Snaplingo

Today I want to introduce a software called Snaplingo, which is designed for Chinese young learners who are aged between 5 and 16. You can download to your mobile phones.

Security

Firstly, in consideration of the target audiences is normally minors, the users have to register for an account under the monitor of their parents. Then, the registration information will be sent to their parents’ email accounts.

Personality

After the registration, the learners could design their own avatar, which I think will stimulate students’ learning motivation. When learners tap any part of body, the students can hear the audio explanation of that part. Accordingly, students will not feel bored although this is a kind of audiolingual method.

Once the learners entered into the user interface, they will be in their own “house” where they can customize the theme according to their own taste. Additionally, they can have their own pet, and they have to look after it, or it will get ill.

Communication

The feature I like most is the function of interactive communication. Students will be given ten tasks each day. In these tasks, the students will be asked to communicate with the learners who are English native speakers, but learning Chinese now. For example, students may be asked to upload a picture, and describe it both in English and Chinese, and then the foreign friends who see this picture could give comments or correct the grammar or spelling errors. Every time the student complete a task, they will gain some rewards, and they can use these money to decorate their house and feed the pet.

Moreover, this app not only can help students on writing, but it can also improve the students’ speaking. In other words, the students will also be asked to give description with audio, and thus they can practice their oral skills as well.

When the children completed all the tasks, they can go to the photo clubs (you can find it at the screenshot below), where they are able to find many pictures uploaded by different users. The students could find a lot of pictures they are interested in and users who have similar hobbies and interests. Like a mini SNS, the students could send friend request to the others within this app. Besides, learners can also find some friends with instant chatting.  The “Wormhole” is a chat room that the students can find one peer to chat in the target language, either in English or Chinese. If the users become friends, they can chat online in two languages, so they can improve their own target language skills. More importantly, users could make friends from different cultural background.

The Wormhole

Photo Clubs

However, it may be noted that the vocabulary range of these young children is very limited since most of them learn English or Chinese only for few years. Also, in spite of the app has the function to help them to translate their words or sentences into the target language, this software is still “a new born baby”, this translation is not accurate. I hope the students will not misled by some errors with it. If the function becomes perfect one day, I still wish the learners could try their own best to communicate with each other.

My opinions

I always believe that the aim of language learning is to communicate with others to achieve the goal of information transformation. This software creates a small chat room for students to practice their writing and speaking skills. Although the majority of students are beginners of the target language, they are all at least intermediate speakers of their mother tongues. The learner-learner interactions can scaffold each other, and their similar age and interests will also motivate them to have more interactions and deep communications.

Culture gap is also significant in language learning. When you learn a language, you have to understand the local culture, which I believe will facilitate language learning.

Drawbacks

The pronunciation of this software is not from a human, but a machine, so the sound is weird. In addition, some functions are only available for VIP users. Personally, the biggest problem is the pictures. Since most of the pictures are related to Chinese culture, so it might be too hard for the overseas users to understand and interested in. Finally, there are too many pictures about celebrities, so I’m afraid the children may know nothing about that.