The Michigan Corpus Linguistics team consists of researchers and students at the University of Michigan (U-M) English Language Institute (ELI). We create corpora of spoken and written academic English, provide corpus-based materials for EAP (English for Academic Purposes) teaching, and carry out research in different areas of corpus linguistics.
On our website you find information about the corpora we make available, the projects we work on, and the training we provide to ELI visiting scholars and University of Michigan students.
Welcome to the Culturally Authentic Pictorial Lexicon, CAPL, the source for authentic images for language learning. As a language teacher and learner, I always seek to connect language, culture, and meaning. This site represents my interest to not only write about language learning, but provide concrete examples.
Our world rich in diversity, both linguistic and visual, and often the connection between word and image can be lost. As commercial globalization brings the world together through 'common products', we sometimes forget how our visual perception of the world affects our use of words and the meanings they convey.
Is a house really a Haus, is pain really хлеб, and when we see red cabbage, is it really red? These are simple and mundane questions that underscore the fact that visual perception is culturally determined and visual cognition varies from culture to culture.
The CAPL project seeks to explore this idea through a collection of authentic photographs arranged by language and context. In the coming year, we will add more photos, more databases, and more textual descriptions. Check back often as we expand our collection.
It is our hope that the collection itself can spur research in a variety of areas and that the collection can be used by language teachers and learners throughout the world with its generous Creative Commons license.
E-MELD is a 5-year project with a dual objective: 1) To aid in the preservation of endangered languages data and documentation. 2) To aid in the development of the infrastructure necessary for effective collaboration among electronic archives.
"iEARN (International Education and Resource Network) is the world's largest non-profit global network that enables teachers and youth to use the Internet and other technologies to collaborate on projects that enhance learning and make a difference in the world."
"As part of the VALUE project, teams of faculty and other academic and student affairs professionals engaged in an iterative process over eighteen months wherein they gathered, analyzed, synthesized, and then drafted institutional level rubrics (and related materials) for 15 of the AAC&U Essential Learning Outcomes, creating the set of VALUE rubrics that appears below. "
the Association for Authentic, Experiential and Evidence-Based Learning (AAEEBL, pronounced "able") is a membership organization for the world e-portfolio community that now has established affiliations and collaborations with nearly all world-wide portfolio initiatives, projects and organizations. Members and affiliates help continue the work of educational transformation by focusing on new designs in learning and assessment, on increasing connections among the portfolio community, and on moving toward a more authentic assessment of actual student achievement and progress based on evidence of learning over time.
Collaboratively creating sharable information literacy tutorials. A set of video-based tutorials on info literacy topics, such as evaluating Internet sources, developing a topic, etc., shared with a creative commons license.
"Welcome to the ItalNet publication of the Opera del Vocabolario Italiano (OVI) textual database. The production database contains 1849 vernacular texts (21.2 million words, 479,000 unique forms) the majority of which are dated prior to 1375, the year of Boccaccio's death. The beta-test installation of the database under PhiloLogic3 contains 1960 documents (see below). The verse and prose works include early masters of Italian literature like Dante, Petrarch, and Boccaccio, as well as lesser-known and obscure texts by poets, merchants, and medieval chroniclers. The OVI database was created to aid in the compilation of an historical dictionary of the Italian language, the Tesoro della lingua italiana delle origini, (portions of which are now available online). The fully-searchable ItalNet implementation of the OVI database presented here has been produced in order to enable scholars around the world to benefit from this rich textual resource. "
Welcome to the Language Technology Boot Camp Site. The first Boot Camp was initiated because the language residents at the Oldenborg Center at Pomona College did not receive any training in the use of technology in foreign language learning and teaching. Many had never encountered the possibilities that a private liberal arts college offers and most had not been familiar with the teaching and learning styles and philosophy prevalent at our institution.
Therefore the first Boot Camp was conducted at Pomona College in August 2006. After talks with colleagues at other colleges I found that this was a novelty, as usually only faculty get trained in these matters and that language residents or assistants usually fall through the cracks. But especially these teacher/students are the ones with a lot of enthusiasm, current cultural knowledge, native-speaker abilities, and a more open and relaxed relationship with new technologies and possibilities.
As I was planning the 2007 Boot Camp, which underwent several changes, the idea was born that all this work and preparation should be shared, and also that if others contributed to this Boot Camp, the program would be better than if only I prepared everything.
Useful resource with instructions for creating accessible documents in multiple formats and using many of the most common software (e.g., Microsoft Office, OpenOffice, Google Docs, Acrobat, iWork, etc.)
"NonVisual Desktop Access (NVDA) is a free and open source screen reader for the Microsoft Windows operating system. Providing feedback via synthetic speech and Braille, it enables blind or vision impaired people to access computers running Windows for no more cost than a sighted person. Major features include support for over 20 languages and the ability to run entirely from a USB drive with no installation."
Red5 Flash Server is a module package for Drupal which allows you to record Flash video files (FLV) by using a standard web cam (or built-in web camera) together with the Red5 Open Source Flash Server (http://osflash.org/red5).
The difference to similar video recorder modules is that we want people to be independent of third-party providers. People should run their own Red5 Flash server instead. The advantages are:
* you can create your own video conversation community
* you have full access to your Flash video files
* you can record high quality videos without paying a license fee (because Red5 Flash server is open source and free - but offering same functionality as Adobe Flash Server)