Archive for E-Learning

The causes of common difficulties in English learning

April 12, 2010   Filed Under: E-Learning, Reflections, School   347 words

Just a quickie about English courses, with particular reference to online ones. To guide you all through the most common problems, which, in my experience, are:

- difficulty with pronunciation
- misunderstanding terms/false friends
- “mothertongue-tion” of English language

More in detail:

1. English pronunciation requires a more softer labial movement of the mouth, while in other languages, such like Italian, the pronunciation is done by applying more force to the muscles. This difference causes the student to have to “re-learn” how to articulate his/her mouth to speak, and it is not always easy. Pronunciation, being one of the hardest skills to acquire, should be guided step-by-step by a mothertongue English teacher, and never left to online course (unless a tutor is provided) or self-teaching. You can only learn to speak by interaction and trial-and-error method.

2. So called “false friends” can lead to misunderstanding of words meaning, and thus an erroneous learning of said terms. It’s important that the teacher finds out as soon as possible, and helps the student overcome the perception that similar words in two languages have similar meanings (that can happen, but it’s not a rule of thumb). Designers of online courses should take this in consideration, and provide a tutor.

3. This is the case of words and/or phrases not known by the student, but “invented” by the student on the right moment, based on his/her own mothertongue and than “Englishized”. That is what I mean by “mothertongue-tion” of English language: i.e. an Italian student may “Italianize” English words that he does not know, or say/write phrases and portions of speech the same way he would in Italian. This is a common mistake, normally part of the process of learning, but a teacher should be there to correct this behavious, which may harm the student’s career if not taken care of.

I’m getting interested in educational practices related to language teaching and training, thus I shall update about this subject very soon. :)

Thanks for reading, my dear friends.

Happy Holidays! :D

December 28, 2008   Filed Under: E-Learning, Holidays   152 words

Hello kids! ^_^ How are your holidays going? Mine are doing pretty fine. I’ve got a lot to study for when school starts again on January, but I’m taking it slowly and everything’s doing good ^^ I aim at getting the highest grades possible by the end of this year, you know that? :P Yeah, I’m a little bit of a perfectionist, hehe.

Anyway, I know some of you guys has a true passion for studying like me, and so I suggest to take a look at this great resource:

The site is for both teachers and students, it’s free to register and there are a lot of online video courses *_* Yay! I love video courses :P

More students help :)

December 21, 2008   Filed Under: College, E-Learning, Friends, University   177 words

Hello kids! :) Here I am to share some more help and tips, through another website I visit regularly every week. It’s online-mba-program-blog.com, and it lists plenty of online schools offering online online master of business administration degrees (Boston University and Northeastern University, for instance), and they give out financial aids for the ones who can’t afford the whole of the expense. To my friend Ratchet Allen, I’d suggest taking a look at the online Health Care MBA page, because I’m sure it has everything he needs to start making plans for his future studies ;) I’m glad that my friend Ratchy is supporting me with the whole online school thing, because my family is still as stubborn as a rock :( Anyway, now that school is over and Christmas break has started, I wish you all a Merry Christmas and a very felt good luck with your studies ^_^ I know how hard education can get, but remember! it’s for your future happiness ;) Mwah! *hugs tight*

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