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Lingu@net World Wide


The About page says:
 
Lingu@net World Wide is a multilingual, online resource centre for learning languages.
In 2013-14, the Lingu@network project, funded by the European Commission’s Lifelong Learning Programme, turned Lingu@net World Wide into a dynamic and interactive website in which users can participate actively by contributing with their resources and creating communities to exchange ideas and experiences about language teaching or particular areas of pedagogy across languages.

Lingu@network is being carried out by a consortium of more than 30 partners led by The Languages Company, UK, and the Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, Spain.

The main function of the site is to provide links to reputable language teaching resources worldwide. You can choose from a wide range of languages to navigate around the site, which is clear and unfussy in design. If you enter a search inquiry you are given a list of links, each of which you can select for more detailed information. The site found all the reputable resource sites I tried and gave quite detailed, largely accurate summaries of their content.

In fact certain quality criteria have to be met for sites to be linked to. They say:

  1. Is the content reliable in terms of linguistic and factual accuracy?
  2. Is the site user-friendly in terms of: ease of navigation; user support (e.g. online help) and interface design?
  3. Is it up-to-date and (where appropriate) is there any evidence that it will be maintained and regularly up-dated in the future?
  4. Is the resource free of offensive material or links to offensive material?
  5. Is it from a recognised provider i.e. 'an acceptable source' such as:
    • international, national or regional organisations and centres supporting the teaching and learning of Modern Foreign Languages;
    • publishers and broadcasters;
    • professional networks and associations;
    • other individuals and institutions involved in foreign languages teaching and learning whose online resources fulfill the quality criteria above.

A search for "French listening" came up with 195 hits. Each one is identified by its site title and a symbol which suggests what the emphasis of the site is: listening, reading, assessment, teaching and learning (most have this symbol), literary texts, interaction and events, authentic materials, newspapers. A search for "French grammar" produced 175 hits including the well known sites such as Tex's French Grammar, Frenchteacher (!) and French in a Click.

There is a tutorial which explains how to upload your own resources to free web space. You should also be able to catalogue your own selections.

The "Community" part of the site includes a forum (which, when I looked, seemed to have been the victim of spamming). My attempt to register to access all the site's features failed - something may be amiss.

I can recommend this site for its search facility and the relatively detailed information it provides on each link. The fact that links have been vetted is a major plus over a standard search engine search. Whether people use its forum and web space for resources is another matter. My guess is that the very breadth of the site may discourage teachers from doing so.


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