The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2013 annual report for Language Pie. Here's an excerpt: The concert hall at the Sydney Opera House holds 2,700 people. This blog was viewed about 16,000 times in 2013. If it were a concert at Sydney Opera House, it would take about 6 sold-out performances for that many people to see it. Click here to see the complete report.
1. Learn a second language to get ahead in business If you’re a business owner, or work for a business which trades internationally, being able to communicate with your partners, suppliers or customers in their own language is a unique selling point for your business. I used to have a Swiss born boss who was fluent in French. All of our French clients wanted to deal exclusively with him for the simple reason he spoke French. He did great business and won many contracts on the back of his fluency. 2. Learn a second language to [...]
Hand gestures only get you so far The bedrock of learning a language is vocabulary. Without it your ability to communicate is limited to pointing and hand gestures (and we can even get the meanings of those wrong!) When we start learning a language we need to accumulate high frequency words...words that are useful, appear often in the language and can be used in multiple situations. With several hundred well chosen words you can go a long way. What's the best way to learn them? Different ways to build your vocabulary There are [...]
Learn a language the easy way Do we over-complicate language learning? I suspect we do. Quite a lot. Language learning doesn't have to be rocket science Volumes have been written and theories abound about the best ways to learn a language. However, if we pause for breathe in all of our deliberations, we can witness the most successful examples of language acquisition: that is the example of children learning their first language. They do it efficiently and effectively and without resort to embracing any complex theories. Indeed they are oblivious - it is [...]
I know how much you all love to learn foreign language vocabulary so I thought I would provide you with some links to some ‘Halloween’ themed vocab. It’s not long now until All Hallow’s Eve is here……so how about you challenge yourself to learn some of these new words by then? French Halloween Words On the Quizlet website there is a set of Halloween themed flashcards that you can view online and then quiz yourself. An example of the vocabulary is :- Un loupgarou means a werewolf and Une lune entire means a full [...]
John Kerry's action disproves the fallacy that the only language you need is English. Lets just imagine he did in fact speak in English ... what response can we expect from the French? Muted at best. The French are so used to people speaking to them in English that when someone makes an effort - it makes an impact.
Learning a language is a great choice Languages make you wealthier. Perhaps not shocking but certainly true and something to think about as children head back to school. A Personnel Today report showed that the average wage for language graduates is higher than other graduates in areas such as Maths, Physics, Chemistry and Engineering after as little as 3 years. Added to that a recent poll of 500 companies, conducted for the National Centre for Languages revealed that one in four said the ability to speak a second language would give a candidate [...]
Hi everybody, Hope you have all been enjoying your summer. As it is school holiday time I’m sure lots of you have been on your summer holidays or making the most of the sunshine and having days out with your family. Here at KLOO it has been an exciting month for us as we have just launched our newest KLOO game! KLOO 'Catch the Bug' Reading Game It’s called ‘Catch the Bug’ and it joins the KLOO Reading Games section of our product line. It is a flashcard based reading game developed for [...]
Speaking a foreign language upgrades your holiday If we are lucky, for 4 weeks in a year, we try to get away from it all and take a holiday. It's a time when we treat ourselves and have a little bit of what we fancy. Eat well, enjoy the sun, go shopping, see the sights and have some fun...and why not? The Secret Holiday Upgrade Making an effort to speak the language of the locals is a great way to improve your holiday. What is more, the efforts you make will be repaid in so many [...]
Short answer: Yes Let's face it, language learning can be hard. To be competent you need to learn strange words; comprehend grammar, as well as learn the skills to speak, listen and read. It can be overwhelming - and for many people it is. The terminology of language, I think, is most off-putting: definitive articles, first person plural, pluperfect, the gerund, imperfect subjunctive! If I am honest I still have to stop and think whenever confronted with such terms. If that's not enough to scare away a budding new learner, I don't know what is. [...]
Recent Comments