The Web as a Resource for Language Learning

Anna Lazzari lazzari3@unisi.it

Main points
1. General overview of what is available
2. How to find resources (Web Search Strategies) 3. How to evaluate what you have found 4. How to use them for linguistic purposes

What is available (1)

Grammar books and lessons General English
http://www.wordpower.ws/grammar/gramtoc.html (A comprehensive grammar book) http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/ (Online course by the BBC) http://www.english-online.org.uk/backindex.html (English for Everybody. Home page) http://www.englishonline.org.uk/course.htm?name=beg&link=begcourse.htm (English for Everybody. Beginners course. Grammar)

What is available (2)

Grammar books and lessons Business English
http://www.better-english.com/grammar.htm (Business English Grammar Exercises) http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/business/index.shtml (Still BBC, but for Business English) http://www.linguarama.com/ps/vocab.htm (Linguarama, vocabulary. But check also the other topics --> buttons on the left) http://www.englishonline.org.uk/specialcourse.htm?name=biz&link=bizcourse.htm (Still English for Everybody. Business English)

What is available (3)

Listening exercises
http://www.esl-lab.com/ (One of the largest ESL listening training resources on the Web at three different levels.) http://www.rong-chang.com/sites/elllo.htm (hundreds of listening exercises. From the Text Page, you can also download the .mp3 file.) http://www.voanews.com/specialenglish/index.cfm (The Voice of America, read and listen to American English articles) http://www.economist.com/audio/ (Podcasts from The Economists website. Freely downloadable)

What is available (4)

Dictionaries and glossaries (1)
http://www.m-w.com/netdict.htm (Merriam-Webster, with pronounciation) http://www.foreignword.com/Tools/dictsrch.htm (access to many online dictionaries, for many different languages) http://stommel.tamu.edu/~baum/hyperref.html (general) http://www.urbandictionary.com/ (funny, American slang)

What is available (5)

Dictionaries and glossaries (2)
http://www.glossarist.com/glossaries/business/ (Business glossaries) http://bizglossaries.tripod.com/ (Business glossaries) http://www.londonstockexchange.com/en-gb/Global/F/glossary/ (specialised) http://www.washingtonpost.com/wpdyn/business/specials/glossary/index.html (many newspapers and magazines feature online glossaries) http://accurapid.com/journal/e_iglossary.htm (rare but not impossible, an English-Italian Glossary in International Finance and Trade) http://www.acronymfinder.com/ (an acronym finder)

What is available (6)

Tutorials E.g. How to write
... business letters (http://www.business-letters.com/business-letters.htm) ... a business plan (http://www.bplans.com/dp/) ... a press release (http://www.pandecta.com/write_press_release.html) ... a marketing plan (http://www.knowthis.com/tutorials/marketing/marketingplan1.htm) ... an oral presentation (http://www.ruf.rice.edu/~riceowl/oral_presentations.htm)

What is available (7)

Samples i.e. examples of
business letters http://www.4hb.com/letters/ business plans http://www.bplans.com/sp/businessplans.cfm marketing plans http://www.bplans.com/sp/marketingplans.cfm

What is available (8)

The websites of important institutions
The European Union (http://europa.eu/ - multilingual) The World Bank (http://www.worldbank.org/) The World Trade Organization ( http://www.wto.org/) Accounting Associations:
American: http://aaahq.org/ European: http://www.eaa-online.org/r/default.asp?iId=JDLFL

Financial Management Ass. (http://www.efmaefm.org/index.shtml) Management ( http://www.eiasm.org/index1.html)

What is available (9)

Jobs or rather job adverts
http://www.monster.com/geo/siteselection.asp http://www.careerbuilder.com/ http://hotjobs.yahoo.com/ and professional profiles jobprofiles.monster.com/

What is available
but should NEVER be used:

Online Translators
See for example www.google.com

Language Tools
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/03/19/MNO8VMABN.DTL

Web Search Strategies (1)

Multimedia information on the Web organised into linked pages located on different computers (servers) connected to the Internet.

Web Search Strategies (2)

The Web is democratic anyone can publish pages! Two problems: lack of authority difficulty in locating the pages searched

Web Search Strategies (3)

Two types of gateways

subject directories
search engines

Web Search Strategies (4)

Subject directories
General
About.com, www.about.com The Librarians Internet Index, www.lii.org, etc.

Specialised
Intute, www.intute.ac.uk (education and research)
Voice of the Shuttle, http://vos.ucsb.edu/ (humanities)

Web Search Strategies (5)

Subject directories are human centered services Categories and their organization are decided and maintained by editors.

Web Search Strategies (6)

Search engines
Some example:
Google, www.google.com Yahoo, www.yahoo.com

Altavista, www.altavista.com

Web Search Strategies (7)

Search engines
Complex type of Web based software made up of three parts: Spiders (or robots, or bots Database Search form

Web Search Strategies (8)

Search engines are machine centered services
Spiders grab Web pages, computer programs index the content, and a search mechanism queries the index and ranks the results.

Web Search Strategies (9)

Search engines
Give access only to the pages in their database The larger the database the more pages are available Do not give access to the Web as it is at the moment The indexing process takes time Allow to combine words into complex search syntax Words are actually keys to the Web

Web Search Strategies (10)

Basic search tips
AND principle Search engines look for documents containing all the keywords typed in the search form. The more keywords you type the less documents you retrieve.

Web Search Strategies (11)

Basic search tips
Most important keywords first Be specific Examples
NY Stock Exchange glossary glossary accounting bookkeping

Web Search Strategies (12)

Basic search tips
Exclude terms: use the minus sign (-) in front of useless words Example
euro -currency

Web Search Strategies (13)

Basic search tips
Learn to use the phrase search Use double quotation marks (... ...) around phrases to ensure they are searched exactly as is, with the words side by side in the same order.

Web Search Strategies (14)

Basic search tips
Combine search phrase and asterisks (*) Examples
how to * oral presentations dissertation * model abstract

Web Search Strategies (15)

Basic search tips
Read and learn to use the Advanced Search page Possibilities
Search within a specific website Look for pages written only in... any chosen language Look for pages within a specific domain (e.g. .uk, .us)

Web pages evaluation (1)

The value of what you find depends on the purpose of your research.
Ask yourself Has it been published by an entity that makes sense? E.g. www.imf.org (the International Monetary Fund) Is it from the source you expect? E.g. www.economist.com/index.html (The Economist) Is it from a valid agency? E.g. www.usaid.gov (US Agency for International Development)

Web pages evaluation (2)

Learn to read the address.
Two types of top-level domains:
generic Top-Level Domains (gTLD). Used (at least in theory) by a particular class of organization. Three or more letters long. country code Top-Level Domains (ccTLD). Used by a country or a dependent territory. Two letters long.

Web pages evaluation (3)

Some gTLDs
.edu restricted use by educational sites (usually a university or college)

.com general use by commercial business sites

.gov restricted use by U.S. governmental/non-military sites .mil restricted use by U.S. military sites and agencies

.net general use by networks, internet service providers, organizations

.org general use by non-profit organizations and others

Web pages evaluation (4)

Some other gTLDs (from November 2000)
.aero restricted use by air transportation industry .biz general use by businesses

.coop restricted use by cooperatives

.info general use by commercial and non-commercial sites .museum restricted use by museums

.name general use by individuals

.pro restricted use by certified professionals and professional entities

Web pages evaluation (5)

Some ccTLDs
.it Italy .uk Great Britain .us United States .ca Canada

.au Australia
.ie Ireland (Eire)

Web pages evaluation (6)

A meaningful structure can also be in the next-to-last word of the domains.
.ac. is short for "academic" in the United Kingdom, New Zealand, and Japan (Oxford University: www.ox.ac.uk) .uni. stands for Universities in many European countries Australia uses .edu. for its universities, as in www.usyd.edu.au .co. is for commercial entities. For example, Hitachi, Japan is at www.hitachi.co.jp.

The Web for L2 students (1)

The Web is a powerful source of...
Grammar-books and online lessons Tutorials Pages written in many languages and so Ready-made language (language is formulaic)

The Web for L2 students (2)

Some strategies to translate...
culture-bound terms
Il comunicato della Farnesina conclude quindi precisando che "non si dispone peraltro di informazioni accertate su altri aspetti della vicenda riferiti oggi dai mezzi di informazione".

How would you translate Farnesina if you had to use it in an English text?

The Web for L2 students (3)

Some strategies to translate...
culture-bound terms
ANCI (Associazione Nazionale Comuni di Italia) OIC (Organismo Italiano di Contabilit) ConfCommercio

How are these associations mentioned in English texts?

The Web for L2 students (4)

Check your English
The following expressions do not exist in English.

How can you correct them?

sending competitors out of business Euro signed bonds The company is formed by 7 departments

The Web for L2 students (5)

Frequency counts
In the following pairs of expressions one is more probable in English than the other. Which one would you choose?
to do investments or to make investments?

ethic banking or ethical banking?

do an internship or make an intership?

The Web for L2 students (6)

Disambiguating from context
Shillers book Irrational Exuberance argues that the boom represents a speculative bubble, not grounded in sensible economic fundamentals. Part one of the book considers structural factors behind the boom. A list of twelve precipitating factors that appear to be its ultimate causes is given. Amplification mechanisms, naturally-occurring Ponzi processes, that enlarge the effects of these precipitating factors, are described. Part Two discusses cultural factors, the effects of the news media, and of "new era" economic thinking.[...]

The Web for L2 students (7)

Disambiguating from context
The first mutuals were formed just 40 years after the Declaration of Independence. They were founded to provide banking services and credit access for ordinary citizens whom the established banking community ignored. Whether state- or federally- chartered, mutual institutions continue to serve everyone.