Mango Languages

Learning ESL: Who Knew “Knife” had a “K”?

As someone whose first or second language was not English, I decided to focus on the most widely-spoken language in the world and the difficulties I had while learning it.

It’s true what they say: kids are like sponges, they soak up all kinds of information rather quickly. This is also true for languages. You place a child in a new environment and they will pick up the culture, slang, pronunciation, etc., in a timely manner. I know this because I was one of those kids. My family and I moved to the United States when I was nine years old, and besides it being the land of McDonald’s and the phrase “I’ll be back,” which I learned from watching American movies starring fellow European native Arnold Schwartzeneggar, I didn’t know anything about the American culture or the English language.

Fast forward nine months later when I tested out of my ESL classroom to a regular 4th grade class. I had American friends, I knew the cool 90′s slang, I felt like I fit in. By that time, most people wouldn’t even be able to tell that I was not a native speaker. However, I still had (and still do have) many questions about the English language.  Fifteen years later after learning four languages, I still believe English is an interesting and at times difficult language to learn.

Examples:

-English has the weirdest spelling. Who knew that knife had a “k”? I didn’t (lost a spelling bee because of this, still bitter). What’s up with the random “g” or “gh” in words such as foreigner or night?

-There, their, and they’re, all have different meanings but sound the same. Enough said.

-I use to avoid telling people what I did in the past because it was much easier to stick to the present. Go becomes went; eat becomes ate, and depending on the subject, eaten; teach becomes taught; and so on and so forth. You realize pretty quickly that you can develop incredible memorization skills.

-Learning English in America doesn’t mean that you’ll be able to understand what is being said to you in Australia, England, or New Zealand.

Earlier last week I came across an article, 10 Reasons Why English Is a Hard Language, and absolutely loved reading all the things that I struggled with as an ESL learner. The article actually goes in depth about the difficulties of learning English but also explains the reasoning behind some of the wacky rules of English. I was very glad to find out that I wasn’t the only one that felt this way. Very informative. Click here for the full article.

This is all to say that learning ANY language is tough, including English. Each language has it’s own rules, forms, pronunciation, and culture behind it. But no matter how confusing it gets, you still learn a lot along the way and it’s a wonderful feeling when you can communicate with others in your new language.

What are some interesting facts/rules about other languages you have studied/learned?

The What and Who of Headedness

Hello again! My last syntax blog left off in the middle of a discussion of how some words draw other words to them in order to form a more complete thought. Recall the verb ate.  Ate has to draw to it “the someone” who did the eating and “the something” that was eaten, in order to be a complete thought. You may wonder why ate is the element that draws the others to it.  Well, ate, as we discussed before, describes a relationship between something and someone, that is, something was eaten by someone.  Apple, on the other hand, does not describe a relationship or anything for that matter.  Apple is a just a noun.  We could say, “The apple is red” or “I ate the apple.” The same logic applies to any other noun.

We also briefly discussed the definite article the and how it also draws other elements to it in order to be complete. The begs the question, “The what?” Similar to how ate begs the question, “Who/What ate what?”  I hope this better clarifies why certain types of words do the drawing, or assigning of thematic roles, while others do not.  Remember, thematic roles are simple: the jobs that need to be filled by some word in order for the predicate, or word/phrase doing the assigning, to be a more complete thought.

In these syntax blogs, we have determined that some groups of words belong together, and we call these groups constituents. We have explored that within constituents there are even smaller groups referred to as phrases.  I mentioned the names of some phrases–determiner phrases, verb phrases, etc.–and I also briefly mentioned that phrases are given different titles depending on the “head” of the group. So, we now return to this question: How do we determine the head of a phrase?  The head of a phrase is the element that assigns thematic roles, or selects other words to complete it, and consequently causes movement of these words to merge with it. This is why in the phrase “ate the apple,” ate is the head.  Ate selected the argument “the apple.” Or, said in a different way, ate assigned a thematic role to “the apple.” Additionally, the is the head of the phrase “the apple” because it selected its argument,  apple.

Can you figure out which is the head of the following phrases: Cindy’s mother; blue house; small annoying child?

Haxey Hood

What happens when a Lord, a Fool, and Eleven Boggins get together with a big leather tube? Haxey Hood.

Every year on the 6^th of January, save for those which fall on a Sunday (in which the event is moved to the 5^th), people gather around in the town of Haxey, England, to push a leather tube, called the “hood”, to one of four pubs where it will remain until the same time next year. The game itself resembles rugby, and may very well be the oldest local tradition in England.

The origin of this custom is a bit cloudy, but the most accepted story is that sometime during the 14^th century, Lady de Mowbray, the wife of an Isle Landowner, was out riding when her hood blew off. 13 farm workers in the field rushed to help her and chased the hood down for her. In exchange, she donated 13 acres of land in exchange that this practice be reenacted every year.

There are thirteen characters from this original tale represented every year in this game: the lord, the fool, and eleven boggins. After everyone is gathered around and warming up is completed, the Sway Hood is thrown up in the air. Everyone then begins the game to try and get the Sway Hood into one of four pubs in either Haxey or Westwoodside. The game ends when the Hood arrives at one of the pubs and is touched by the landlord from his front step.

At any time there are about 200 people in the “Sway” (the fight to push and pull the actual hood), and around 1,000 people watching.

Have you participated in anything like this before?

Mango’s Feature Presentation

Numustay Everyone! Happy Tuesday!

I have been going through the Hindi Complete course and have been really enjoying learning a new language.

Did you know that to say “How are you?” in Hindi, you would say “ahp kaisay haeN?’

At first when I saw this, I got a little nervous. I wasn’t sure if I could pronounce the words correctly, but after practicing a few times I felt very comfortable and had an urge to learn more and more.

The cool features that Mango offers in each of the courses have been making this experience really interactive and fun. The semantic color coding, which shows the word order in Hindi in comparison to English, really helps the learner remember how the words are combined in the foreign language.

The pronunciation feature, which allows you to hear the word/phrase in either a fluent speed or the articulate speed, allowed me to take my time and really learn the correct pronunciation. The two speeds are recorded separately so that you can hear each and every syllable of the new word/phrase.

Once you learn what each word sounds like, you have an opportunity to practice pronouncing it all on your own using the Voice Comparison feature. This feature allows you to play the narrator’s voice and your own voice at the same time. So cool!

What is your favorite Mango feature?

Is Cheese plural for Choose?

Hello All,
As an individual whose first language isn’t English, I thought I would take this opportunity and use this blog to express how funny (and at times hard) the English language can be. I am sure that other people who learned English as a second or even third language would agree with me.

I was very happy to come across the list below which includes words and phrases that have made me scratch my head in confusion on numerous occasions. I have been speaking English for 14 years, and to this day I come across sayings that just don’ t seem to make sense. If I learned anything, it’s that sometimes you just need to just accept things just the way they are… especially when it comes words and phrases in the English language.

Here are some examples…  you tell me…

There is no egg in eggplant or ham in hamburger; neither apple nor pine in  pineapple…
Is cheese the plural of choose?
If teachers taught, why didn’t preachers praught?
If a vegetarian eats vegetables, what does a humanitarian eat?
In what language do people recite at a play, and play at a recital?
Ship by truck, and send cargo by ship?
Have noses that run and feet that smell?
Park on driveways and drive on parkways?
Sweetmeats are candies, while sweetbreads, which  aren’t sweet, are meat.
And why is it that writers write, but fingers don’t fing, grocers don’t groce, and hammers don’t ham?
If the plural of tooth is teeth, why isn’t the plural of booth,  beeth?
One goose, 2 geese.  So, one moose, 2 meese?
One index, two indices?
When a house burns up, it burns down.
You fill in a form by filling it out, and an alarm clock goes off by going on.
When the stars are out, they are visible, but when the lights are out, they are invisible.
And why, when I wind up my watch, I start it, but when I wind up this essay, I end it?
English muffins were not invented in England or French fries in France

How can ‘slim chance and fat chance’ be the same, while ‘wise man and a wise guy’ are opposites?

We take English for granted.  But if we  explore its paradoxes, we find that quicksand can work slowly,  boxing rings are square, and a guinea pig is neither from Guinea nor is it a pig.

Personally, I’ve had a really hard time understanding why the word knife is spelled with a ‘k’. That’s just me.

“Syntax – It’s not another tax on beer?” Continued…

In my last blog I began to delve in to the wonderful world of Syntax. I looked at the linguist definition of a sentence and more importantly the abstract idea of the proposition. I also briefly touched on word order as it is involved in sentence grammaticality. So from my previous blog we can now make two statements: 1) Sentences are abstract mental objects and, 2) word order is somehow involved in the “grammaticality” of sentences. However, we have not yet determined what role word-order plays in grammar. We will begin to look at that in this blog entry.

In her entry, Did you know languages have constituents?, my colleague briefly touched on an important component of Syntax: constituents. Constituents are a group of words which have an internal coherence. That is, they belong together. For example, the words in the phrase ‘that glass of milk‘ seem to belong to each other, as do, ‘the black wooden chair‘, ‘the big red odd shaped container’, etc. We know this because in a complete sentence all of these phrases can be replaced with one little word: it. However, compare those “constituents” to these segments: ‘the table over’, ‘wooden chair by’, and ‘big red odd‘. In contrast these segments don’t seem to belong together. They most certainly cannot be replaced in the sentences with any one word.

So now we have determined that some groups of words belong together and we call these groups constituents. Within constituents there are even smaller groups. These groups are given different titles depending on the “head” of the group. (I will explain headedness in a later blog). Some of these are: determiner phrases (DP) (sometimes referred to as noun phrases, NP), prepositional phrases (PP), adjective phrases (AdjP), adverb phrases (AP) and, verb phrases (VP). An example of a determiner phrase (DP) is ‘the container’. However, ‘the big red oddly shaped container‘ is also a DP, only a larger one also containing an adjective phrases (AdjP): big red oddly shaped container. Additionally, ‘the apple‘ is also a determiner phrase. However, ‘ate the apple‘, is a verb phrase (VP) that also contains a determiner phrase, ‘the apple‘.

Can you get creative and come up with a large phrase that contains more than one other additional phrase? What are the constituents in the phrase?

Now There’s Even More Mango to Love!

From the our new website, and new product features, to new courses and languages, the Mango elves have been very busy around here.What are we celebrating this fine, foggy, Friday? We have just launched an additional 9 language courses!

What are the new language courses? Well, I’m glad you asked:

Farsi Complete 2.0

ESL French Complete 2.0

ESL German Complete 2.0

ESL Greek Complete 2.0

Hebrew Complete 2.0

ESL Italian Complete 2.0

Korean Complete 2.0

ESL Korean Complete 2.0

Vietnamese Complete 2.0

In the spirit of the new language courses, here are some fun facts:

-Did you know that Farsi is widely spoken in Iran, Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, and many other countries?

-Do you know how to say, “coffee with milk” in Vietnamese? (‘Ca-phe sua’- which has a lovely flavor, but beware… Vietnamese style coffee is strong!)

-The Italian language evolved from the Latin of the Roman Empire.

-Hebrew, a Semitic language, is one of the oldest languages in the world.

You learn something new everyday!

We are so excited about all these new courses! Now you can travel to France, Germany, Vietnam, Israel, Iran, Italy, Greece, Korea and many other amazing travel destinations and be able to communicate with the locals!

Which language/s are YOU excited to learn?

It's Not Only What You Say, But Also How

Good Morning Mango Fans!

Last night, I was motivated to improve the little bit of French that I know, and decided to drive in the world of Mango, in French.  I was interested in learning about the etiquette, culture, and vocab when it comes to restaurant outings.  I got to chapter six, lesson 41, slide 7, which was about un plat principal, the main course.  I read the phrase a few times, heard the narrator say it, and memorized it. Each time I said the phrase to myself, I pronounced the phrase louder and louder, feeling confident with my French accent.  I was ready to test my pronunciation skills with narrator using the “voice compare” feature.   As I recorded myself saying “un plat principal” as clearly as I could and played it back along with the native speaker for the 4th time, I realized what I was trying to do.  Why did I want to record and play my pronunciation back over and over again? I was trying to perfect my French accent. I then started to ponder, about accents, specifically English accents…

There are many countries in which English is the native language, yet in all of these countries English sounds very different because of the accent.  In linguistics, an accent is a manner of pronunciation of a language.  Accents are not only phonetics, but they are an identity.  There are two types of English accents widely spoken in the world today; they are the General American English and the Received Pronunciation (RP), also known as the Queen’s English.  In North America, the interaction of people from many ethnic backgrounds contributed to the formation of the different varieties of North American accents (making up a Boston specific accent and one that is specific to Texans).

Looking back at history, it is difficult to measure or predict how long it takes an accent to formulate.  Accents in the USA, Canada, and Australia, for example, developed from the combination of different accents and languages in various societies, and this had effects on various pronunciations of the British settlers.  Yet North American accents remain more distant, either as a result of time or of external or “foreign” linguistic interaction, such as the Italian accent.

The accent does indeed provide the identity of the country to its native language.  When we hear American being spoken, we associate it with the United States and when we hear someone speak with a British accent with think of England.  Learning the vocabulary, grammar, and use of a language is very important; however practicing the correct accent allows you to indulge in the identity and history of the language and its native country.

Realizing this, I kept practicing, putting the “voice compare” feature to full use.  Un plat principal … u(n) pla pri(n)seepal.

The more I practiced my French accent the more connected I seemed to feel to the French culture.

Next phrase: Comme plat principal, je voudrais le plat du jour (As a main course, I’d like the plat du jour).

They say practice makes perfect… or so I hope.

10 Ways English Takes You Out To The Ball Game

Yesterday was a reminder of the extent that American sports has infiltrated the English language and just how unique baseball is to the American culture.

The Mango Team got to spend the afternoon at a Detroit Tigers’ Game, where we sported our orange Mango shirts proudly. Much of our staff is international and many of our team members had never been to a baseball game. Jamie our accountant is from China, and she even printed out the rules of the game before she went. It was really hard for me to even imagine not knowing the names of certain aspects of the sport because baseball is so much a part of life here in the U.S. If you don’t the the game than you probably would have a hard time with these idiomatic phrases.

Think about it:
1. 3 strikes and you’re out (you only three chances to do it right)
2. Hitting a homerun (when you do something well)
3. Hit it outta the ballpark (same as above)
4. First Base, Second Base, Third Base (all sexual dating terms)
5. He is out in left field (when someone is thinking differently than the group)
6. Batter up (who is next in line to speak or present)
7. Being on deck (same as above)
8. Someone throws you a curve ball (tells you something you didn’t expect)
9. He made a bad call (when someone doesn’t see what really happened or make the right choice)
10. He is on the Home Team (someone who is on your side)

Can you think of any I missed?

We had a great time at the game – check out a clip of the fun below.

Funny Video: English Lesson – How to Pronounce The "th" Sound

Late last Friday – a few Mango Languages staffers sat down and had a couple drinks while they practiced pronunciation of the “th” sound based on a Learn English Pronunciation exercise we found on the internet. Note…this is not the way we teach English!

The results a very funny video. Check it out and let us know what you think of our English pronunciation!!