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Learning Languages
Featured Resource
- Mango
- Freely available to members of Thrall. Start learning any of the following languages: Arabic, Chinese (Mandarin), Dari, Dutch, English (American), English (British), Filipino (Tagalog), French, German, Hebrew, Hindi, Indonesian, Irish, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Latin, Pasto, Persian (Farsi), Polish, Portuguese (Brazil), Russian, Spanish (Latin America), Spanish (Spain), Swahili, Swedish, Turkish, Urdu, and Vietnamese.
English as a Second Language (ESL)
- BBC Skillswise: English for Adults
- Practical literacy skills for adults. Topics include Reading, Writing, Spelling (British), Word Grammar, Sentence Grammar, and Speaking and Listening. Will have a British emphasis. From the BBC.
- The Best Free Language Learning Websites
- Reviews of 14 sites giving pros and cons of each site. From Lifewire.com.
- ELL/ESL Resources
- "Web-based resources that address the needs of students who are nonnative speakers of English called either "ELL" (English-language Learners) and/or "ESL" (English as a Second Language) students, terms which are used interchangeably on this site." Topics include General ESL/ELL Resources, College Writing for ESL/ELL Students, TOEFL Preparation. From SUNY Empire State College.
- English as a Second Language (ESL) for Teachers and Students
- "Whether you are a teacher looking for ESL teaching materials, a beginner who's just starting out, or an advanced student who wants to hone and polish reading comprehension, conversation, and writing skills, these resources can take you to the next level." Topics include: Basics; Pronunciation & Conversation; Vocabulary; Writing Skills; Reading Comprehension; Grammar; Business English; and Resources for Teachers. From Thoughtco.com.
- The Internet TESL Journal
- Includes articles, research papers, lesson plans, classroom handouts, teaching ideas & links. Also includes links to previous issues going back as far as 1995.
- ManyThings.org
- "This web site is for people studying English as a Second Language (ESL) or English as a Foreign Language (EFL). There are quizzes, word games, word puzzles, proverbs, slang expressions, anagrams, a random-sentence generator" and other language learning activities. Also includes "American Stories for English Learners". Text and MP3 audio files for 57 fifteen-minute readings of stories from such writers as Edgar Rice Burroughs, Willa Cather, Folk Stories, O. Henry, and more.
- My Best of Series
- Websites for ELL, ESL and EFL teachers grouped by subjects from art, classroom practice, jobs, games, health to writing. From a high school English teacher's blog.
- Oxford Learner's Dictionary
- Includes Topic lists of words, Word Lists focusing on the Oxford 3000 ("a list of the 3000 most important words to learn in English"), and Academic Words.
- Tongue Twister Database
- "For teachers of young English Language Learners (ELLs)" From the EFL Playhouse.
Other Language Learning Resources
- ASL University: American Sign Language
- Free lessons for words, phrases, and conversations. Videos require the Adobe Flash player. To look up the sign for a word, select the first letter of the word at the top of their page, then scroll down on the left panel to find the word and click on it to see how it is signed.
- BBC: Languages
- This page has been archived and is no longer being updated. Courses in French, German, Portuguese, Spanish, Greek, Italian, and Chinese as well as essentials in 36 other languages including Japanese, Albanian, Danish, Polish and Russian.
- The Best Language-Learning Software
- From PC Magazine.
- Booklets By Language
- "Download PDFs of any booklet here. PDFs and some MP3s are also available for User's Guides."
- Busuu
- "Learn languages online with interactive language courses and lessons." Languages include: Arabic, Chinese, English, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Turkish, and Spanish.
- Ethnologue: Languages of the World
- "An encyclopedic reference work cataloging all of the world's 6,912 known living languages."
- FSI Language Courses
- "The FSI (Foreign Service Institute) language courses are arguably the best free language courses available anywhere. The FSI language courses cover over 40 languages from the most spoken in the world to some less well known ones. Some of the language learning material is a bit dated, but it is still possible for someone to learn a huge amount from this material This material is public domain, that means we have put it up at no costs, and with no commercials. Feel free to use and download the PDF files and audios on this page however you would like. All of these files are the original, and some of them are a bit old (over 30 years) so some of the information in them may be a bit out of date, but they are still the best free language courses you can find anywhere." From the Live Lingua Project.
- Let's Learn Korean
- Free online lessons basic to advanced. Includes conversational and travel phrases, pronunciations, and more. From KBS.
- lexicool.com
- "lexicool.com offers primarily a directory of 'all' the online bilingual and multilingual dictionaries and glossaries freely available on the Internet. It is a resource intended for translators, linguists, language students and all those interested in foreign languages. The directory currently has links to over 7500 dictionaries and glossaries, many of which have been created by translators working in specialist fields."
- Mango Languages
- With free registration, website provides access to some online language lessons in English, Spanish, French, Japanese, Russian, Greek, Mandarin Chinese, German, and Italian.
- Modern Language Association Language Map
- View and compare color coded maps of the United States as a whole or by each state. Bar graphs can be created by state, zip code, town, city or county.
- National Foreign Language Center E-Learning Portal
- Requires a subscription of $5.00/month.. From the University of Maryland.
- OmniGlot: A Guide to Written Language
- Find alphabets currently in use as well as decorative and religious alphabets.
- Open Culture
- "This collection features lessons in 40 languages, including Spanish, French, English, Mandarin, Italian, Russian and more. Download audio lessons to your computer or mp3 player and you're good to go." From Open Culture.
- OverDrive / RCLS eBooks: Foreign Languages
- Thrall/RCLS members: browse and download language learning eBooks and eAudiobooks in the library system.
- Spanish Pronunciation
- "Use this section to quickly develop confidence in your Spanish pronunciation skills." From StudySpanish.com.
- Speech Accent Archive
- "The speech accent archive uniformly presents a large set of speech samples from a variety of language backgrounds. Native and non-native speakers of English read the same paragraph and are carefully transcribed. The archive is used by people who wish to compare and analyze the accents of different English speakers." From George Mason University.
- Rosetta Stone Library Solutions
- Online language learning program available to Middletown Thrall Library card holders.
- WordReference.com
- Free online bilingual dictionaries for English-Spanish, English-French, English-Italian, Spanish-french, and Spanish-Portuguese. Also includes German, Swedish, Russian, Polish, Romanian, Czech, Greek, Turkish, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, and Arabic.
Linguistics and Studies of Languages
- Do You Speak American?
- Based on a PBS show. Topics include: Words That Shouldn't Be?; From Sea to Shining Sea; What Speech Do We Like Best?; What Lies Ahead?. From PBS.org.
- Endangered Languages Project
- "The Endangered Languages Project, is an online resource to record, access, and share samples of and research on endangered languages, as well as to share advice and best practices for those working to document or strengthen languages under threat. The languages included in this project and the information displayed about them are provided by the Catalogue of Endangered Languages (ELCat), produced by the University of Hawai'i at Manoa and The Institute for Language Information and Technology (The Linguist List) at Eastern Michigan University."
- Frequently Asked Questions about Linguistics
- "The LSA publishes a series of educational and authoritative pamphlets on language-related issues. Written with the layperson in mind, FAQs have been used as instructional aids in Linguistics courses, at information sessions for undergraduates and prospective majors interested in linguistics courses, and as part of outreach program to professionals in other fields." Why Major in Linguistics?, How Many Languages Are There in the World?, What is an Endangered Language?, Does the Language I Speak Influence the Way I Think?, Is English Changing?, Language Acquisition, Bilingualism, Ebonics, Sign Language, How Did Language Begin?, and more. Topics include: From Linguistic Society of America (LSA).
- Global Language Monitor
- "Global Language Monitor (GLM) documents, analyzes and tracks trends in language the world over, with a particular emphasis upon Global English."
- Language and Linguistics
- "Common to all humans, language is nonetheless complex. How do languages develop and change? What happens when one is lost? What about sign languages? Linguists explore these questions and more." Includes introductory information on dialects, endangered languages, and sign language. Provided by the U.S. National Science Foundation. Adobe Flash required for some parts.
- Lexicon of Linguistics
- Search or browse. From the Utrecht institute of Linguistics OTS, Utrecht University.
- The Modern Language Association Language Map: A Map of Languages in the United States
- "The MLA Language Map is intended for use by students, teachers, and anyone interested in learning about the linguistic and cultural composition of the United States. The MLA Language Map uses data from the 2000 United States census to display the locations and numbers of speakers of thirty languages and three groups of less commonly spoken languages in the United States."
- OED Appeals
- "The OED Appeals is a major new online initiative involving the public in tracing the history of English words. Using a dedicated community space on the OED website, editors are soliciting help in unearthing new information about the history and usage of English, including the earliest examples of particular words. The website enables the public to post evidence in direct response to OED editors online, fostering a collective effort to record the English language and find the true roots of our vocabulary." From Oxford English Dictionary.
- The World Atlas of Language Structures (WALS)
- "The World Atlas of Language Structures (WALS) is a large database of structural (phonological, grammatical, lexical) properties of languages gathered from descriptive materials (such as reference grammars) by a team of 55 authors (many of them the leading authorities on the subject)." From Max Planck Digital Library.
Pronunciations
- Names
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- Author Pronunciations
- "Guidance on how to pronounce those tricky author names." From BookBrowse.com.
- Author Name Pronunciation Guide
- "A collection of brief recordings of authors & illustrators saying their names. Hello, my name is … [O]ne-minute audio recordings of authors and illustrators pronouncing and telling stories about their names." Over 2000 names. From TeachingBooks.net.
- Encyclopedia Mythica: Pronunciation Guide
- Alphabetical list of names and pronunciations and the areas with which they are associated. From Encyclopedia Mythica.
- The Name Engine
- "Provides audio name pronunciations of athletes, entertainers, politicians, newsmakers, and more."
- Pro-nounce
- "Use VOA's Pro•nounce to correctly pronounce names and places quickly and easily. VOA's pronunciation guide has helped people around the world pronounce challenging words in the news since 2000." Browse by region and last name. From the Voice of America.
- Say How? A Pronunciation Guide to Names of Public Figures
- Over 11,000 entries. From the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped.
- Words
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- BibleSpeak
- "Learn How to Pronounce Hundreds of Bible Names & Words!"
- inogolo
- "The site contains a searchable database of names with both phonetic and audio pronunciations in English."
- The International Dialects of English Archive
- A "free, online archive of primary source dialect and accent recordings for the performing arts... Recordings are in English, are of native speakers, and include both English language dialects and English spoken in the accents of other languages." From the University of Kansas.
- Pronouncing Dictionary of Music and Musicians
- Contains 30,000 names. Download A-Z guides in PDF format. From WOI Radio, Iowa State University.
- The Speech Accent Archive
- "The speech accent archive uniformly presents a large set of speech samples from a variety of language backgrounds. Native and non-native speakers of English read the same paragraph and are carefully transcribed. The archive is used by people who wish to compare and analyze the accents of different English speakers." From George Mason University.
- UCLA Phonetics Lab Archive
- "For over half a century, the UCLA Phonetics Laboratory has collected recordings of hundreds of languages from around the world, providing source materials for phonetic and phonological research, of value to scholars, speakers of the languages, and language learners alike. The materials on this site comprise audio recordings illustrating phonetic structures from over 200 languages with phonetic transcriptions, plus scans of original field notes where relevant." From University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA).
Online Keyboards - Typing Characters in Other Languages
- Branah
- "Type in your language." Choose by language.
- Chinese Input (IME)
- Type in Chinese.
- Lexilogos
- Type in Chinese, Spanish, Greek, and most other languages. Choose by language.
- TypeIt
- Choose by language.
