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Interview with Elisa Delaini of Myngle.com
publication date: Jan 22, 2009
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author/source: Jason West
This is the first of what I hope will be a series of interviews with people involved in language and language learning. Since I started English Out There in 2001 and got seriously interested in how people really learn languages I have been reading, researching and speaking to people about the subject the whole time. Anyone who knows me half well will know that I speak English and poor French. For years I have been desperate to immerse myself in another country and attempt to become fluent in its mother tongue. Last year it looked like my family might move to Denmark to live. My partner and the mother of my two boys is Danish, and I really was keen to plunge in and fulfil a dream, to live the life and speak her first language. But we moved to the south coast of England and now my dreams are filled with thoughts of buying a camper van and getting the ferry to France for protracted trips with my two and half year old, who says he is definitely up for it (rather annoyingly in both Danish and English). Listen to my interview with Elisa: Elisa Delaini, the education manager of Myngle.com, an award winning online language teaching and learning website can speak nine languages (English, French, Portuguese, Spanish, Italian, intermediate Dutch, German, Chinese and Arabic). I wanted to know how she does it, so I asked her when she was at the London Language Show late last year. I went on to ask Elisa about how Myngle works, what its biggest challenges are, how they recruit and quality assure teachers, what materials are used and, the big question for thousands of language teachers...if anyone is actually making a living on Myngle and what she thinks the future of sites like Myngle will be like. When I interviewed Elisa at the end of last year Myngle had 25,000 users. They now have 40,000. My next interview has already been recorded and is with an English guy who learnt fluent Thai in under two years at a very unusual language school in Bangkok. My quest continues...
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What they say..."Remarkable..a major contribution to what we know works." Professor Stephen Krashen. "EOT not only enriched my
vocabulary, but also made English speaking become a habit for me. I think that is my improvement." Jane, 27, student, China. "It's not just good for your English...it's good for your entire life." Arda, 19, student, Turkey. "Congrats on the great review! You have a great product." Eric Pang, President and COO, Italki.com "I love that you are using Skype as a tool here—it's so obvious that I can't believe that no one's thought of this already. Kudos to you guys for making it happen." Michael Boezi, Editorial Director, Flatworldknowledge.com "I like your program; the issues and concerns about teaching language(s), teaching materials, and teaching strategies that I obtain from your website help me in my delivery to my ESLstudents here in Xavier University, Cagayan de Oro City, Philippines. Thank you." Anita Oblina Associate Chair Department of English Language and Literature "It is an original method to learn English, it is more interesting." Marie-Carmen, 16, student, France. "It's the right way to learn English." Marion, 35, student, Liechtenstein. "I am really enjoying teaching the lessons and the programme is great - the students seem to really get something out of being out and talking to people. We have had some really interesting classes so far!" Sheree, new EOT teacher, summer 2009 "My teacher in Russia recommended it" Dmitry, 40, student, Russia. "It was very good, especially because the lesson aren't boring like the others." Mari, 16, student, Italy. "It is very funny to learn English at this school, when you are scared to speak with people you must visit this school." Claudia, 35, student, Germany. Search our resourcesLogin |
I have contacted some very eminent professors and talked to a lot of students but I have never met anyone who can speak nine (9) languages so I went to the London Language Show to meet someone who could. 
