Tag: reading

Someone cooking beans by a campfire. Preparedness reading can be great for your languages!

Dystopia Warning: Reading Preparedness Booklets for Language Learning

Dystopia warning: there’s a lot of doom-mongering in the news lately. Much of it (we hope) is newspapers sensationalising for clicks. Now, you could just limit the flow of all this in the name of sanity. But, since all that reading material is there, why not turn that negative into a positive?

That’s my thinking with one type of foreign-language literature reflecting the current Zeitgeist, anyway: the preparedness booklet. This is a type of public information pamphlet that pops up from time to time when the news gets hairy.

If you grew up in the 70s or 80s, you’ll remember these as the ‘nuclear survival’ leaflets that, to be honest, frightened, rather than reassured people. These days, they’ve resurfaced, thanks to a rather dicey new geopolitics.

This time round, however, they’re less When the Wind Blows, and more about general preparedness for anything from power cuts to cyberattacks. They’re also a lot more accessible than back in the day, since they’re largely downloadable PDFs rather than locally distributed leaflets now.

Oh – and they’re also completely free.

Reading Preparedness Booklets

So why are these rather alarming publications so good for language learners? Well, first off, in terms of vocabulary, they are all about basic items. That’s the kind of stuff that’s useful to know in many situations, let alone emergencies. Food, water, utilities… All great stuff to know how to talk about when visiting a target language country.

Also, they’re accessible in terms of language, too. They’re meant to be read and understood by everybody, which means the language is clear, direct and unfussy. That’s great for a bit of intermediate reading practice.

If I’ve convinced you that a bit of prepping lit is good for your languages, then here are some links to preparedness booklets I’ve come across in other languages:

Hopefully we’ll never need these for real. For now, at least, they’re great reading practice, and offer some insights into public life in your target language countries.

Have you found any more of these online? Please let me know, as I’m always glad to add them to the list!

Parcels flying over from Germany - from Momox perhaps?

Meet Momox – German Language Materials on the Cheap

You might already know that I’m a language learning eBay bargain hunter. The site is a goldmine of course book treasures. But if you’re after German realia in particular for your teaching and learning, the Momox store could be even more of an Aladdin’s cave.

Momox is one of the big used media sellers on eBay. If you’ve bought popular items on eBay in the past, you may well already know them. They deal in all the usual mainstream books, CDs and DVDs.

But there’s one key difference: Momox is actually a German storefront. Being headquartered in Berlin, they have an immense catalogue of German-language materials. And better still, all that still qualifies for their standard free delivery charge, making it a really affordable way to buy your authentic materials auf Deutsch.

Momox Merch

One particularly rich seam of goodies available for a bargain on Momox is reality TV merch. In terms of language learning, you’ll know that I rate following a reality franchise as a super fun way to engage with your target language country.

Personally, Germany’s take on Pop Idol, Deutschland sucht den Superstar, has been a favourite of mine since I excitedly discovered it in the early noughties. Back then, I had to wait for a trip abroad to grab the CDs and DVDs. Now, there’s a raft of Deutschland sucht den Superstar memorabilia on Momox, all at super cheap used prices! For fans of the rival Voice of Germany, you can even pick up the console game from the series. Hours of fun.

And there are books, of course – loads of them. For easy target language reading, all the big kids’ series are all there, like Harry Potter – just search “Harry Potter und” for all the German ones. They’re a lot cheaper than buying them from a UK-based store.

It’s all the kind of thing that would have made me giddy in my early language learning years (and kept the postman busy). If you’re a German learner, then Momox might be just what you need to stay plugged into German pop culture – without breaking the bank.

A robot playwright - now even more up-to-date with SearchGPT.

Topical Dialogues with SearchGPT

As if recent voice improvements weren’t enough of a treat, OpenAI has just introduced another killer feature to ChatGPT, one that can likewise beef up your custom language learning resources. SearchGPT enhances the LLM’s ability to access and incorporate bang up-to-date information from the web.

It’s a development that is particularly beneficial for language learners seeking to create study materials that reflect current events and colloquial language use. With few exceptions until now, LLMs like ChatGPT have had a ‘data cutoff’, thanks to mass text training having an end-point (albeit a relatively recent one). Some LLMs, like Microsoft’s Copilot, have introduced search capabilities, but their ability to retrieve truly current data could be hit and miss.

With SearchGPT, OpenAI appear to have cracked search accuracy a level to rival AI search tool Perplexity – right in the ChatGPT app. And it’s as simple as highlighting the little world icon that you might already have noticed under the prompt field.

The new SearchGPT icon in the ChatGPT prompt bar.

The new SearchGPT icon in the ChatGPT prompt bar.

Infusing Prompts with SearchGPT

Switching this on alongside tried-and-tested language learning prompt techniques yields some fun – and pedagogically useful – results. For instance, you can prompt ChatGPT to generate dialogues or reading passages based on the latest news from your target language country/ies. Take this example:

A language learning dialogue on current affairs in German, beefed up by OpenAI's SearchGPT

A language learning dialogue on current affairs in German, beefed up by OpenAI’s SearchGPT

SearchGPT enables content that mirrors real-life discussion with contemporary vocabulary and expressions (already something it was great at). But it also incorporates accurate, up-to-the-minute, and even cross-referenced information. That’s a big up for transparency.

Unsure where that info came from? Just click the in-text links!

Enhancing Speaking Practice with Authentic Contexts

Beyond reading, these AI-generated dialogues serve as excellent scripts for speaking practice. Learners can role-play conversations, solo or group-wise, to improve pronunciation, intonation, and conversational flow. This method bridges the gap between passive understanding and active usage, a crucial step in achieving fluency.

Incorporating SearchGPT into your language learning content creation toolbox reconnects your fluency journey with the real, evolving world. Have you used it yet? 

Greek text on a packet of crisps

Language Lessons from Packaging (And A Little Help from ChatGPT)

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If you love scouring the multilingual packaging of household products from discounter stores (a niche hobby, I must admit, even for us linguists), then  there’s a fun way to automate it with LLMs like ChatGPT.

Take the back of this packet of crisps. To many, a useless piece of rubbish. To me (and some of you, I hope!), a treasure of language in use.

Greek text on a packet of crisps - food and household item packaging can be a great source of language in use.

Greek text on a packet of crisps

Normally, I’d idly read through these, looking up any unfamiliar words in a dictionary. But, using an LLM app with an image facility like ChatGPT, you can automate that process. What’s more, you can request all sorts of additional info like dictionary forms, related words, and so on.

From Packaging to Vocab List

Take a snap of your packaging, and try this prompt for starters:

Create a vocabulary list from the key content words on the packaging label. For each word, list:
– its dictionary form
– a new, original sentence illustrating the word in use
– common related words

The results should be an instantly useful vocab list with added content for learning:

Vocabulary list from food packaging by ChatGPT

Vocabulary list compiled by ChatGPT from a food packaging label

I added a note-taking stage to round it off. It always helps me to write down what I’m learning, adding a kinaesthetic element to the visual (and aural, if you’ve had ChatGPT speak its notes out loud). Excuse the scrawl… (As long as your notes are readable by you, they’re just fine!)

Handwritten vocabulary notes derives from crisp packet packaging

Notes on a crisp packet…

It’s a fun workflow that really underscores the fact that there are free language lessons all around us.

Especially in the humblest, and often least glamorous, of places.

Foreign alphabet soup (image generated by AI)

AI Chat Support for Foreign Language Alphabets

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I turn to AI first and foremost for content creation, as it’s so good at creating model foreign language texts. But it’s also a pretty good conversational tool for language learners.

That said, one of the biggest obstacles to using LLMs like ChatGPT for conversational practice can be an unfamiliar script. Ask it to speak Arabic, and you’ll get lots of Arabic script. It’s usually smart enough to work out if you’re typing back using Latin characters, but it’ll likely continue to speak in script.

Now, it’s easy enough to ask your AI platform of choice to transliterate everything into Latin characters, and expect the same from you – simply instruct it to do so in your prompts. But blanket transliteration won’t help your development of native reading and writing skills. There’s a much better best of both worlds way that does.

Best of Both Worlds AI Chat Prompt

This prompt sets up a basic conversation environment. The clincher is that is give you the option to write in script  or not. And if not, you’ll get what script should look like modelled right back at you. It’s a great way to jump into conversation practice even before you’re comfortable switching keyboard layouts.

You are a Modern Greek language teacher, and you are helping me to develop my conversational skills in the language at level A2 (CEFR). Always keep the language short and simple at the given level, and always keep the conversation going with follow-up questions.

I will often type in transliterated Latin script, as I am still learning the target language alphabet. Rewrite all of my responses correctly in the target language script with any necessary grammatical corrections.

Similarly, write all of your own responses both in the target language script and also a transliteration in Latin characters. For instance,

Καλημέρα σου!
Kaliméra sou!

Do NOT give any English translations – the only support for me will be transliterations of the target language.

Let’s start off the conversation by talking about the weather.

This prompt worked pretty reliably in ChatGPT-4, Claude, Copilot, and Gemini. The first two were very strong; the latter two occasionally forget the don’t translate! instruction, but otherwise, script support – the name of the game here – was good throughout.

Try changing the language (top) and topic (bottom) to see what it comes up with!

 

An illustration of a cute robot looking at a watch, surrounded by clocks, illustrating AI time-out

Avoiding Time-Out with Longer AI Content

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If you’re using AI platforms to create longer language learning content, you’ll have hit the time-out problem at some point.

The issue is that large language models like ChatGPT and Bard use a lot of computing power at scale. To keep things to a sensible minimum, output limits are in place. And although they’re often generous, even on free platforms, they can fall short for many kinds of language learning content.

Multi-part worksheets and graded reader style stories are a case in point. They can stretch to several pages of print, far beyond most platform cut-offs. Some platforms (Microsoft Copilot, for instance) will just stop mid-sentence before a task is complete. Others may display a generation error. Very few will happily continue generating a lengthy text to the end.

You can get round it in many cases by simply stating “continue“. But that’s frustrating at best. And at worst, it doesn’t work at all; it may ignore the last cut-off sentence, or lose its thread entirely. I’ve had times when a quirky Bing insists it’s finished, and refuses, like a surly tot, to pick up where it left off.

Avoiding Time-Out with Sectioning

Fortunately, there’s a pretty easy fix. Simply specify in your prompt that the output should be section by section. For example, take this prompt, reproducing the popular graded reader style of language learning text but without the length limits:

You are a language tutor and content creator, who writes completely original and exciting graded reader stories for learners of all levels. Your stories are expertly crafted to include high-frequency vocabulary and structures that the learner can incorporate into their own repertoire.

As the stories can be quite long, you output them one chapter at a time, prompting me to continue with the next chapter each time. Each 500-word chapter is followed by a short glossary of key vocabulary, and a short comprehension quiz. Each story should have five or six chapters, and have a well-rounded conclusion. The stories should include plenty of dialogue as well as prose, to model spoken language.

With that in mind, write me a story for French beginner learners (A1 on the CEFR scale) set in a dystopian future.

By sectioning, you avoid time-out. Now, you can produce some really substantial learning texts without having to prod and poke your AI to distraction!

There may even be an added benefit. I’ve noticed that the quality of texts output by section may even be slightly higher than with all-at-once content. Perhaps this is connected to recent findings that instructing AI to thing step by step, and break things down, improves results.

If there is a downside, it’s simply that sectioned output with take up more conversational turns. Instead of one reply ‘turn’, you’re getting lots of them. This eats into your per-conversation or per-hour allocation on ChatGPT Plus and Bing, for example. But the quality boost is worth it, I think.

Has the section by section trick improved your language learning content? Let us know your experiences in the comments!

Parallel text style learning, like Assimil courses, can be a great way to improve your fluency.

DIY Assimil : Parallel Text Learning with ChatGPT

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Assimil language learning books are hugely popular in our polyglot community. And for good reason – many of us learn really effectively with its parallel text method.

They’re especially userful when the base language is another of our stronger languages, adding an element of triangulation. I learned a heap of Greek vocabulary from the French edition Le Grec sans Peine, at the same time as strengthening my (ever slightly wobbly) French.

Now, Assimil is already available in a great range of language pairs. But it’s not always a perfect fit. For example, some editions are more up-to-date than others. More off-the-beaten-track languages still aren’t available. And at times, you can’t find the right base language – no use learning Breton through French, if you don’t have any French.

Enter ChatGPT (or your alternative LLM of choice – Bing also does a great job of these!).

DIY Assimil Prompting

Copy and paste this into your AI chat, changing the language (top), translation language (middle) and topic (bottom) to suit.

You are an expert creator of language learning resources. I want to create some text-based learning units for beginner Malay learners (level A0/A1 on the CEFR scale). The units follow the parallel text approach of the well-known Assimil language learning books.

Each unit has a text in the target language (about 250 words) on a specific vocabulary topic. It should be narrative, talking about how the topic relates to an everyday person. It should be divided into logical paragraphs. After each paragraph, there is an English translation of that paragraph in italics.

The text should be written in very clear, simple language. The language must read like a native speaker wrote it, and be error-free and natural-sounding. Source the info for the text from target language resources online, making it as up-to-date and authentic as possible. It should be completely original and not copied or lifted from any other source directly.

After the text, there is a glossary list of the key topic words from the text, sorted alphabetically and grouped by parts of speech (nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs etc.).

Are you ready to create some content? The first topic is: Mobile Technology

This prompt creates a prose-based parallel text unit. However, if you prefer dialogue-style texts, simply change the second paragraph of the prompt:

Each unit has a humorous dialogue in the target language (about 20 lines) on a specific vocabulary topic. The dialogue should relate the topic to everyday speakers through colloquial, idiomatic language.

The prompt works a treat in both ChatGPT Plus (paid) and Microsoft Bing (free). I also got very useable results in the free version of ChatGPT and Claude 2. It works so well as the focus is purely on what LLMs do best: spooling off creative text.

How Do I Use Them?

So, with your shiny, new Assimil-style units spooled off, what do you do with them?

Personally, I like to copy and paste the output into the notes app on my phone. That way, they make nice potted units to browse through when I have some spare moments on the bus or train. They’re equally handy copy-pasted into PDF documents that you can annotate on your phone or tablet.

Parallel text for Malay language learning created by AI

Parallel text in Malay and English created by AI

In terms of real-world use, the self-contained, chatty texts typically created make perfect material for the islands approach to improving spoken fluency. Create some units in topics that are likely to come up in conversation. Then, spend some time memorising the phrases by heart. You’ll be able to draw on them whenever you need in real-life conversation.

Enjoy prompts like these? Check out my book AI for Language Learners, which lists even more fun ways to get results without paying hefty course book price tags!

Fun With Texts : Travel Edition

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I came across an ancient video this week that took me right back. The video in question  was from a series of video diary entries I made on a trip to Austria in 2004. In this particular segment, I was proudly showing off the stash of free leaflets I’d cached from Klagenfurt town hall – treasures of authentic texts to take home for my teaching materials box.

German-language texts from Austria - leaflets about the EU in 2004

Austrian leaflets about the EU (2004)

A still of Rich West-Soley showing some leaflets from Austria in a video from 2004

Showing off my Austrian leaflet haul in 2004 in a video shot on a phone just a little more sophisticated than a toaster, judging from the quality

Fast forward 19 years, and I’m approaching the end of a wonderful, extended trip around Greece. It’s been a holiday full of wonderful sights, amazing food, and of course, lots of language practice. Incidentally, Greeks must be amongst the most encouraging people on the planet when you try to speak their language.

But what links this trip with that early noughties vid is that continued fascination with curating authentic texts. It’s a polyglot obsession that’s lasted well beyond my classroom teaching days; there’s no longer any teaching materials box to fill, but I’m still on the hunt.

Hunting Texts : Then and Now

The format has changed, naturally. It’s less about free brochures and leaflets now. Alas, my EasyJet baggage allowance won’t quite stretch to that any more. This time, it’s digital – and I’ve been going to town collecting text samples for my virtual Greek learning box.

Of course, Greece has a tradition of texts that stretches back a little further than many fellow European countries. It’s been particularly fun looking out for inscriptions on the many ancient monuments, and spotting similarities and differences between the ancient and modern languages.

A stone tablet in an Ancient Greek ruin, with a partial inscription in Greek

Authentic Texts in stone!

An Ancient Greek artefact


But it’s the modern examples that really hit the spot – the more everyday and prosaic the better. From bags of crisps to public notices, every bit of writing is a potential new word learnt, and an extra peep into the target language culture. It’s addictive.

A notice to save water on a Greek ship

Save water, and save those words (in Anki!)

A washing machine control panel with Greek labelling

It’ll all come out in the wash

As far as I’m concerned, there’s never any going over-the-top when collecting digital texts. Knock yourself out with as much target language as you can! The criteria for what makes an authentic text are wildly broad – it can be the odd couple of words, a text-dense poster or an entire book. It all has worth to us as learners, no matter how long.

The only rule I try to stick to is one of practical use; I aim to try and use the images somewhere, be it a blog post (like this one on German political posters) or by scraping the language for Anki flashcard entries.

A bag of crisps with Greek labelling

Language snacks

Are you a curator of authentic texts in your target language? How do you collect them, and what do you do with them afterwards? Let us know in the comments!

Nigheanan Mòra by Catrìona Lexy Chaimbeul (2014). Reading target language texts is an excellent way to improve foreign language skills.

Working with Target Language Texts

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Eager to push my Gaelic out of the language course box and into the wild, I’ve been working with a number of short texts for intermediate learners lately. Luckily, quite a few readers have appeared in the recent years, including a bunch of fun titles that go beyond the usual ‘Celtic myths retold’ route (not taking anything away from the great series of beginners’ books from Jason Bond).

A recent favourite of mine, Nigheanan Mòra (Big Girls, 2014), was penned by one of the creatives behind recent BBC Alba drama hit An Clò Mòr, Catrìona Lexy Chaimbeul. On the surface, it’s in firm rom com territory, at turns silly, funny and melodramatic. But it’s grown-up enough to feel like you’re reading a real book, and not just an oversimplified, fleshless yarn that trades plot for easy reading. It’s also chock full of colloquial, conversational Gaelic dialogue, which makes for a great living language learning model.

That said, getting the most from a reader takes a bit more organisation than simply starting at page one and ploughing through. Better to have a strategy to maximise both your enjoyment and your learning.

Working With Texts : One Approach

Of course, there’s no single ‘correct’ way to work through target language texts. Through trial and error, I’ve found a way that works for me, which I’ll outline here. It works best with short-ish texts, since it involves two passes in quick-ish succession, but you could also use it with short sections of longer texts.

That’s because manageable chunk size is the key to this method. Often, you won’t need to worry about that with texts specifically for learners. Many books that support learners, like Nigheanan Mòra, already have nice short chapters of 5-10 pages. I find that’s the ideal length to read and digest texts without tiring (because, let’s face it, reading in a foreign language is more taxing). If chapters are much longer, just flick ahead a little way to see if there’s a natural stop somewhere, and make that your goal.

Pass One : the Chill read

After that, it’s time to start reading. The first pass is the no-chill literary gambol. Read for gist and plot, and don’t fret a jot about the odd unknown word. The focus here is on simply understanding and enjoying the story, first and foremost. I like to go full non-study mode at this stage. I’ll pick a cosy reading spot, grab a drink and just try to immerse myself in the story. No dictionaries, no pencils, no interruptions.

After that first reading – maybe 20 minutes or so – I’ll stop, take a breath, and reflect on the twists and turns of the plot. It’s important to take a passive break to cogitate calmly like this, given that our brains work more efficiently with pacing (a trait the Pomodoro technique plays into).

Pass Two : The Close Read

After this brief pause, I’ll then flick back casually through the pages I’ve just read. In particular, I’ll revisit those passages I felt were tough, or noticed myself slow down in during the first pass. For each one, I’ll re-read carefully, this time trying to translate in my head, paying more attention to the grammatical structures. I’ll also spend some time on words I didn’t get the first time round, looking for contextual clues to help guess the meaning (and not reaching straight for the dictionary).

This is the stage where I really prefer old-school paper books to Kindle ones. I’ll have a pencil by me, underlining any turns of phrase that sound really idiomatic or conversationally useful. With a pop-story like Nigheanan Mòra, there’ll be loads of those, thanks to all the snappy dialogue.  They’re the snippets where I’ve realised aha! So that’s how you say X in Gaelic.

Finally, after all that, I’ll spend some time cross-referencing those new structures in grammars and online materials like the LearnGaelic.scot dictionary and Wiktionary. Once I’m sure I’ve understood them, I’ll add the phrases to my Anki deck. Adding phrases is so much more effective that lifting just individual words from texts. We speak in phrases, not lone words, so by the end of this stage I have some truly useful material to drill. This phrase-lifting approach thoroughly mines a text for connectives and sentence frames – the bread and butter of fluency.

Find What Works For You

So there you have it – one way to work with authentic texts. It’s not rocket science or particularly groundbreaking, but it works for me. And it helps, in terms of discipline, to know that I have these regular steps to follow, to give my target language reading some kind of structure.

What I also find invaluable about it, in terms of motivation, is building in a reading for pleasure stage, which includes choosing material I find fun, as well as the time to enjoy it without pressure. Even if that is silly old rom coms.

After all, learning and practising languages shouldn’t just be work, work, work.

There are myriad ways to approach target language texts. What works for you? Let us know in the comments!

ChatGPT writing a short story in German.

Short Stories… in ChatGPT

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It’s no secret – reading fiction is a favourite strategy of polyglot learners. That’s more than simply reading Harry Potter novels in translation. There’s a whole market sector that revolves around non-native short stories, and I’m not alone in enjoying the excellent Short Stories In… or Penguin Parallel Texts series to practise my languages.

But what if we could source those stories on demand… and for free?

Unless you’ve been hiding for the past three months, you’ll know where I’m going with this. ChatGPT, the natural language processor, has already made ripples in the fan fiction arena. And, it turns out, it has a knack for performing the same feat multilingually, and tailored to your exact needs.

The power of it becomes apparent when you ask it to write you a story. Because you can tailor that story precisely to your own interests. Personal interest, of course, is a holy grail with language learning motivation. And ChatGPT is like your own private author, ready to fit original content to exactly what you like.

I started where I started – literally, with languages – and requested a German short story about Eurovision. What else? The results were pretty impressive.

ChatGPT writing a short story in German.

ChatGPT writing a short story in German.

The only thing is, it’s a bit wordy for my (hypothetical) class of German students. So I ask ChatGPT to tailor it to a specific level:

ChatGPT writing a short story in German.

Tailoring the story to a specific level.

Brilliant – we’re getting something we can turn into a learning resource now. But I’d love my students to focus on more descriptive adjectives to improve their writing. Can we turn this into a better model?

ChatGPT writing a short story in German.

Tweaking the output with specific criteria.

Again, ChatGPT turns up the goods! The German is sound, and the story is a fun little read. But what about making this a polyglot resource, parallel resource, so anyone learning more than one language can keep their learning in sync? No problem:

ChatGPT writing a short story in French.

Translation into French.

Impressive. It has no issue with any of what you’d call the mainstream languages. I tried it in all of the languages I have some proficiency in, and it even churns out decent Greek and Polish. I’m not yet fluent enough in Scottish Gaelic to check this properly, but it seemed the only one that was a bit iffy, despite giving it a good go:

ChatGPT writing a short story in German.

A translation into Scottish Gaelic.

Finally, let’s throw in a short summary version we can use as revision materials, or an item description:

ChatGPT writing a short story in French.

A short summary of the story in French.

Obviously, this all comes with the caveat that it needs careful checking before use as an accurate resource. But the initial performance is pretty spectacular, to be honest. As the model is tweaked and improved, it’s not hard to imagine this becoming a cornerstone of personal resource creation for learners of languages, as well as everything else.