Alan Schwartz

TOKYO, JAPAN– September 23, 2016 – EnglishCentral, the leading provider of online English conversation solutions, participated with the Japan’s Minister of Internal Affairs & Communications, Sanae Takaichi, as she inspected an English class at a Tokyo Elementary School as part of the Ministry’s  plan to promote the use of information technology in the classroom called “Creating the Learning Environment of the Future” .

As part of her visit, she joined the school’s English class and tested out  EnglishCentral interactive speaking technology IntelliSpeech℠ using a Chromebook Tablet device.

Minister Takaichi tests her English speaking skills using EnglishCentral’s IntellispeechSM conversational English learning platform.

The Maehara Elementary School in Tokyo is aggressively using new technologies to motivate student to study English.    For the class visited by the Minister, the students were using an interactive, video-base version of the English textbook “Hi Friends!” published by the Ministry of Education and adapted by EnglishCentral for use on the Chromebook tablet.

Minister Takaichi commented, “This program is well designed for the school because it helps improve students’ speaking ability, including their pronunciation, as well as makes it easy for teachers to monitor students’ speaking progress at a glance.”   The school is also using EnglishCentral’s learning management system (LMS) that allows teachers to monitor student progress and even listen in on their speaking practice sessions.

EnglishCentral’s General Manager for Japan, Hirofumi Matsumura, explains EnglishCentral’s  conversational English learning platform to the Minister of Internal Affairs & Communications at a Tokyo Elementary School.

The Minister  actually tried the EnglishCentral program herself in the classroom, sitting next to children in the class.  She noted that children who practiced their pronunciation operating tablets by themselves seemed to speak English quite fluently using EnglishCentral.

Hirofumi Matsumura, General Managers of EnglishCentral  Japan,  commented “there is nothing that makes me happier than seeing  Japanese children improving their English speaking using the EnglishCentral platform.  It’s a true honor for the Minister to have visited this class and tried out EnglishCentral herself. I feel there is a revolution happening in Japan English education, moving from a traditional grammar based curriculum towards a curriculum that emphasizes real listening and speaking skills that students can really use in real life.   We are happy to contribute to that revolution with our EnglishCentral platform.”

About EnglishCentral

EnglishCentral is the most widely adopted online English language conversation platform in the world, changing the way students and professionals across the globe learn to speak English. Adopted by over 400 universities, schools and corporations in over 100 countries, the company delivers interactive, video-based language learning experiences for both self-study and one-on-one tutoring, providing one of the most widely adopted and complete platforms for practicing and mastering English conversation online. Its extensive library of videos lessons, proprietary IntelliSpeech℠ speech assessment technology, and pre-built course modules guarantees results for English as a Second Language (ESL) learners. EnglishCentral partnerships include the world’s largest private and online English language schools including Open English (Latin America), UOL(Brazil), NTT Learning (Japan), and Meten (China), Learn more at  www.englishcentral.com of find us on Facebook/EnglishCentral or Twitter at @EnglishCentral1.

EnglishCentral App Wins at Russian Golden App Awards

English Conversation Solution Honored for Its Unique Ability to Integrate Video Self-Study With One-on-One Online Tutoring

ARLINGTON, MA–(July24th , 2016) –  EnglishCentral, the leading provider of online English conversation solutions, today announced that it has launched its web version in the Russian market.

The EnglishCentral mobile app has been available the last 4 months and already has been awarded a prestigious Golden App award.  The Golden App  Awards are an annual program that honors innovative applications in the Russian market over many categories.

The awards were announced June 21st, 2016 in Moscow, Russia.  EnglishCentral placed 3rd overall in the “Best Application” category.  It also places 3rd overall in the Productivity, Services and Education category competing with major Russian government and corporate entities. View the results in full.

“It is a great honor, we’ve worked a lot to localize our app for iOS and Android and provide users with an outstanding service of learning English”, – says Kathryn Zhilich, representative of EnglishCentral in Russia, – “It has been a race with time. We have just started in Russia, and we are extremely glad to receive such wide recognition. Our company is dynamic so our users will see a lot of new features and improvements in the coming months.”

The award announcement specifically highlighted as exemplary EnglishCentral’s video-based vocabulary learning system and its IntelliSpeech(SM) assessment system. The award committee also pointed to EnglishCentral’s unique approach of using authentic and engaging video content as a key element setting it apart from other learning platforms.

“We are excited the Golden Apps award committee recognized our latest GoLive! product with this award. The market continues to validate the product as the number of students using EnglishCentral globally has doubled in the last year, and we are delighted with the award for our Russian app.” said Alan Schwartz, CEO & Founder of EnglishCentral.

About the Golden App Awards

The Golden App  Awards annually recognize the best applications from all over Russia. Companies compete in 22 categories. “Theme-based” nominations include Music, Games, Health, Lifestyle, Education and more. “Golden” nominations embrace best Design, Technical solution, Business model… The main award and focus category is  “Best Application”.

About EnglishCentral

EnglishCentral is the most widely adopted online English language conversation platform in the world, changing the way students and professionals across the globe learn to speak English. Adopted by over 400 universities, schools and corporations in over 100 countries, the company delivers interactive, video-based language learning experiences for both self-study and one-on-one tutoring, providing one of the most widely adopted and complete platforms for practicing and mastering English conversation online. Its extensive library of videos lessons, proprietary IntelliSpeech(SM) speech assessment technology, and pre-built course modules guarantees results for English as a Second Language (ESL) learners. EnglishCentral partnerships include the world’s largest private and online English language schools including Open English (Latin America), UOL(Brazil), NTT Learning (Japan), and Meten (China), Learn more at www.englishcentral.com or find us on Facebook/EnglishCentral or Twitter at
@EnglishCentral1.

CONTACT INFORMATION:

info@englishcentral.com

We are happy to announce that our “Listen In” feature in the teacher LMS has a new user experience.  Now you can listen in to all student recordings, whether done in the mobile app or on the web.

You can easily play students’ recordings from the Teacher Tools or download them as mp3 files.   It’s a great way to verify that the student who was assigned the work, did the work.  Also, a perfect way to assess student reading skills. Assign the same video for all students.  “Listen in” and using a reading skills rubric, assess students on their level of surface reading skills – pronunciation, rhythm, phonemic awareness, voice.

Here are the steps for you to try the new “Listen In” feature:

• Log in to your teacher account and select a class

• Select “Reports” and then the “Spoken Videos” report

• Click the “Listen In” icon beside a student’s name

• Select a video that the student has spoken and “Listen In”!

View a full video demo of the feature in action here >>> or visit your class page and try it out!

We hope you enjoy this improved feature.

Did you know that you can learn English with songs on EnglishCentral?

Music is something everyone enjoys and it’s a powerful way to learn or teach English.  The music video lessons produced on EnglishCentral are specially chosen so they are slow, repetitive and meaningful for English language learning. Also, just plain great songs!

Here’s our  list of reasons why music really helps a student learn English or a teacher teach English.  But first try one of the music video lessons yourself – we bet you’ll enjoy it and learn a lot of English!

Here are a few other music video lessons we highly recommend studying or teachers assigning students to complete:

Acapella Blank Space   |    Ukulele Hey Jude   |    Wonderful World  |   Sweet Acoustic Cover

10 Reasons Why Music Is A Great Way To Learn A Language

1.  THE RESEARCH SAYS MUSIC WORKS!

Music is a proven teaching tool which fosters language retention and production in young learners (Medina, 1993, Jalongo and Bromley, 1984, Borchgrevink, 1982,   Martin, 1983, Mitchell, 1983, Jolly, 1975). Teachers need to read many of the comprehensive studies that show undoubtably that students of all ages learn more and learn better with music

Using music in your classroom will help your students succeed as English language students.  Language itself is musical, speech has flow and form and songs strongly link and teach the underlying patterns of the language itself.  If you aren’t using music in your ELT classroom, you aren’t following strong research driven instructional practices.

2.  SONGS  ARE MOTIVATING!

Songs, when used correctly, are very motivating for students. Students learn language in a fun way and gain confidence through repetition and voicing. Further, music appeals to the affective needs of students, their inner world and feelings. Music is an input (like stories and pictures) which makes its way through the student’s inner filter (see Krashen’s “affective filter hypothesis”) and helps them learn by appealing to their emotive and social experiences. What pleasures us, teaches us!

3. THEY ARE AUTHENTIC!

The value of authentic language input can’t be undervalued, especially in an EFL environment. Songs are “real” English and provide students with input that is not educational or scripted.  Songs also promote highly valued “ambiguity tolerance”, allowing them to not get too upset when they don’t understand every word.  An important quality we should help our students develop.

4. THEY ARE STUDENT FRIENDLY!

Songs are seen by students as “cool” and “high tech”. With the popularity of programs like “American Idol”, singing is mainstream, especially singing with a microphone. Everyone can be a star!  Teens especially learn through music and “pop” culture, teachers shouldn’t ignore this and especially since English language songs are so international and widely popular, the world over.

Further, students like that their favorite songs can be used to help them learn English. Get your students to bring in their own songs to listen to and share in the classroom.  This kind of informal needs analysis really works and is as simple as setting up a “request box” where students can anonymously recommend their favorite English songs.

Songs help create a student centered classroom and gives students a feeling of empowerment and control in the classroom.

5. THE ARE PEDAGOGICALLY “DEEP”!

Songs and music are such a versatile material.  They can be used for so many purposes and in so many ways other than just as the usual “listening cloze”.  Here are just a few of the main ways music and song can be used as a learning material.

1.  As a listening cloze

2.  As a vocabulary focus

3.  As a game and play

4.  As background music for self study/reading

5.  As an activity (dance and total physical response)

6.  As a social and historical document

7.  As introduction, engagement

8.  As a writing activity (lyric rewrite)

9.  As pronunciation practice / focus (especially intonation & stress)

Songs also have several features beyond just the text/words and sound themselves that make them so pedagogically strong.  Songs are usually very repetitive and they recycle vocabular and language structures.  Songs are short and condensed – they usually don’t take up so much time in class.  Songs are thematic.  You can find a song for almost any topic or grammar point.  All in all, songs offer us teachers pure gold when it comes to choosing a language learning material.

6.  SONGS OPEN THE READING DOOR!

Songs are  the perfect tool to help students begin to see and learn the associations between sound and script – it helps foster phonemic awareness. It is a phonics powerhouse and by using songs with lyrics, teachers are helping young learners to read and recognize the connections of sound, rhythm to text.

Karaoke in particular, has been used in classrooms to help struggling readers and is a mainstay tool of special educators to use with students who have a hard time learning to read. ELT teachers can also use karaoke to do the same and help students to become strong second language readers.  Visual lyric videos and kinetic typography have become very widely available and are now at any teacher’s fingertips.

7.  THEY WIDEN THE CLASSROOM AND CREATE COMMUNITY!

Students will listen to and learn the songs outside the classroom. It helps students  become “self – learners”.  Further, your own song lessons and files can be made available to students to play at home, on their computers. It extends your classroom into the world and makes it relevant to the larger learning world.

Further, songs are a way to bring students together and create a strong classroom learning community.  Songs are very social.  I remember once teaching a very difficult Grade 4 ESL class. I was their homeroom teacher and students were from every continent of the world. I started us just singing songs every day to start the morning and afternoon classes. What a difference this small change made.  We held hands, we clapped together, we started looking into each others eyes and relating to each other.  Students started helping each other more in class and learning more.  And just plain feeling happier (and don’t think this isn’t an important objective!). All through the power of music and song

When a teacher uses up to date songs in the classroom, students feel like the classroom does not consist of 4 walls but is a part of the wider world. Using music and songs can be a way to bring a lot of fresh air into your classroom, your learning community.

8.  THEY ARE  INTELLIGENT!

Music is one of numerous forms of “intelligences” (Gardner, 1993). It is important for educators to foster the development of all these intelligences and address the needs of the whole child. Even or especially so with  EFL / ESL  students.  We don’t just teach a subject (English), we teach a student.

Music helps nurture musical intelligence and helps create a fully developed, balanced person. It is especially successful in educating those children with emotional difficulties. Further, it isn’t just something for young learners. At any stage of life, people need to  be intouch with their musical nature. It uplifts, it fosters intelligence, it helps make a person whole.

Too often msuic and the arts are given short attention by educators and we are realizing how wrong this approach has been.  As Ken Robinson has described in his well known TED Talk, “Do Schools Kill Creativity?”,  we have been wrong in considering education as something that happens only from “the neck up”. The whole body should be taught and learn.

9. THEY TEACH CULTURE!

Without traveling and directly visiting a country, it is terribly hard to learn the cultural aspects to language and the culture of the wider English language community. Culture is something transmitted and not directly taught.  All English language teachers need to teach culture, it is a cornerstone of what language is.

Songs have been described colloquially as a “repository of culture”, the place where the spirit of a people are described, preserved and shared.  Think of our national anthems, our folksongs, our nursery rhymes. They all contain the core of what we were, are and believe..  Songs are a way to enter into the culture of a community and they transmit the values, ideals, history and nature of the culture. Students benefit and understand the target culture through the deductive, implicit learning that occurs through song.

 10. THEY ARE  FREE!

Who doesn’t like a bargain? Songs are widely available free online and can be found on many video sharing sites and resource sharing communities. Most countries have some level of “fair use” for education when it comes to using songs in our classrooms.  Songs are also low tech – all you really need is a device to play them.  Could be a CD player, a cell phone or your own voice, yes, this too is a “device”!

If songs are anything, they are freedom.  They can be sung and enjoyed for the most part, freely.  It shouldn’t cost you or your school a penny!

If you aren’t using music or song as a study or teaching tool – YOU SHOULD BE!

RECOMMENDED READINGS / RESOURCES

50 Ways To Use Music And Song In The Classroom.  EFL Classroom 2.0

REFERENCES

Borchgrevink, H. (1982).  Prosody and musical rhythm are controlled by the speech hemisphere.  In M. Clynes (Ed.), Music, Mind,and Brain.  New York: Plenum Press, pp. 151-157.

Gardner, H. (1993).  Multiple intelligences: The theory in practice. New York: Basic Books.

Jalongo, M. & Bromley, K. (1984).  Developing linguistic competence  through song. Reading Teacher, 37(9), 840-845.

Jolly, Y. (1975).  The use of songs in teaching foreign languages. Modern Language Journal, 59(1), 11-14.

Krashen, S. (1982).  Principles and Practice in Second Language Acquisition. Oxford: Pergamon Press.

Martin, M. (1983).  Success! Teaching spelling with music.  Academic Therapy, 18(4), 505-506.

Medina, S. (1993). The effect of music on second language vocabulary acquisition. FEES News (National Network for Early Language Learning, 6 (3), 1-8.

Milman, C. (1979).  The metronome and rote learning.  Academic Therapy, 14 (3), 321-325.

Mitchell, M. (1983).  Aerobic ESL: Variations on a total physical response theme.  TESL Reporter, 16, 23-27.

Many advanced students benefit from watching and studying the best TED Talks on EnglishCentral.

We now have a course of all our best TED videos so students can study them in one handy place.  View the course >>>>

You can find all our hundreds of TED Talks video lessons through our video search feature.

This article by our CEO and Founder,  Alan Schwartz originally appeared on Xconomy. Read the original here.

Good teachers often say that “95 percent of good teaching is just getting students motivated.” Online learning presents a new opportunity to both measure engagement and create learning methods that increase it. Facebook sets the high bar for online engagement—65 percent of its billion-plus users are on the platform for an average of 40 minutes per day.

For online learning, the current stats are much less impressive. For example, the initial enthusiasm for massive open online courses (MOOCs) dampened when data showed that on average, completion rates were below 10 percent.

Here are 5 strategies that showcase what best-in-class online learning platforms are using to do just that.

1. Let the students drive. Giving students the choice of a content path is key to increasing engagement. It’s the YouTube effect: let learners discover one video that piques their curiosity and then present them with a learning path going forward from there. Khan Academy has done a fantastic job of this with their learning map.

2. Adapt to the students’ level. Learners need to feel challenged, but not frustrated, and the key to this is real-time adaptive learning. Getting learners content at the right level at the right time, and adapting levels over time is key for keeping up motivation levels.

3. Use game dynamics. Online learners, like online gamers, react to incentives. Brain training is a great example of giving students “bite size” nuggets of learning that they feel compelled to consume every day. These incentives can be modeled more towards the experience points of online gaming platforms like the Xbox, or towards badges or certifications like those offered by Duolingo. The best game dynamics also involve collaboration and/or competition among learners. Knowing where you stand among your age group or even better among your friends can be a huge source of motivation to impress and therefore improve.

4. Go mobile. A slick mobile app is a sine qua non to boost engagement. It’s a simple fact that learners spend more time with their mobile devices than with their computers, and mobile access allows them to make progress and engage anywhere and anytime during their day. Duolingo has achieved over 100 million downloads of its language-learning app and claims great user engagement by making a mobile-focused product that allows for snacking on language learning in 10-minute chunks.

5. Amplify the teacher’s voice. The best online platforms don’t eliminate the teacher’s presence in the learning formula, they amplify it. The best platforms maintain a strong instructor presence through frequent teacher messaging (which can be automated) such as “I noticed you didn’t practice in the last 3 days,” or through tools that allow teachers to listen in on student progress and provide asynchronous and personalized feedback. Hybrid platforms go one step further and enhance the self-study learning path by, for instance, providing a “Talk to a Teacher” button along the way to enable access to live tutoring in real time

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Alan Schwartz is CEO & Founder of EnglishCentral. He started his career in edtech as an English teacher in China over 25 years ago. After that he spent over a decade in the speech recognition industry, including as head of Nuance’s Mobile & Consumer division. Follow @EnglishCentral1