Tag Archive for 'languagelab'

What are Languagelab classes like?

If you have visited our website and been to see a Helper in-world but still don’t know what our classes are like we have taken a little video of a class about buying and selling in English City.

The students are trying to buy a car from our car show room and are working in pairs to negotiate and improve speaking.The students are all in their home country and meeting at Languagelab to practice and learn with their teacher. One good advantage for them is that they can speak with people from lots of different countries so they can’t use their native language!

All of Languagelab’s classes have a speaking element so that you can practice the language that you have learned at school or in a previous class. You also get to be in a multi-national class so all the students have to use English to communicate.

Buying and selling is important in all countries and in all situations, and if you don’t know how to do that you limit yourself

Here is a little challenge for you:

tag, label, cashier, bargain, receipt, exchange, take back, try on, fit, advice, shop assistant, credit card, check, select, cash, refund, size, sale

What do the words above mean and how can  you use them in a sentence?

Try to make some sentences and post them back as a comment to this blog.

Or join us and ask one of our teachers!

Bye for now !!

Jessie Teacher

Languagelab named as solutions provider by Glenn Linden

Languagelab has been named as a solutions provider in Glenn Linden’s latest blog post on real world businesses that use Second Life.   “We define Solution Providers as professional businesses and individuals who work in Second Life with real-world businesses, creating immersive experiences that aim to invite, engage, educate and entertain fellow Residents, as well as their employees and internal audiences.”

Using the Second Life grid to operate a real life business is becoming increasingly common. As the pioneer of language learning in virtual worlds with a real life work force on every continent Languagelab is a working example of how traditional services such as language learning can be taken into the 21st century.

Glenn also said “Languagelab uses the immersive environment of Second Life as part of the learning experience for their unique language classes”.  Languagelab is in good company using the grid as a platform as L’Oreal, the World Bank and Cisco all use the grid to provide services and carry out promotional activities.

There are many reasons to use virtual worlds as a platform for your business; cutting operations costs, hosting international events without leaving a huge carbon footprint and taking advantage of the immersive environment to create a truly engaging experience. Being able to re-create an environment or situation as we can in English City is something that you could never do in real life.  If you live hundreds of miles from the nearest large city that has a multi-cultural population you may never meet anyone to practice your English with but as Languagelab students know, at English City there are lots of native speakers and students from 45 different countries to talk to.

See you soon in English City !

Top Ten Tips to Choosing a School in a Virtual World!

Being the newest an most innovative form of learning languages, plenty of students world-wide are jumping on the band-wagon to be educated on a virtual platforms. However, in the name of quality control it is now the time to really scrutinise the services available beyond the hype.

…So we here at Languagelab have decided to give you 10 handy questions that any student wanting to learn a language efficiently and effectively need to ask before they join one of the many schools out there on virtual platforms… Happy Reading:

Continue reading ‘Top Ten Tips to Choosing a School in a Virtual World!’

My Languagelab Experience (Portuguese)

Ola, meu nome é Paulo, sou brasileiro e moro no Japão onde trabalho em uma fábrica de autopeças.

Estou estudando na Languagelab desde Abril de 2008 e descobri esta escola em um site de jogos online. Devo dizer que estava procurando uma escola ou curso de inglês online já havia algum tempo então decidi experimentar estudar na Languagelab para ver como funcionava este novo modelo de ensino. Talvez pela minha familiaridade com jogos digitais, foi muito fácil me adaptar com a interface e controles que na verdade não se diferem muito dos programas que usuários de computador são habituados a encontrar em suas casas.

Estudando aqui, aperfeiçoei minha gramática, vocabulário além da capacidade de compreender e ser compreendido em inglês, pois todas as aulas são lecionadas por professores nativos do idioma e temos a opção de conversar com moradores de uma cidade inteira, experimentando situações reais da vida cotidiana. Apesar de não dominar muito bem o idioma não tive grandes dificuldades, pois todos os envolvidos no ensino se esforçam para tirar nossas dúvidas por mais simples que sejam.

O que considero como maior vantagem e diferencial dessa escola é o fato de poder estudar no conforto de minha casa e interagir em tempo real com falantes nativos que estão sempre nos estimulando a praticar levando ao aperfeiçoamento global do idioma.

No futuro pretendo viajar para muitos países onde o conhecimento do inglês será vital e vejo que conseguirei atingir esse objetivo de uma forma muito mais prazerosa que eu imaginava, por isso agradeço a todos os professores, os assistentes e amigos da escola e parabenizo os responsáveis deste incrível projeto.  

Paulo Tanimoto (Spytani Aichi)

DZIEN DOBRY! WELCOMING LANGUAGELAB POLAND

DZIEN DOBRY! WELCOMING LANGUAGELAB POLAND

Languagelab has selected Poland as the first country to introduce a designated learning support services team. Marcin Wawro (Learning Services Manager) and James Aldous (Development Manager) will assist and support Polish individuals and groups looking to learn English in a new and exciting way, as offered by Languagelab. To visit Languagelab Poland, go to www.languagelab.com/pl

If you or your company would like to speak with our Polish team to discuss ways of working together, do not hesitate to get in touch.

James Aldous (Development Manager, Poland)

james@languagelab.com

Marcin Wawro (Learning Services Manager, Poland)

marcin@languagelab.com

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Donatella Benoir back to English city

夏末的一天,在英语城购物的时候,终于又见到我最喜欢的英语城居民(English City people)之一Donatella,假期归来的她依旧谈笑风生。话题还是些老话题,但是每次都让我耳目一新。

英语城有很多故事,而Donatella总能把第一时间把第一手小道消息传给我,这次她谈到了pebblespebbles是另一位城市居民,一个做着好莱坞梦的乐观小姑娘,如果你常看美剧,说不定可以在屏幕中看到她)她告诉我pebbles的小兄弟也要搬来英语城生活了,然后不忘飞短流长的加一句pebbles的小兄弟是大胖子。

谈到最后她又要张罗着要给我找个如意郎君把我嫁出去,这个英国妞就是不顾文化差异,每次都是要用结婚的话题开我的玩笑,也不管我都羞的满脸通红了。还好她很快又转移话题说她迷恋的贝克汉姆马上要为她而和辣妹维多莉亚离婚了。

在Periwinkles 成衣店门前的Donatella总是一幅职业模特的姿态:) 她说自己还在为英语城筹备时尚设计和模特大赛,期待中:)
对于Donatella来说蜚短流长都是她的生活方式了,她总能用诙谐幽默和坦诚把说闲话演绎得精彩出色。她还是精明的生意女人,经营这英语城里最大的成衣店Periwinkles
如果你需要时尚、着装建议,一定不要错过Donatella:)

The end of summer is the beginning of new season Donatella Benoir back to English city

languagelab.com نظرة نحو أفق جديد للتعلم(1)

لطالما كان التعليم حاجة لم تستغني عنها البشرية على ممر العصور
وتنوعت أساليبه وطرقه باختلاف الأزمنة والحضارات . ولا شك أن الملاحظ لمسيرة التعل�
بتقدم الزمان يشهد تطورًا بالغًا من فترات النحت على الحجارة إلى استخراج الاوراق
والأحبار والأقلام هذا علاوة على تقدم أماكن الدراسة وظهور المدارس والجامعات وكل
أمر منها شهد ارتقاءًا وتقدمًا بالغين .

أما في عصرنا الحالي العصر الذي بلغنا فيه اقاصي الفضاء .. تبرز لنا استراتيجية
تعليمية حديثة ألا وهي التعليم عن بعد ” من مكتبك ومنزلك ” قد يكون هذا الأمر ليس
بغريبٍ عنا ولكن التعليم عن بعد هذا .. يستخدم تقنية العوالم الافتراضية ثلاثية
الأبعاد .

في هذه العجالة سأتحدث لكم عن تجربة التقيتها صدفة وذلك ضمن تصفحي شبكة الانترنت .
وهي تتلخص في موقع يدعى Languagelab.com .. هدف هذا الموقع تقديم الخدمات التعليمية
في مجال تعليم اللغات وذلك باستخدام أساليب مبتكرة تتيح لأي فرد من حول العال�
الانضمام لها . ويتم تركيز هذا الموقع وتقديم دروسه عبر برنامج يتيح للمشترك الولوج
إلى عالم ثلاثي الأبعاد ويدعى هذا البرنامج SecondLife وذلك بعد اجراء مستلزمات
التسجيل عبر الموقع . يتم استقبال جميع الطلاب الجدد في منطقة مخصصة لذلك ويت�
تعريفهم بالبرنامج والتأكد من ضبط إعدادات الصوت - لمحادثة بين المعلم والطالب
والعكس - وإرشاده إلى كيفية حجز الحصص الدراسية وكيفية حضور فعاليات التدريب على
اللغة المختلفة والمتنوعة والشيقة أيضًا .ولعل أهم ما يجذب المتعلم في هذه البرامج
تقريب العوالم له فمثلا قد تكون هنالك محاضرة في الانجليزية العامة عن كيفية حجز
التذاكر في المطار فيأخذك المعلم إلى مطار افتراضي ويتم هنالك استحداث درس . ويتنوع
البرنامج بالكثير والكثير من الأمور المفيدة والممتعة وهو ما يتيح بيئة تعليمية لأي
باحث عن تعلم أي لغة أخرى بأقل التكاليف.

Jessie Teacher speaks at the DRHA 2008


The DRHA 2008 conference at focused on how cross discipline knowledge sharing is essential to the future of digital humanities and teaching. Languagelab as experts in this field were invited to participate. The interdisciplinary nature of virtual worlds is not only relevant to teaching English at Languagelab but to many other communities of practice. Digital art, heritage, 3-D visualisation and engineering, science and theatre are all using virtual environments to create and share content. The use of virtual worlds in education was highlighted as increasingly important and a number of practitioners showcased their student collaboration and creativity in virtual environments. Among the leading institutions discussing their successful initiatives were The University of Pisa, Brunel University and Rezzable, Harvard Law School are now using Second Life as a platform to teach their courses, which are being marketed globally.

The other speakers at the conference also gave interesting presentations, here are some links to find out more about them:

Mike Takeo Magruder

Hugh Denard

Olinkha Gustafson-Pearce

Enrica Salvatori

Stephen Byrne

However there is a stark contrast between successful institutions and others who have established projects that have stagnated due to the lack of maintenance and provision of new content. Indeed, one delegate at the conference stated that many have ‘Built very impressive empty spaces’. This differs from others that are breaking new ground and attracting a significant number of new students.

Languagelab was specifically invited to show how the combination of; live actor immersive practice (The City People), classes and full courses combine narrative, student generated content and pedagogy to create a new way to learn language. Attendees were also given sight of of future projects at Languagelab, new courses (IELTS, Business and General English) and even a glimse of a radical new teaching methodology, TRIP.

How to use Languagelab in 4 easy steps…

WHICH ENGLISH DO YOU LIKE?

Greetings from Languagelab, welcome to our new features:

  • 7 day free trial!
  • The Grammar House
  • Easy payment via Paypal!
  • City people
  • (our new professional actors to help you study in real life situations)

    Here at Languagelab we help with every detail in learning English. Our professional native ESL teachers are from a wide range of English speaking countries from London to Los Angeles, Sydney to Southampton and many more. We can help you learn the important differences between different types of English for example*:

    Table 1

    *not 100% for all cases, there are some exceptions.

    The differences are not just in the spelling but cultural too!

    Can you notice differences between British and American English?

    Table 2

    Easy? Then take our level test now! Check below for the answers and join our new Myspace and Facebook pages too:

    www.myspace.com/wearelanguagelab

    www.facebook.com

    Search:
    “We Are Languagelab”
    “Second Life in English City” (Groups)

    Don’t forget to try our FREE lessons, we KNOW you will have fun learning English with Languagelab.

    See you soon;-)

    ANSWERS:

    1. USA/UK

    2. USA/UK

    3. UK/USA

    4. USA/UK

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