, praising Compelling Conversations: Questions and Quotations on Timeless Topics – the book that I co-authored and self-published. Her experiences mirror my own experiences with the material, and validate the book’s premise: engaging students in sophisticated conversation helps build their vocabulary, leads to memorable conversations, and deepens relationships.
Here, in Joan’s own words, are excerpts from her strong recommendation for the unorthodox ESL book.
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I am an English tutor working with Japanese adults in Jackson, Michigan. I was a public school and ESL teacher for many years, retired, and now my retirement job is tutoring. A few weeks ago I purchased the PDF of your book and then this week I bought the hard copy which just arrived from you this morning. I want to tell you what a marvelous book this is!
I’ve always used questions as a conversation stimulus, and now I have this whole organized around topics book to use with my students! As you probably know, Many Japanese arrive in this country with a fair understanding of English grammar and quite a lot of vocabulary, but are initially unable to engage in conversation. This book is the perfect answer to this situation!
Thank you so much for putting this together!
Teachers and tutors should know about Compelling Conversations. I was a classroom ESL teacher for many years, went to conferences with book displays shopping for books, and was usually disappointed by the books I saw. There were a lot of boring books out there!
The book needs to on display at ESL conferences if they are still being held. ESL teachers and tutors working with intermediate and advanced level students would choose this book over almost anything else if they knew about it. Also many community colleges have ESL programs using traditional materials focused on grammar and repetition rather than real meaningful conversation which your book provides.
I happened on your book accidentally on the internet and looking at the sample lessons, I quickly knew that this book would work for my students.
I wanted to add one more thought regarding Compelling Conversations. It is saving me a lot of time! I have been tutoring Japanese adults (businessmen and their wives) for nine years after retiring from almost 30 years of teaching in public
schools. I’ve spent so much time gathering materials from various sources–textbooks, my own materials, bilingual dictionaries, etc.
Now I’m finding that printing out a chapter of your book provides plenty of conversational focus for at least two hours or more of tutoring time. Even more important, our conversations are at a deeper level. For example, in
chapter two there are some questions about childhood. A couple of weeks ago a student bordering on fluency was able to tell me about his childhood dreams and that now he is living that dream! I was thrilled!
Thanks.
Joan
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Wow!
Thank you, Joan! You made my week!
Check out sample Compelling Conversations lessons for yourself at:
http://www.compellingconversations.com/pdf/cc_sampler_esl.pdf
http://www.compellingconversations.com
Hopefully, you will have the same satisfying experiences that Joan and other satisfied teachers and tutors have had with Compelling Conversations. Enjoy!
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English language learners should beware of saying ‘Yeah, yeah, yeah’
Yeah Yeah Yeahs is a popular indie band, but “Yeah, yeah, yeah” is a problematic response to job interview questions.
“In common use almost every word has many shades of meaning, and therefore needs to be interpreted by the context.”
Television personalities, celebrities, and basketball players often respond to questions with “Yeah, yeah, yeah.” In fact, there’s a popular indie band called the “Yeah Yeah Yeahs.” Many English language learners mimic this phrase, partly because they want to sound like the “typical” American. It’s a good instinct.
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TONE MATTERS
Yet this casual expression can also be a profound mistake in more formal settings, like job interviews. It’s one thing when a professional basketball player who has just scored 45 points in a game and makes $25 million a year, is asked “Do you feel good about your performance tonight?” It’s another when a student is asked a verifying question such as “You have been studying English for five years, correct?” saying “Yeah, yeah, yeah” in response can be viewed as disrespectful. This snappy response has become a personal pet peeve of mine when interviewing international students for their language skills. Perhaps they think they’re just confirming the fact in a casual manner. Alas, “yeah, yeah, yeah” sends a less friendly message.
I’ve often discussed the importance of informational interviews, and it would be a shame that a students’ misunderstanding could reflect unfavorably upon them to potential employers. “Yeah, yeah, yeah” can sound condescending and even snarky. (Snarky, by the way, denotes a sharp, cutting and caustic tone).
Context almost always counts. Let’s clearly distinguish the casual and professional setting to make students aware of boundaries. “Yeah, yeah, yeah” sounds perfect if you want to accept a friend’s invitation to a beach party. You can also inadvertently offend a potential employer by repeating the same phrase. Be aware; be careful.
What are some of your pet peeves in daily conversations? How do you teach the importance of tone in your English classes?
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Create Compelling Conversations.
Visit www.compellingconversations.com
