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Web 2.0 and Learning Spanish Grammar 2007-03-13 09:34:56
I’ve been working on Spanish
Sense more and more in recent days. I had been concerned about tackling the grammar of an entirely new language, but in fact, it’s turned out to be really interesting and quite manageable. One reason has been Maria’s tremendous knowledge of Spanish grammar. She knows this stuff and she can make it accessible. Excellent.
Another encouraging thing has been discovering how we can actually do something really unique with grammar - stuff that hasn’t been done before and could not be done in a book format. Let me explain through some notes I wrote after a recording a newbie lesson yesterday:
Let’s push on with the inductive approach where ever possible. In the audio we need to make the distinction between offering examples (these should be concrete and drawn from from the dialog) and abstractions (the grammar rules that offer generalized, deductive observations).
Always start with concrete examples. Take them from the dialog, and ex Read more:Learning
, Grammar
Grammar´s ghosts 2007-03-07 10:56:57 Every time that I start to work with a new group of students, I ask them which the difficult aspects of Spanish are for them. The more popular answer is that they care about verbs in Spanish. Honestly, I believe that is a point to be considered, but they seem to be harder to handle than what they really are. With enough time and practice any student can discover the patterns followed by the verbs and he is able to use them. In second place the topic of the gender of certain kind of words, such as nouns and adjectives, is mentioned.
These days I’m working in the grammar section. I’m wondering what things the learners need to know about the formal structure of the language. What is helpful for them. I’m listening to as many opinions as possible. I would like to receive your impressions in this space. Read more:Grammar
, ghosts
Who is there? 2007-02-28 11:29:18 Here is María, a Spanish teacher. I’ve been working as teacher since I’m very young. In fact, when I took my first group of students I was 19. Some minutes after I left the office of the school’s director who had hired me, I lost all the confidence in my self that I had been trying to show her during our interview. I began to think about how my daily life was going to change from this moment, how many responsibilities I was going to have and, mostly, how difficult was going to be awaking every morning at 6. As soon as these thoughts were disappearing a big question appeared on my mind. Who were going to be my students was my obsession for the next weekend.
“Who” meant several things in this context. I was wondering about their previous knowledge and expectations. This was actually the point: what they were expecting from me, what they wanted to learn and how. To understand that these questions don’t have a definitive answer took me some time, and probably to ke
A good resource for learning Spanish 2007-02-15 07:57:13 Here’s a pretty good resource for the Spanish
learner. It’s a weekly podcast on the subject and it’s called Trying to Learn Spanish. Although it doesn’t directly instruct the language, it compliles resources that are helpful to the learner. Well worth a listen.
I plan to contact the host at some point in the near future.
Ken Carroll
Why all the grammar? 2007-02-07 08:37:31 It seems to be de rigeur to base all Spanish lessons on grammar. I guess it’s not surprising. Structurally speaking, Spanish has a lot in common with Latin, so I guess it inherited the old fixation on grammar.
I listened to some Spanish instruction podcasts this week and found a good deal of the same fixation. Another issue I found in the podcasts was the focus on things like ’stuff you’d find in the kitchen’, or ‘drinks’, or ‘clothing’. This makes for horrendously boring and irrelevant lessons. To make lessons engaging you need a predicate/verb, and a situation. Lists of words have none. Situations are inherently interesting, lists aren’t. Nor does the list enable a conversational flow in the target language, a serious no no. And as if this weren’t enough, the need to fill the list leaves the instructor oblivious to frequency of the items, so he piles in with anything you might find in a kitchen. But does the newbie Spanish
Pushing forward with Spanish Sense 2007-02-06 01:07:16 We had a very good response on the ChinesePod blog for people interested in the Spanish
project. There simply are many more people in the US and Europe studying Spanish than Mandarin. I think we’ll find some really great talent, especially if we use the Big Brain to do it - for example through the ChinesPod blog.
One issue for me is the pedagogical basis of the program and particulary the role of grammar. I’m keen to see if the lexical approach will work. (I’m pretty sure it will.) As far a I can tell it hasn’t been widely used to teach Spanish. I definitely want an alternative to the old grammar-translation approach.
Ken Carroll Read more:Pushing
, Sense
Learning Spanish through podcasts 2007-02-01 06:47:05 Here’s an article from a couple of weeks ago that offers insight in to podcasting and the Spanish
market. There isn’t much out there. Coffeebreak Spanish surged to the top of the iTunes educational podcasts listings in the last few weeks. I guess this points to an interest and indeed a market for Spanish in our format.
The article also says:
Gone are the days of pricey foreign language textbooks and lengthy lectures. All it takes is a high-speed Internet connection to download lessons and listen to them on a computer or a portable MP3 player.
Er, maybe.
Ken carroll Read more:Learning
Interest in learning Spanish 2007-01-31 04:45:50 I wrote a post on ChinesePod last night about the plan to launch a Spanish
product. The response was good. Lots of good comments on how there is no one single concept of Spanish, for example. Many of the people who responded are indeed interested in learning Spanish. I guess if you speak the Big Three languages - English, Spanish, and Mandarin - it’s got to be good for something!
Someone also asked if we were not making a mistake by changing the focus of the company. It’s a question that we’ve thought about hard. I’ll try to answer in more detail in the coming days and weeks.
Ken Carroll Read more:Interest
Learning Spanish 2007-01-30 11:21:48 Over the coming weeks and months I’ll be sharing my ideas on how to learn Spanish
. Not that I know much about learning Spanish - in fact I haven’t even started yet. But maybe that’s why it could be interesting.
I have a fair bit of knowledge of several other languages, including French and Italian, so my guess is that Spanish won’t be all that difficult. We’ll see. Either way I hope my experiences are of some help to other newcomers to the Spanish language.
I’ll also continue in my existing role with ChinesePod.
Ken Carroll Read more:Learning
Praxis in the NYT 2008-02-16 20:33:00 An article in Sunday’s Times discussing distance language learning (with an excellent photo of one of our students - Mike Kuiack - as well). Check it out »
Help us Select a Domain for the Online Confucius Institute! 2008-02-06 16:44:13 With the Hanban partnering with ChinesePod to develop the Online ConfuciusInstitute
, we have been encouraging them to be a lot more collaborative with the people who will use the site - that is, you. For reference, the last attempt at a domain name was “Linese”, or short for living in Chinese.
Please let us [...] Read more:Select
Praxis Language Partners with NOCFL to Develop Online Confucius Institute 2008-02-06 16:43:31 Beijing/Shanghai, February 7, 2008 — Praxis Language is partnering with the National Office for Teaching Chinese as a Foreign Language (NOCFL, also known as the Hanban) to develop the Online ConfuciusInstitute
.
At present, 180 Confucius Institutes operate in 50 countries with independent websites and promotional activities. With today’s agreement, however, Praxis Language will develop [...] Read more:Partners
Praxis Language 与国家汉办合作，开发网络孔子学院。 2008-02-06 16:42:37 北京/上海，2008年2月3日
Praxis Language 与中国国家汉办合作，共同开发网络孔子学院。
目前，分布于50个国家的180所孔子学院都独立运行和推广其网站。而根据今天的协议，Praxis Language将会开发正式的孔子学院官方网站（网络孔子学院）以帮助他们统一其活动。这个网站将由国家汉办与Praxis Language合作开发学习资料库，一如ChinesePod。同时，网站也会为学习者、教师以及机构提供实时更新的信息，用以进一步发展成长中的汉语教学行业。此外，新型的网络社交方式使个人或者团体在学习中能够整合他们的电子学习资料。世界各地的中文老师将会有一个平台去共享、联系以及合作，从而也推进了汉语教学
Meetups. How can we help? 2008-02-01 19:25:35 We are big believers in language learning as a social process. That said, we do take a different approach than some of the other leading, language social network verticals (e.g. LiveMocha, Mango Languages, Shanghai-based iTalki, etc). While they tend to put the emphasis on making connections first and then introducing the language learning content after, [...]
Partner with Praxis: The Affiliate Program 2008-01-21 01:05:29 How would you like to lend a hand to Praxis Language, with minimal effort, and get paid in the process?
If this sounds too good to be true, read on.
Praxis Language is now running an affiliate program, and anyone with a blog, website or e-newsletter is eligible to join up. You can place an ad on [...] Read more:Partner
, Affiliate
, Program
LanguagePod Cities 2008-01-15 21:25:41 We are busy planning a number of features to help regional groups of Chinese & Spanish language learners get together. So, I thought it might be a good time to review our current top cities.
ChinesePod Top 10 Cities
Shanghai
Beijing
London
Singapore
Sydney
Chengdu
New York
Hong Kong
Bangkok
Melbourne
SpanishPod Top 10 Cities
London
New York
Bogota
Washington
Melbourne
Sydney
Brooklyn
San Francisco
Madrid
Houston
Please let us know if you have any ideas or requests [...]
SpanishPod Product and Community Updates 2007-12-26 06:05:12 Hope you’re enjoying your holidays!
SpanishPod Product Update
Just one thing to report this week: new subscribers to SpanishPod will be treated to a “Welcome Podcast,” featuring the SpanishPod team explaining their roles, as well as some crucial concepts that are important to the SpanishPod experience. New subscribers will automatically receive the “Welcome Podcast” in their [...]
ChinesePod Product Updates 2007-12-24 04:39:18 Here we are again, telling you what’s new on ChinesePod.
You can once again choose in your personalized feed whether to include simplified characters, traditional characters, or even both.
There is a new “Welcome Podcast” for the new users. You “old users” can still go listen, of course…
As for future features:
Expect new exercises later this week. (OK, [...]
SpanishPod Product and Community Updates 2007-12-18 10:22:25 It’s been another big week at Studio Fiesta…
SpanishPod Community Updates:
Thanks, everyone, for all your encouragement, your support, and for getting the word out about SpanishPod. Today, SpanishPod was #2 among educational podcasts according to iTunes USA, and #45 in overall podcasts. Even more impressive are the great reviews we’re getting on our [...]
ChinesePod in Masie’s Learning TRENDS 2008-03-12 22:03:33 original article @ The MASIE Center
Language Learning
by iPod: An Emerging Model
by Hank Horkoff and Jonathan M. Kayes
As podcasting becomes ubiquitous in the world of e-learning, it can bring us almost anything from investment tips, to interviews with leading authors some of which are fabulous and others have you reaching for your MP3 player to [...]
Server Upgrade 2008-03-21 21:43:53 Both ChinesePod and SpanishPod will experience some down time today from 3pm to 4pm (Beijing time), as our servers in the United States are upgraded with more RAM. This should lead to faster and more reliable site performance. We thank you for your patience.
Learn Spanish By Phone – A Pioneering New Service From SpanishPod 2008-04-02 03:07:08 “Spanish
Pod has launched the Practice Plan, which connects students and professional Spanish teachers by phone at anytime, anywhere in the world. “
Shanghai, April 2, 2008 - From today, people will be able to practice their Spanish with a native Spanish teacher at anytime and anywhere thanks to a revolutionary new service available through SpanishPod.com. One-to-one [...] Read more:Service
Our Blogs 2008-04-01 03:41:04 Just a reminder that if the discussion seems a little slow here it is probably because we are posting in the Conversation sections of the LanguagePod sites and on our own blogs. If you are interested in joining the discussions:
Ken Carroll blogs at Here Comes Everybody
John Pasden blogs at the legendary Sinosplice
JP Villanueva blogs at [...] Read more:Blogs
Bienvenue à FrenchPod 2008-05-11 22:13:18 Everyone at Praxis Language is very happy to announce that FrenchPod is now open to the public, joining ChinesePod and SpanishPod in the growing Praxis Language family. Erica, Amaury, Christela, and Christophe have been working hard in preparation for this launch, and it shows in the quality and variety of lessons already available.
If you’re already a ChinesePod or SpanishPod subscrib Read more:Bienvenue
We’ve moved 2008-06-06 06:20:43 The new Praxis Language website has launched, and we’ve moved this blog to a new address: If you’re reading this in a feed reader, please change your subscription to look forward to seeing everyone at the new site.
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