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Six Holiday Gift Ideas that Promote Language Skills

December 22, 2011 in Education, Language by admin  |  No Comments

Evoca guest blogger Lynda Stucky, CEO of ClearySpeaking, the accent reduction specialists, shares terrific holiday gift ideas that provide fun and language skills exercise for people of all ages.

Are you looking for a unique gift this holiday season for the board game lover on your list?  Whether it is for a child or an adult, a native English speaker or non-native English speaker, building language skills is important for anybody at any level. How about a game that promotes language skill development or vocabulary building and promises hours of fun and laughter with your friends, family or colleagues!

Like anything else, practicing healthy habits and developing new speech and language skills can escalate self-confidence, improve memory and cognition.  If you were told that this process could be accomplished by playing games and having fun, would it sound too good to be true?  Well, it is true.  Here are a few games that will really bring joy this holiday season and build language and cognitive skills!

Mad Gab – an excellent game for learning the importance of stress in words

Taboo – learn to describe an action, idea, or thing using different words

Cranium – develops word finding, spelling, unscrambling, and vocabulary skills

Scattergories – a game that requires you to express yourself quickly

Balderdash – learn to use creative word expression

Scrabble – an all time classic that builds vocabulary and spelling

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Stonehill College Spanish language instructor uses mobile recording

October 27, 2011 in "How-To" posts, Education, Facebook, Humanities, International, Interviews, Language, Testimonials, Twitter by admin  |  No Comments

Sister Tania Santander Atauchi combines her Spanish language skills and cultural expertise about Spanish-speaking countries to educate her students at Stonehill College in Easton, Massachusetts. She expands her students’ educational experience “into the cloud” by enabling them to record their language-and-culture assignments simply by using their mobile phones to record from any location.

Students can record, listen, and re-record. Their audio assignments are saved online as MP3 recordings. Sister Tania emails the recordings, with feedback, to the students, who can listen, download, embed in their own websites or blogs, or even post to Facebook or Twitter to share their accomplishments. Their instructor easily registered the students’ mobile phone numbers to instantly save and store the recordings in her password-protected Evoca account, one of several recording management methods available with Evoca for Educators.

When the Evoca team learned that Sister Tania was applying Evoca is exactly one of the uses for which it was built, we wanted to hear more about her background, her work inside and outside of the classroom, and the faith and devotion she brings to her students. Listen to Sister Tania’s own words.

 

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Accent reduction increases chances for jobs and promotions

October 14, 2011 in Blog, Business, Education, International, Interviews, Language, Public Speaking by admin  |  No Comments

Fluency in English is not enough to ensure that a speaker will be understood. Lynda Stucky, president of ClearlySpeaking and certified speech pathologist, advocates for clear, professional speech in the global workplace. Her company helps her clients speak more clearly and be understood. Good English pronunciation can provide the competitive edge for a promotion, new job, or sale. ClearlySpeaking offers tele-coaching sessions recorded using Evoca, one-on-one instruction, corporate group meetings, and digital media products.

ClearlySpeaking trains individuals with a variety of communication challenges including accent modification — regional and foreign, care of the professional voice, vocal dynamics, diction, grammar and how to speak concisely. Businesses and groups are educated on effective communication skills, the spoken image and vocal hygiene.

In her phone interview with Evoca CEO Murem Sharpe, Lynda explains, “I work with non-native English speakers who have a great grasp of the English language, but they struggle with intelligibility or being better understood because they are not following American intonations.” She adds, “Our language has a very definite rhythm and melody to it.”  Hear examples about correcting Eastern Indian and “Pittsburghese” accents in the Lynda Stucky interview recorded and shared online using Evoca.

 

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How to create a mobile online language lab

September 12, 2011 in "How-To" posts, Education, Humanities, Language, Skype by admin  |  No Comments

Using a high school student’s favorite companion — the mobile phone — an experienced  Spanish language teacher has increased opportunities for her students to learn Spanish and boost performance in the Speaking section of the College Board Advanced Placement [AP] Spanish Language Exam, 20% of the total score. Teacher Irene Zingg reports,”The kids really, really like it!” Students in Ms. Zingg’s Spanish classes are producing 10 times more practice sessions using Evoca.

The students dial a local number from their mobile phone and start talking. The audio session is saved as an MP3 recording into the student’s online album in the teacher’s Evoca account. The student can listen to the recording on any computer, smartphone or tablet and download it to track progress. Students achieve two key language learning objectives: improve pronunciation and think in the language, fast and efficiently. Another bonus: shy students no longer have to speak in front of the entire class. Their mobile phone is their private online language lab, sharing results only with the teacher.

 

Listen to the interview with Ms. Zingg about how she has created a mobile online language lab.

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Simple English News streams audio on iPhones, iPads and Androids

July 29, 2011 in Blog, Business, Education, Facebook, Humanities, International, Interviews, Journalists, Language, Skype, Social Networking, Twitter by msharpe  |  No Comments

Simple English News [SEN] publishes interesting English language news articles with audio recordings to help ESL [English-as-a-Second Language] learners around the world to read English, listen to the pronunciation, and practice it.

Using Evoca’s universal Evoca smart audio player, a listener can playback audio recordings with any smartphones or tablets – including iPhones, iPads, Androids, and BlackBerrys, and any computer. The Evoca smart player automatically detects the listener’s browser type and streams the right audio player – Flash for Androids and other devices or HTML5 for Apple devices. Three other player widget types are available: Flash, iFrame, and HTML5.

Simple English News Founder Sam Margolis launched the website to make the news accessible to people learning English. Sam operates his global website from his new home country of Hungary with this mission: “Simple English News hopes to be what it says it is. Our desire is to make the news more understandable for those who are learning English.”  Margolis is a journalist, language educator, and former U.S. Peace Corps volunteer in the small city of Papa, Hungary, where he taught English to high school students. His articles have appeared in The Independent, The International Herald Tribune, Wired Magazine, United Press International, The Globe and Mail, and other publications.

Listen to a Skype interview with Sam Margolis about how his career led to founding and growing Simple English News. Spread the word about how to learn English by posting Sam’s interview to your website, blog with the Evoca smart player and Post to Facebook profile or fan page and Post to Twitter features.

Record audio stream of Skype video calls

July 12, 2011 in "How-To" posts, Facebook, Interviews, Journalists, Language, Skype, Social Networking, the Best Of Evoca..., Twitter by admin  |  No Comments

Evoca makes it easy to instantly record the audio stream of Skype video calls. You can record and retrieve as the host or participant.

Capture the audio during Skype video interviews and conference calls using your computer or Skype smartphone or tablet apps and securely save and store recordings in your online Evoca account.

Email recordings to other call participants or colleagues, post to  any website, blog, Facebook or Twitter, or keep private. Playback on any computer, smartphone, or tablet. Evoca’s web service creates and streams MP3 recordings online “in the cloud”, so no software downloads are required.

Skype video calls to another person are free. Skype video conference calls with 3 to 10 people requires Skype Premium plan sign up following a 7-day free trial.

Access the full news release here.

How to record audio for Skype video calls

After an easy one-time set up, you can record the audio stream again and again with one click. Read more

Toastmasters International veteran speaks and leads

March 24, 2011 in "How-To" posts, Business, Education, International, Interviews, Language by msharpe  |  No Comments

As a Toastmaster Jane Jude’s speaking and leadership expertise has grown exponentially during her 15 years as a member and club officer. Within her first 6 months as a member, Jane was impressing colleagues with her new speaking skills. Jane continues to participate because she continues to learn. Jane notes “Toastmasters is not just about communications. It is about leadership as well.”

Jane is in good company. In the words of MSNBC’s Chris Matthews, “Toastmasters changed my life. They really did. Put me on the stage. I don’t know what I would have done without that positive boost.”

From its founding in 1924 Toastmasters has served over four million people, and today the organization serves over 260,000 members in 113 countries, through its over 12,800 member clubs. 

Listen to Jane’s compelling Toastmasters’ story.

Evoca makes it easy to record your Toastmasters’ speech for practice using your phone or computer mic. It also is easy to email it to your mentor for feedback before delivering it.

Record language interpretation using Skype and phones

February 10, 2011 in "How-To" posts, Business, Conferences, Education, International, Language by admin  |  No Comments

Language interpreters can record business and practice sessions using Evoca’s convenient voice recording service.  Recording a session is as easy as conducting a conference call by phone or Skype, which is especially convenient for international teams. When the recording session is completed, the host can email the recording to the appropriate recipients, keep it private in an Evoca account, or share it online.

These are the typical roles in a spoken word interpretation session:

  • Interpreter
  • Speaker – Interpreter actively listens to this speaker of the source language
  • Listener – Interpreter conveys the speaker’s spoken words into the target language of the Listener
  • Optional: an instructor or evaluator can listen in

How it works