TED Talks as a Tool for High-Level Learners of English

Videos can be an interesting way of practicing languages. Quite often, though, it is useful to have captions and/or subtitles for them. Captions in the language we are studying can make it easier for us to learn new words as we encounter them. We can see their spelling as well as hear them pronounced and used in context. Similarly, subtitles in our first language (or in another language we are comfortable with) can help us better understand the video’s content. When both captions and subtitles are available, a learner could, for example, watch the video with subtitles first, to get a good understanding of the content, and then watch it again with captions to practice the target language in greater depth.

With that in mind, here is something I thought language learners – and high-level learners of English, in particular – might enjoy. It’s a website with excellent talks (in English) by all sorts of really smart people on all sorts of topics, from sustainable development and food to how the brain works, education, autism and a whole lot more.

http://www.ted.com/

And here is a link for the most recent ones (for 2010): http://www.ted.com/themes/a_taste_of_ted2010.html

The videos have captions/subtitles in various languages – which always include English, but almost always include several other languages. Here are all the ones with Korean subtitles: http://www.ted.com/translate/languages/kor

If you click the red “Open interactive script” on a video’s page, you will see a transcript of everything said in the video. If you click on a word, the video will jump to that point and start playing from there. A very useful resource, I think.

Hiragana Times

Yet another smart.fm series. This one is from Hiragana Times and is intended for somewhat advanced learners of Japanese. Each of the lists includes a short text in Japanese with the English translation. The vocabulary in each list is taken from the text and the example sentences too. The topics covered all look pretty interesting. Here is the link: http://smart.fm/series/3335

[EDIT: smart.fm shut down and became iknow.jp. As of July 2nd, 2011, it seems the Hiragana Times series still hasn't made the transition to the new website. I do not know whether or not it will become available again at some point in the future. If it does, I will add the link here.]

Modern China: The Media

Another great smart.fm series, this one from Cerego: http://smart.fm/series/3325

This series of five intermediate course covers 1,220 common Chinese words and expressions that you need to know in order to understand Chinese newspapers and magazines. Most of the sample sentences focus on the kind of societal commentary you see in today’s press, both in style and content. Mastering these items will give you a solid foundation in written Chinese and the more formal side of spoken Chinese.

This series is aimed at students who have studied Chinese for at least one year. Second-year students of Chinese at the university level should start with the first course in the series, Chinese Media: Lesson 1. Third-year students should probably jump ahead to Lesson 2 or 3.

To learn more basic Chinese characters, have a look at the “Mastering Chinese Characters” series from TaipeiProgram. There is probably some overlap between the two series, but I would expect them to complement each other well.

[EDIT: smart.fm shut down and became iknow.jp. The content is now organized on two pages: one for Simplified Chinese and another one for Traditional Chinese.]

Mastering Chinese Characters

Another excellent smart.fm resource for learners of the Chinese language this time. This list was not made by Cerego. It was made by a partner organization though, so the quality is excellent. I haven’t used it personally, but it includes example sentences and audio for both the words and the example sentences, just like all the lists created by Corego itself. I do not know much about the Chinese language, but I think the series is standard Mandarin Chinese with the traditional (rather than the simplified) writing system. (Please correct me if I’m wrong.)

This series of courses teaches the 2,700 most important Chinese characters. These characters collectively represent over 98% of the characters used in written form in newspapers and other journalistic essays.

Mastering these 2,700 characters is the key to achieving literacy in Chinese. The first course, Level 1, assumes little or no prior knowledge of Chinese characters, while Level 10 is for very advanced learners.

Our selection of characters represents an attempt to strike a balance between the most common characters and the most useful ones, with a focus on characters necessary for reading journals, essays, and newspaper articles.

Consulting frequency lists, our staff of experienced native-speaker instructors chose characters that, in their judgment, (1) are pertinent to society, culture, science and technology, business and economics, administration, politics, military affairs, the environment, and other current issues of international importance; and (2) are useful in understanding the main ideas of prose conveying factual information and the writer’s opinion.

Here is the link: http://smart.fm/series/3334

[EDIT: smart.fm shut down and became iknow.jp. The content is now organized on two pages: one for Simplified Chinese and another one for Traditional Chinese.]

Intermediate Japanese

Another great smart.fm series from Cerego – the creators of smart.fm – for learners of the Japanese language:

This series picks up where the Japanese Core 2000 left off, covering the next 4,000 most important words in Japanese. So when you finish both series, you’ll have mastered 6,000 items.

The series contains a total of 12 lists that cover quite challenging intermediate and upper-intermediate items. This series is for the learner of Japanese who has already mastered the basics and can get by in most everyday situations. Once you have completed this series, you’ll have a solid command of spoken Japanese, and you should be able to follow the majority of what you read in newspapers.

Here is the link: http://smart.fm/series/3321

[EDIT: smart.fm shut down and became iknow.jp. The various series for learners of the Japanese language are now presented on this page.]

Japanese Core 2000 [Kanji Focus]

Another great smart.fm series from Cerego for learners of the Japanese language:  http://smart.fm/series/3319

Note:This series is identical to Japanese Core 2000 apart from the fact that it only includes items from that series which contain kanji. All courses in this series are optimized for study in the iKnow! application’s Kanji Only mode.

I have not yet used this smart.fm series myself, but Cerego is a Japanese company and I am sure that their Japanese language series are very solid. I believe that James W. Heisig’s excellent Remembering the Kanji could prove to be an excellent complement. The latter is an authority when it comes to learning the kanji. I will cover it in more detail in a future post.

[EDIT: smart.fm shut down and became iknow.jp. The various series for learners of the Japanese language are now presented on this page.]

Beginner Japanese: Core 2000

In a previous post, I mentioned that smart.fm has an excellent series called “Core 2000″ that focuses on the 2000 most important English words. The “Core 2000″ series presented here is the mirror image of that. It presents the most commonly used Japanese words. It includes example sentences and English translations, with audio for both the Japanese words and the Japanese sentences (but not for the English translations since the focus here is on the Japanese). Here is the link: http://smart.fm/series/3318

Please note that the focus of the series is on vocabulary rather than grammar. Therefore, the grammar used throughout the series is fairly basic – intentionally so, to make sure that the users understand the sentences. To learn Japanese grammar as well as vocabulary, it might be a good idea to combine this tool with something else. I will cover resources to learn Japanese grammar in another post.

Finally, if you haven’t done so already, you should learn hiragana and katakana before starting the Core 2000 series. (You can do so here: http://smart.fm/series/3322 )

[EDIT: smart.fm shut down and became iknow.jp. The various series for learners of the Japanese language are now presented on this page.]

Learn to Write Japanese – Hiragana & Katakana

If you want to learn Japanese, I believe it will be extremely helpful to learn these two writing systems first – before trying to learn words and expressions, I mean. I’m not sure whether it is best to learn them before, at the same time as, or after learning the kanji, but the latter will be covered in another post. For now, here is the link: http://smart.fm/series/3322

[EDIT: smart.fm shut down and became iknow.jp. The various series for learners of the Japanese language are now presented on this page.]

Erudite Vocabulary (English-to-English)

For native speakers of English or high-level students of the English language, smart.fm offers another great series. I recommend it wholeheartedly to all of the crossword puzzle lovers and Scrabble players out there. Here it is: http://smart.fm/series/324-vocabulary

[EDIT: smart.fm shut down and became iknow.jp. The various series for advanced learners of English are now presented on this page.]

SAT: English-to-English

In addition to its excellent “Core 2000″ series, smart.fm has several other great lists for students of the English language. The material presented here is for slightly more advanced students and is presented in English only. In other words, the lists contain English words with English definitions rather than English words with their translation into a foreign language.

In the words of the good folks at Cerego: “The two lists in this series cover 500 of the most frequently tested words on the SAT. Master these to ace the verbal section.” For those of you who may not know what the SAT is, here is the Wikipedia explanation: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SAT If you want to study in the United States, this series will probably improve your chances of getting into a good university.

And here is the link to the SAT lists on smart.fm: http://smart.fm/series/325-english-to-english

[EDIT: smart.fm shut down and became iknow.jp. The various series for advanced learners of English are now presented on this page.]