With gadgets as the new-age teachers, smart services help you learn English quicker The English language doesn’t come naturally to a lot of us. However, new-age learning methods are changing that, very quickly. And the smartphone is playing a very important role. Hello English app, which was updated on 8 July, has been developed by the Jaipur-based start-up Culture Alley. Thedevelopers claim the app has 3 million users. According to app analytics website App Annie, Hello English is the 98th most downloaded app in India on Android phones as of 8 July—and is the most popular among educational apps. It is currently available as a free download on the Google Play store, and it doesn’t cost a dime as you progress through the different levels of learning—there are pop-up ads within the app, and that is how the developers earn money. The app can teach translation from almost any Indian language to English—at the time of writing this, the options included Bengali, Hindi, Punjabi, Marathi, Telugu, Tamil, Urdu, Gujarati, Malayalam and Kannada. The idea is to allow users to link back to their primary dialect to gain a better understanding of the new language. Once you start learning, there are a total of 200 preset lessons that focus on grammar and conversational English—each answer to a question is immediately checked and suggestions offered to the user. In-app virtual currency is accumulated on the successful completion of each lesson—this allows the user to unlock the next, more advanced lesson. The most interesting part is the availability of a tutor over a Whats App-like chat feature—if you have any queries, you can discuss them then and there. More lessons and dictionary additions will happen with future app updates that will be downloadable from the Play store itself. And it is not just the smartphone which is changing the way we learn a new language. The good old computer and the idiot box are also learning avenues.
Source| http://www.livemint.com
