Hi there, just finishing off an email…
just a second.
"Students will follow the subjects
outlined in the course kurriculum."
Hmm… looks like I spelled
that word incorrectly.
Not to worry -
I'll just use my digital spellcheck -
Aha, that's the correct spelling:
c-u-r-r-i-c-u-l-u-m.
What a useful tool the spellchecker is.
I would have looked very silly if I sent that
email with a misspelled word in it!
I remember my old English Teacher,
Mr Wordsmith, used
to get so angry
with me for my spelling!
And by sheer coincidence
that's what we are
going to look at today:
Digital tools to help you
with your English for studying.
We are so lucky
to be living in a digital society
where we can find lots of useful tools for
learning languages.
There are lots of tools online
or built into our digital devices that can
help us use language better in our studies.
After all, reading and writing clearly is
a massive part of your studies,
especially if you are using English
as a second language.
The spell check tool
that features in many websites
and word-processing applications
is really useful.
Let's see it in action:
I'll enter this word
but spell it incorrectly.
Ok, so there's an indication
that I have got the spelling wrong…
so now I can see some
suggestions. Yes, that's the correct spelling
of the word - I'll just select it
- and bingo! The word is correctly spelled.
If I don't want to accept it, I can ignore
it, or even add to the dictionary
so it won't happen again.
Top Tip: Remember spell-checkers
usually have dictionaries
for British and American English
so make sure you have the
right one selected!
Next up - grammar checker. See if you can
spot the grammar mistake
in this sentence.
Did you get it? Let's see what the grammar
checker says.
Yes, that's the problem,
so let's accept the correct version.
Fantastic!
Grammar checkers do sometimes get it wrong,
so you may have to check in a grammar book,
or on a grammar website.
You don't have to accept
what the grammar checker says:
ultimately, it's up to you.
These features are often built into computers,
smartphones and word processing software.
Now talking of software,
here's a useful thing to know.
Distance learners often need
to use office software
But I often use online software.
It's easy to use and best of all it's free!
And your documents are
saved online so you can
access them anywhere.
And you can also let other people work
on the same document -
great for working as a team with other learners!
It's quite usual for distance learners to
work collaboratively.
There are lots of benefits to this
as it helps you plan, share information
and check each other's work before submitting.
And your documents are saved online, so you
can access them anywhere.
Just remember to keep your
collaboration platforms secure,
and only let people you
trust have access.
There are a few more digital resources you
can use to help you with your studies.
If you want to find out the meaning of a word,
you can use an online dictionary.
And if you want to find an alternative word with the
same meaning, you can use an online thesaurus.
A thesaurus is a book or online database that
gives you words with similar meanings
so you can vary your language - so useful!
And if you want to use language suitable
for academic purposes,
there are lots of websites to help
you with this.
They have all the most useful words and
phrases you will need to write your coursework.
And so until the next time, goodbye –
or should I say farewell, so long,
see you later, adios!