Translate Shakespeare 2 Text Lingo 4 Twitter??

If like me you struggle with text and SMS or even Twitter lingo then transL8it will surely be a handy tool for you.

Simply type the text you want to translate into the field and then click on translate it. Your text will then appear translated in the filed next to it.

Or should I say?

Simply typ d txt U wnt 2 transl8 in2 d feLd & thN clik on transl8 it. yor txt wiL thN apEr transL8d n d filed NXT 2 it.


The translation works both ways so you can also feed in text messages and then translate them back to 'standard' English.

I couldn't resist trying this out with some Shakespeare so I took a short snippet of text from Tamming of the Shrew and translated it to text lingo

• Here's what I put in:
  
  See, how they kiss and court! Signior Lucentio,
  Here is my hand, and here I firmly vow
  Never to woo her no more, but do forswear her,
  As one unworthy all the former favours
  That I have fondly flatter'd her withal.

• And this is what I got:
  
  c, how dey :-* & court! Signior Lucentio,
  hEr iz my h&, & hEr I firmly vow
  nevr 2 woo her n mo, bt do forswear her,
  az 1 unworthy aL d formR favRz
  dat I hav fondly flatterd her withal.

I think this is a great tool to use with students to make short texts or dialogue a bit more interesting.

• You could have them try to figure out the code and rules of translation being applied, then translate some of their own statements.
• You could prepare some of your own lingo texts for students to translate back.
• You could translate headlines from the news.
• You could Tweet them text using Twitter and get them to translate and Tweet you back

This is a fun tool that you can use so easily in so many ways to make dealing with text a bit more entertaining and engaging for students.

I hope you enjoy it.

• Find more text related activities for EFL ESL students
  

Related links:

• Revising Short Texts and Syntax on IWB
• Prompting reading speeds
• Comparing Texts to Aid Noticing
• Write Your Own Quick Biography
• Animated EFL ESL Writing Prompts
• Text to Speech for EFL ESL Materials
• Creating audio-visual monologues
• Drama project tools

Best

Nik Peachey Read More..

Interview with David Crystal

Whilst in Cardiff at the IATEFL 2009 Conference I was lucky enough to meet once again and interview one of the UK's most esteemed linguists and genuinely very interesting man David Crystal.

One of the things that for me makes David's work so interesting, is not only his knowledge of the English language, but his open minded curiosity about the way the language is evolving in new media and electronic genre. In the interview he talks about, among other things, the use of language within SMS and his own blog at: DC Blog

I hope you enjoy the interview and check out some of the many other 40 + videos from the conference at: Cardiff Online

Here's the interview.


You can read more about SMS texting in an article by David written for the Guardian website at: 2b or not 2b?
Hope you enjoy it.

Related links:

• Interview with Marc Prensky
• Teachers' Stories
• Rod Bolitho on TeachingEnglish
• ELT classroom videos
• Would you recommend this?
• English Online
• Conference presentation videos

Best

Nik Peachey Read More..

Create your own sms groups

With the vast increase in the number of people with phones capable of receiving sms, having your own group for your students seems like a pretty good idea.

GupShup provides you with the ability to make this happen for free. You 'simply' register for free on their site and then start creating groups. The site has quite a few groups there already and some with more than 2,000 members. The groups are split into categories and there's a couple of pages of educational ones, which include quite a few word of the day type services.

Once you register you can either send out messages to the group through the website or by using your phone.

I guess the downside of this is that your students are going to be paying every time they send a message, and I've no idea what the rates are likely to be. I tried to register using my own phone here in Morocco, but never get the confirmation message with my registration code, so that's about as far as I got.

• Anyone else tried this?
• Do you know of other similar services that are free?

Would be very interested in hearing comments from anyone else doing anything like this.

To try GupShup go to: http://www.smsgupshup.com

Best

Nik Peachey Read More..