Welcome to Fluency for Free

Melanie Leggatt, Modern & Medieval LanguagesIan Mackey, Information Services

http://www.flickr.com/photos/saint_george/5657629352/

Melanie LeggattModern and Medieval Languages

Ian MackeyInformation Services

FLUENCY FOR FREE

What you can achieve with a computer, a network connection and your inspiration

Based on a graduate training session entitled

The Web, my browser and me

And no money

Historically, an assumption that success was guaranteed if you threw cash at an expensive language-learning package

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Or indeed locked students in a language lab with grammar aids http://www.flickr.com/photos/fake_eyes/342753239/

The truth lies elsewhere

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In your own enthusiasm and ability

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You can avoid the financial cost – it's time and effort that count

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Lots of useful resources online, but no shortcuts

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Indeed the true skill likes in navigating through the piles of detritusto find the hidden gems

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A bit of a gallop so lots of supporting links available online after the sessionif you sign the attendance sheet and leave your email

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Primarily – that this isn't you

Quite the opposite – that you're bubbling over with ideasabout what you'd like to do

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You just need the tools to make it happen

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Introducing you to these tools, where to find them and the possibilities is the focus of this session

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The good news is that today we are spoilt for choice because of Web 2.0 and beyond!

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Before we go any further, an aside about Web 2.0 – just what is it?

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Initially with Web 1.0 we all tooled up and went shopping, then something changed. . .We stopped being merely consumers and started creating instead. Web

2.0 meant write access for all!

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Lots of people posted their own resources and made them freely available for sharing

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The good news for us is that this included language geeks!

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So, we have whole world of digital creativity to explore

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So which pieces of the jigsaw will you need?

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GatewaysHuman-reviewed listings of the best sites around

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GatewaysExamples

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Sites like Bab.la and Wordreference provide excellent online dictionaries

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Sites like Memrise and Busuu provide excellent online vocabulary resources

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Sites like Lang-8 allow you to connect with native speakers who willHelp you with your written language – of course you need to help them too

Tunein has a comprehensive listing of international radio stations playing online

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SOUNDS

Forvo 2,102,797 words 2,173,421 pronunciations 306 languages

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SOUNDS

On demand audio recordings from native speakers

Of course you have to help out others too. Try Rhinospike

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SOUNDS

ICDL provides free access to childrens' books with their limited vocabulary

Excellent for beginners!

The written word

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Online newspaper and media listings provide useful links for more

advanced learners!

The written word

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Online newspaper and media listings provide useful links for more

advanced learners!

The written word

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Generate your own flashcards to help extend your vocabulary and grammar

with Anki

TOOLS

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Italki: Skyping to improve your language skills

TOOLS

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DuoLingo offers totally free high-quality online courses

TOOLS

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Internet Polyglot also offers totally free high-quality online courses

TOOLS

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Join active online forums like the one at Fluentin3months

TOOLS

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Benny Lewis' account of how he went from mature monoglot to polyglot

INSPIRATION

Follow the most productive blogs

INSPIRATION

Follow the most productive blogs

INSPIRATION

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START YOUROWNBLOG!

SERIOUSLY!

If you can drive a web browser you can do it! http://www.flickr.com/photos/stephens-pictures/2962923660/

So how do we find the stuff to get started?

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Thankfully for us, publishing is now as easy as falling off the proverbial log

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And if you can use a web browser and drive a word processor it's easy to do it with style too

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1,000s of people blog on Wordpress so it can't be that difficult,can it?

You don't have to publish for everyone to see until you're ready

It can be somewhere for you to organise all your favouritelinks, record your thoughts and your progress

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Treat it like your personal language learning diary

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But if you do decide to share your experiences you becomepart of the online language learning community too

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And remember you can do it anonymously!

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And you can enjoy knowing you've reciprocally shared back

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Which neatly takes us back to systems like Diigo to help us manage all this information

Scoop.it – curating and displaying your favourite contentcreated by you and others

Looking forward: what next?

Explore the links on the page we'll supply you with

Don't forget to give it a go and have fun!

Questions

Onward to the practical!