I'm always prowling the Internet to find new pages and resources for teaching English. One I often go back to for daily updates is one with the predictable name 'The English Blog'. I particularly like their daily discussions of words from the headlines and cartoons.


The English Blog. Have you checked it out? Found other useful pages?

One of the sites I read a lot from is MakeUseOf for their variety of online tools. About a month ago I read a page about ESL tools and I've been meaning to write about it ever since.
My English students are at the level where they need to be able to write quite a bit more than just a few lines. They often struggle with specific ways that they can express themselves. When it comes to certain fixed expressions, collocations or phrasal verbs it is often so complex that students often need to have tools to find the correct language.

This post from MakeUseOf presents six useful tools that anyone can use to improve their writing. I already use some of these tips in my translation work, but some of these are new to me, particularly this one, inside of Google search

If you're not sure about certain words within the sentence, replace them with an asterisk (*). That tells Google that 'something should be here, but I don't know what'. The search results will contain variations of the sentence, from which you could learn the right way to write it.

For example, searching for this query: "paste it * google" (including the quotation marks) would have taught you to write "paste it into google" rather then "paste it to google".

I think that this would be very useful for students and, in fact, anyone writing as much as many of us have to. What do you think? Nic

Chinglish is dying.

As you may have read here, here or here, Shanghai has announced that they are going to be working on getting rid of what is known as Chinglish or Engrish.

Chinglish is inaccurate use of English in China or by Chinese on signs. It is both an embarrassment for China and a source of amusement for tourists.

These, from the BBC

Sometimes you can see what the author was getting at, such as the sign that warns people to "keep valuables snugly", and "beware the people press close to you designedly".

Then there are signs where they have mistranslated a crucial word.

One in a hotel lift advises people "please leave your values at the front desk".

Sometimes they have just got it the wrong way round, such as on the sign in the stairwell of a department store asking shoppers to "please bump your head carefully".

My favourites though, are those which get more surreal, like the one on the Shanghai metro from the public security bureau that reads: "If you are stolen, call the police at once."

I've never travelled to China but as an ESL teacher teaching a large number of Chinese students I often see t-shirts or stationery with slogans that often make little sense.

My colleague tells of a student who wore a shirt "Are you cats?"

What do you think of the new plans? Do you have any examples of Chinglish?

Oh and can someone shed some light on the Chinese translation of the picture?

So I've been using Across for the last couple of weeks and must say that I really like it. It is a translation memory system with terminology management tools. It does a similar job to Trados and Wordfast but I much prefer the user interface and the project management tools.

The learning curve was quite short and the keyboard shortcuts are similar to other tools I've used. It is a standalone program (you don't need to use it inside of Microsoft Word etc) and it doesn't seem to be too heavy on resources.

One other big drawcard for me what the fact that as a student I was able to get a free license and thereby avoid the cost of the download. All you need to do is fill in a request on their website.

As well as the other two that I've mentioned above I've tried Anaphraseus (as an OpenOffice extension) and another called Felix (as in 'the CAT). But for now I'm happy with Across and think I'll stick with it for a while.

What have you tried? What do you like and why? What do you stick with?

The web-hosting service that I'm using here is really easy to use and I would certainly recommend it if you are thinking about setting up a website or blog. It took only a few minutes to set up and I don't know anything about programming or the code they use. So do check it out. Definitely worth your time and effort. Nic

DevHub

At the moment in my German class I need to write an essay commenting on the quote from Einstein "Es gibt keine andere vernuenftige Erziehung, als Beispiel zu sein: Wenn's nicht anders geht, ein abschreckendes." (There is nothing more important in life than being an example; when it doesn't work any other way, a terrible one). The question is from the GDS exams (a German language exam which I will be sitting later this year) and I think it is interesting. I plan to write about what happened last week here in New Zealand with a referendum on the 'anti-smacking bill' and domestic violence. May be interesting.

What do you think about writing essays in foreign languages? Do you find it hard to write on abstract topics? Is it a waste of time or do you really get down into the process?

I'm just beginning here with websites so go easy with me. Devhub looks like a good domain provider so far. I am a student at the University of Auckland studying my PGDip in Translation Studies which includes theory, practice and language learning. I'm also an ESL teacher, teaching three days a week. I spend a lot of time on the internet and subscribe to many blogs from other translators and teachers. My purpose here is to provide you with some of the information that I have read. I guess I will provide some links, some suggestions and hopefully help you see what is out there to help fellow translators, language teachers and other language lovers! Nic