From YouGlish to Fluency

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Image credit: YouGlish

Most of ESL teachers make use of YouTube as a source of free videos that help their students improve their listening and their pronunciation especially in their online classes. However, not all teachers have heard about YouGlish.  And a few of them know how to use it not only to enhance listening and pronunciation; but to boost their students' fluency as well. This post will open a door to YouGlish, showing its benefits and possible limitations. What's more, I will show you a a sample lesson plan, using YouGlish to help promote your students' fluency. Ready to go?! 🤩🧐

YouGlish's benefits:

1- Discovering the world of YouGlish with my peers, we got really impressed with this free source of videos with its simple layout and its rich content.

2- The very first option that attracted my attention was the number of English varieties the website provides, i.e. British, American, Australian, Canadian, Irish, Scottish and New Zealand. This definitely supports the learners' listening skills and exposes them to different pronunciations of English words.

3- The bar on the top of the page has a treasure that you may need to discover. 


Image credit: YouGlish



  • The first thing that you can find in this bar is the "Daily lessons"
- In this section, YouGlish offers chances to learn English through different websites that can help your student work on their own to develop their fluency. You can also sign up and receive notifications about the topics that may interest you.

- In this section, we also found in the bar below that you can use YouGlish to improve other languages not only English. Amazing, isn't it?😃


Image credit: YouGlish


  • Back to YouGlish bar, you can "submit" your lesson adding a new video or a channel to YouGlish.

Image credit: YouGlish

 
  • If you want to embed YouGlish to your website, you can do so using "Get your Widget" in YouGlish. Despite being enthusiastic about this option, I think you may need to consider the pricing plans that may reach to 20 £/ month for hobbies and 250 £/ month for small businesses. 
Image credit: YouGlish

4- When it comes to the videos' controlling options, we found helpful tools for the language learning process. 

  • First, you can control the speaker's speed, in case your learners are not very good at (fast) listening.
  • For those who concentrate on listening with less visual effects, you can toggle the light of the website and reduce the video's frame while listening.
  • As in any other video, you can go 5 seconds back or replay the video as many times as you can.
  • Having a series of videos that contain the word you search for, you can find clear subtitles highlighting the targeted word while listening. I think your learners will be thankful for having this option 🤩😊. 
I haven't finished the list of benefits of this website, but the following lesson plan will show us more benefits that can help you and your learners.

My peers and I thought about preparing a mini-lesson plan using the word "moribund".

Aim of the lesson: By the end of the lesson, students will have:

  • Introduced to meaning, form and pronunciation of the word “moribund” in different contexts. 
  • Practiced using the word in a role play in economic, social or political contexts

Language level: Advanced

Procedures:

1-    1- Teacher shows students two or three sentences with the word “moribund”, eliciting the meaning of the word. 

      2- Students will use YouGlish to discover the following things:

a-     Meaning of the words

b-     Contexts in which it is mostly used

c-      Genders that use it the most

d-     Words to collocate with this word

e-     Pronunciation of the word


3-     * After they listen, teacher checks with students the meaning and the form of the word including the contexts in which it is used, its collocates and the gender that uses the word the most.

      * Searching for the word "moribund", we found the following on YouGlish:

  • 84 videos in different contexts. This shows that YouGlish helps contextualize the word you search for not just show its meaning and pronunciation. 

Image credit: YouGlish


  • Nearby words, which is an option provided by YouGlish, helps your students improve the pronunciation of the word through other words with similar pronunciation and articulation features. This is besides the phonetic tips to improve the words' pronunciation.

Image credit: YouGlish

Image credit: YouGlish


       3- As the word is noticed to be used in TV. shows, so students will be divided into groups. Each group will choose/search for a trendy Egyptian topic in different contexts, i.e. economy, politics, arts, society, etc.. They may need to choose Egyptian talk shows that have something described as "moribund" and tackle their chosen trendy topic. 

      4- They will have time to watch the Arabic version of the TV. show, recall it and try to act the presenter and the interviewee's roles in English in front of the class focusing on meaning, contexts, genders and collocations they learnt from the English videos on YouGlish

      5- Teacher will videotape students' acting and the best acting is the one that will cover most of the aspects including meaning, contexts, genders and collocations.

     6- Teacher can post the videos, the ones form YouGlish and those acted by the students, on the class group on Facebook, Google classroom or Edmodo.



Commentary on the lesson:

  This lesson is a straightforward example of using YouGlish in which listening and pronunciation are used to the pave the road to better fluency. Students will start step by step from knowing the meaning of the word, the contexts it is used in and its pronunciation. Then, they will use the word themselves in a way that help them be more aware about its use and more fluent in using it.
      
      Limitations of YouGlish:
       
  •     It takes time from the teacher to prepare an effective lesson that focuses on listening, pronunciation and speaking.
  •     Students need guidance in using YouGlish especially if they are of lower language level.
  •     I think if other varieties of English are added to YouGlish, this will enrich the concept of English as an International Language. This could be achieved through adding videos for people whose English is their L2 using the targeted word.

       

     So, if you find that your students produce language after enjoying videos and hearing different accents, I think YouGlish is a suitable tool for you. 

   I am waiting for your comments on the lesson. Please feel free to suggest new ideas to use YouGlish. This would be great for all of us.


Comments

  1. JannatApril 27, 2022 at 3:53 AM

    Hi Yumna,
    I really like your activity. It is very detailed and has several procedures which are easy to follow and understand.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Yumna M. AlyApril 27, 2022 at 7:34 AM

    Hi Jannat,
    Thanks a million for your nice comment. I am positive you are engaging your students more and more with YouGlish.

    ReplyDelete

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