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Interactive L-R with Parallel Texts | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Learning Techniques, Methods & Strategies |  | |
| An Senior Member United States Joined 4908 days ago 10 posts - 20 votes Speaks: English | Message 1 of 16 20 August 2015 at 6:42am | IP Logged | |||||
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It has been nearly 10 years since siomotteikiru/aYa had shared his/her beautiful
thoughts regarding L-R approach here in this forum. Original L-R Thread http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=6366&PN=0&TPN=1 Although L-R was not new to many senior forum members here before that, aYa was very kind to show her personal approach and to spend a great deal of time answering many of our questions. As many of you I was instantly drawn to it and had wished that the tool and materials were more available for learners. Whether or not I agree with the specifics of the method, I found that there is something naturally addictive and easy about understanding a narrated story in parallel texts. When I Listen-Read and understand, I can feel the story...and I WANT TO FEEL the story/message whenever I am exposed to a new language. I LOVE that connection. There had been many wishes and laborious attempts to create this tool. And here after a long time, I would like to introduce to all the language learners here the "interactive L-R parallel texts" website where learners can - read along with highlight of parallel text (auto scrolling) - hover L1-L2 and L2-L1 dictionary for quick definition - click and restart from any phrase - works on Ipad/Iphone with Photon/Puffin apps (flash support app) Please free-signup and check it out http://www.languagelovers.net/signup/ http://www.languagelovers.net/fr-en- alice/ As of now I only have 1 French-English book available with more to come. It is a slow work-in-progress and it is not perfect. Please let me know what you think. Thanks, happy parallel-texting and just read AllenN P.S Any tool can be used in different creative ways. Use what works for you at different learning stages. 10 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| tommus Senior Member CanadaRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5893 days ago 979 posts - 1688 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: Dutch, French, Esperanto, German, Spanish | Message 2 of 16 20 August 2015 at 2:36pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Very interesting! I tried it out and it works very well. I have a few comments.
1. I almost didn't go to your sign-up page because you said "works on Ipad/Iphone. I took that to mean it ONLY works there. But it works in browsers. You should make that perfectly clear. I used it in a Chromium browser in Linux where it seems to work well. 2. After sign-up, it says that I have one free book. But it is not at all obvious how I get to that book. I now see that your second link in the post above is a link to that book. I also found it by looking around the web site. You should make it easier to get to that free book. 3. There are two modes, from the two buttons. One says Read by a red button/arrow. The other is just a red button/arrow. The two modes work differently. I was initially reluctant to press on the Read button because I thought it meant that I was to Read (record). But it is the best interactive mode to listen, with click for dictionary, pause, etc. However, that mode does not have the auxiliary dictionary that the plain red button/arrow has. All the features should be available in a single mode. 4. In the read mode, you can resume by clicking on the French text or the English text. But if you click on the English text, the reading resumes at the NEXT paragraph. In general, I was very impressed. Excellent audio. Very fast responses to interactive controls. Excellent dictionary. Well designed. Do you plan to have Dutch-English books? 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| An Senior Member United States Joined 4908 days ago 10 posts - 20 votes Speaks: English | Message 3 of 16 20 August 2015 at 10:10pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Thank you Tommus for your input:
...."1. I almost didn't go to your sign-up page because you said "works on Ipad/Iphone. I took that to mean it ONLY works there. But it works in browsers. You should make that perfectly clear. I used it in a Chromium browser in Linux where it seems to work well. " You are right :). It works in all browsers those support flash whether android or iOs. I'm glad you made that clarification. ...."2. After sign-up, it says that I have one free book. But it is not at all obvious how I get to that book. I now see that your second link in the post above is a link to that book. I also found it by looking around the web site. You should make it easier to get to that free book. " The book is located at the book menu or here http://www.languagelovers.net/fr-en- alice/ .... "3. There are two modes, from the two buttons. One says Read by a red button/arrow. The other is just a red button/arrow. The two modes work differently. I was initially reluctant to press on the Read button because I thought it meant that I was to Read (record). But it is the best interactive mode to listen, with click for dictionary, pause, etc. However, that mode does not have the auxiliary dictionary that the plain red button/arrow has. All the features should be available in a single mode. " Clarification: - READ button will start interactive L-R parallel texts (built-in hover dictionary, no aux dictionary) - red button/arrow is to play only audio (include abbreviated hover dictionary and aux dictionary) ..... "4. In the read mode, you can resume by clicking on the French text or the English text. But if you click on the English text, the reading resumes at the NEXT paragraph." - when READing, the L2 is interactive. This means you follow the highlighted reading in L2 and replay any phrases in L2 by clicking. L1 (right column is for parallel translation/context only and has no audio) Yes Tommus, I plan to have other language pairs books as well. I will note your interest in Dutch-English. I have added you for the complete book access. Please enjoy and let me know if other thoughts come to mind :) Cheers 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| tommus Senior Member CanadaRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5893 days ago 979 posts - 1688 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Dutch, French, Esperanto, German, Spanish | Message 4 of 16 22 August 2015 at 1:28am | IP Logged | |||||
OK. I have spent some more time on the site. Again, it is quite impressive. As you say, the interactive books are rather limited at the moment. That is not a problem, but I think it is very important to put a clear explanation right up front to explain the current status and functions of the web site. Otherwise, new users will be confused about what it can do. They will search for books and articles and language pairs that either aren't there yet or are noy yet complete. They will get a parallel text but will be confused about why they can't find the audio (which isn't there yet). The site seems to be set up at the moment as primarily to learn English from several languages, but not the reverse. For example, Call of the Wild has English plus 6 other language, but only English is set up as L2 with audio. There is no way to reverse the order and get the audio for the other 6 languages. I don't find that parallel texts with only L1 audio to be very useful. Again, I understand the site is under development so that situation is OK. But it needs to be clearly explained UP FRONT. Otherwise, new users will just get frustrated and not come back. There should be a way to select your target language and then get a list of articles/books in that language which have parallel L2/L1 text, showing which of those also have L2 audio.
Again, that should be made much clearer on the buttons themselves or in the header for this part. It is still very confusing to a new user that, when you sign in, the first thing you are confronted with is a big interactive panel like this: MY PAGE TO RECORD YOUR READING 1) Click RECORD and OK here 2) Open a separate window/tab for reading text 3) When completed click SAVE, DOWNLOAD or 4) EMAIL voice MP3 RECORDING to info@languagelovers.net for feedback What is this really all about? It certainly needs more explanation. This feedback is meant to be very constructive because I think you have a potentially very useful product. But be sure you don't confuse all your new users by having features that seem like they should work but don't, and there is too much guesswork about how things do work. I'm sure this is a whole lot of hard work. But it is looking good. 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6624 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes 4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 5 of 16 22 August 2015 at 1:41am | IP Logged | |||||
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Wait, are there parallel texts for pairs other than English-French?
1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| tommus Senior Member CanadaRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5893 days ago 979 posts - 1688 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Dutch, French, Esperanto, German, Spanish | Message 6 of 16 22 August 2015 at 2:35am | IP Logged | |||||
An gave me "complete book access", I guess because I provided some feedback. So that gave me access to one more book (Call of the Wild) with English text and audio, and parallel text in 中国, Deutsch, 日本語, Pу́сский язы́к, Español and 한국어. If those fonts don't work, they are Mandarin, Japanese, German, Russian, Spanish and Korean.
1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| An Senior Member United States Joined 4908 days ago 10 posts - 20 votes Speaks: English | Message 7 of 16 22 August 2015 at 6:22am | IP Logged | |||||
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Hi Serpent, I hope to have more language pairs books in the very near future. I will
keep you posted. Thanks for your previous inputs 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| An Senior Member United States Joined 4908 days ago 10 posts - 20 votes Speaks: English | Message 8 of 16 22 August 2015 at 6:58am | IP Logged | |||||
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1) "...I think it is very important to put a clear explanation right up front to
explain the current status and functions of the web site. Otherwise, new users will be confused about what it can do. They will search for books and articles and language pairs that either aren't there yet or are noy yet complete. They will get a parallel text but will be confused about why they can't find the audio (which isn't there yet)." Great point, corrected. Now after login user will see link: "Site Is Under Development!…Click Here To Go To Interactive Parallel Text Books(Click READ to play and red button for audio only)" 2) ...."The site seems to be set up at the moment as primarily to learn English from several languages, but not the reverse. For example, Call of the Wild has English plus 6 other language, but only English is set up as L2 with audio. There is no way to reverse the order and get the audio for the other 6 languages. I don't find that parallel texts with only L1 audio to be very useful." Correct Tommus, currently L2(the language being acquired) is setup to be on the left column and is the only interactive part to be clickable-repeat and highlighted read- along. The other languages had not been prepared for interactive read yet. The other book you found is for English learners :) and therefore English is their L2. 3) ...."There should be a way to select your target language and then get a list of articles/books in that language which have parallel L2/L1 text, showing which of those also have L2 audio." That feature will be available as our library grows of course. This is the hard part. 4) ...."It is still very confusing to a new user that, when you sign in, the first thing you are confronted with is a big interactive panel like this: ...." Very true, the recording is not necessary at this point and therefore removed for now. 5) ...."This feedback is meant to be very constructive because I think you have a potentially very useful product. But be sure you don't confuse all your new users by having features that seem like they should work but don't, and there is too much guesswork about how things do work." Thank you for your feedback Tommus. I appreciate them. 6) ..."I'm sure this is a whole lot of hard work. But it is looking good." :) It was... I think some learners can finally begin to use it now although it will be work-in-progress for some time. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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