Make a Living Online With These 13 Online Language Teaching Tools

If the start of the 2020s has taught the world anything besides the importance of vaccinations, it has to be how fantastic it is to learn online.

But have you thought about teaching languages online before?

There are lots of great reasons to teach languages online:

🛋 It’s super convenient to teach from your home or office..

🚙 …and adventure is open to you because you can teach languages online when you’re on the road

💰 You can save money on class materials like outdated books and CDs.

⚖️ And it’s a super flexible job, which puts you in control of your time!

All this becomes much easier when you have the right tools, so today we’re rounding up the tools that we think you absolutely need to start your business.

Best Video Conferencing Tools for Teachers

As an online language teacher, you need fast internet and a stable connection, so the first important thing is to check your speed using something like Speedtest so you can be sure your internet is reliable.

Next, you need a video conferencing app. Here are 3 to try:

1. Zoom, one of the most popular video conferencing tools for online teachers that want to have meetings with high security, a cool whiteboard, and great video quality. The app is not entirely free, but if you go for it you can get group meetings included.

2. Google Meet has one big advantage: No need to download an app! You can easily screen share and chat in your browser or on your phone, and it works super well with Google Calendar. This is great when you want your students to make sure they show up for lessons. SMS invitations are easy now!

3. Whereby is a newer video platform. You can bring colour to your teaching life with its many custom options, and it never requires any software downloads. The free plan allows unlimited 1:1 meetings, though you only get one meeting room URL to share.

Best Online Tools to Teach Vocabulary

When you are teaching your students online, you will often want to share new words and expressions that come up in conversation.

The majority of online teachers use the in-built chat function in Zoom for this, and many will also type words into Google Docs as they go.

Here’s how to make it more fun:

As an online language teacher I provide many touch points so the student benefits from natural review and repetition. The following tools can make teaching vocabulary into a game:

1. Memrise is a vocabulary learning app with in-built courses and options to make your own vocabulary sets for students to use. The courses are built around CEFR levels (A1-C2). Memrise is easy to use and its feature of “mems” helps students make words sticky.

2. Quizlet is very popular with teachers, especially if you base your lessons on resources that you use many times. It’s a simple flashcard app, allowing students to review on the go. You can create a custom set of vocabulary phrases and words for them, or use pre-created sets from other users.

3. Kahoot is an amazing tool for creating super fun quiz games. Best for when you are teaching groups of students, because they can compete to get the right answers just like on a quiz show!

For more ideas to use as an online language teacher, click here and discover 6 vocabulary learning techniques.

The Best Online Tools to Teach Grammar

Let’s face it, teaching grammar is an art in itself. I do not advise teaching grammar by reading out rules to students, instead I use a curiosity-based method that is perfect for adult learners.

1. Online whiteboards like Limnu can help you and your student understand grammar through visual explanations.

2. Whimsical is a great place for more visual explanations, for example through flow charts and mind maps.

3. If you want to encourage speaking, why not ask your students to answer questions or record sentences where they practice new grammar structures! Tools like Speakpipe are fantastic for this, and personally I’d consider using Voxer or Whatsapp (it’s where I do my coaching sessions!).

4. Finally don’t underestimate the power of playing games with your language learners. Gamified apps are nice, but they will love it so much more when you can engage them in a game so they don’t even know you’re teaching grammar! Here are 5 games that will help you teach a language in lessons, online and offline.

The Best Platforms to Find Students as an Online Language Teacher

Languatalk’s listing page where you can find students

There is a BIG market of platforms for online language lessons, but beware because they are not all the same. Some platforms are MUCH more fair to teachers. My advice is that you should not feel pressured to price yourself cheaply.

If you’re a quality, creative language teacher (here are a few great ideas!), your students will benefit from your lessons and you can earn good money through your work.

So let’s see..here are a few platforms that make finding online students easy.

1. Languatalk are a new language learning platform who have been a big hit with teachers. The teachers on Languatalk love how easy it is to set up and adjust your profile and how there are no hidden fees. The team is also very available for supporting new tutors. Recommended for any online teacher with experience or qualifications.

2. italki are one of the big names in language learning, and they stand out for their HUGE range of languages. You will find students here no matter which language you want to teach, but be aware that the market is very busy. Italki don’t always accept new teachers for every language. Recommended if you teach a rare language.

Apart from those two platforms, I don’t recommend that you rely on the big marketplaces too much. Use them to get started and only continue if you find you’re getting great students at great rates. In my experience, the best way to get great work as an online is to build lasting relationships with great students.

Here’s The Full List of Tools for Online Language Teaching

I hope this list was helpful for you and that you found the tool you were looking for! Here’s a quick reference list of what they were:

For Online Video Conferencing: Zoom, Google Meet, Whereby

For Teaching Vocabulary Online: Memrise, Quizlet, Kahoot

For Teaching Grammar Online: Limnu, Whimsical, Speakpipe, Voxer, Games

For Finding Online Language Students: Languatalk, italki

If you would like to bookmark this article, here is the address:

https://www.fluentlanguage.co.uk/blog/online-teaching-tools

Frequently Asked Language Teacher Questions

How do I become a language tutor?

Anyone can start tutoring languages,

1. Advertise yourself locally with flyers in local venues like cafés and libraries.

2. Contact local schools and let them know that you offer tutoring services.

3. Find students online! In this article, you will learn about my top recommended platforms where you can make a profile and start teaching online.

4. Find a good location to teach, for example your home or a café.

5. Set yourself up for taking payments. This can be cash, by card, or via online platforms.

What qualifications do I need to teach languages?

This varies depending on the learner and the platform. Sometimes they will look for someone to practice conversations, and you can be that partner even without qualifications. At other times, you will need specific qualifications such as

• Teaching diplomas like CELTA

• Language degrees like Masters or Bachelor

• Experience working in schools or tutoring environments

If you want to tutor young people in person, you might also need a criminal records check.

How do I become a freelance language teacher?

You will usually need to set yourself up as a self-employed person in your country, so that you are legally allowed to earn money. Please check this with your local government so you’re above board when it comes to tax.

To teach online, you need good internet, a microphone, and video conferencing software like you can read in this article.

Finally, if you want more experience you can offer to participate in free language exchanges. Here are some great tips for making language exchanges work for you.

Got More Questions About Teaching Online?

I have over a decade of online teaching experience, from 1:1 language lessons all the way to creating a hit language course.

If you want to learn more from me about how to make money online, make sure you join my newsletter here - you’ll automatically be registered for all emails about online teaching!

The Best Language Learning Tools for Autumn/Winter 2019

Have you ever googled "the best tools for learning a language?"

Oh, you were doing that just now?

Lucky you found us, because in this blog article I've got the best tools of the season all lined up for you.

What Makes The Top Tools?

Top tools are curated by me (Kerstin Cable) together with my co-host Lindsay Williams, and we have been doing this honorable job for a few years now! Every 6 months, we list the most interesting and useful language learning resources we've seen online and offline.

There's also a podcast episode of the Fluent Show where you can hear a discussion of each of these resources and what makes them great.

The Recommendations for Language Learning in Autumn/Winter 2019

Try them out yourself and make sure you listen to the podcast episode to find out which ones we chose as our top 3.

FlipWord

FlipWord inserts target language vocabulary and quizzes into every page you're reading online, so that you can learn and review vocabulary in your target language while reading the content you would read anyway. As they say, it's passive language learning.

Flipword is a Chrome Extension, soon to be available on mobile devices too. Currently, it works on every page that you read online in English, Chinese, or Korean.

The Indo-European Cognate Dictionary

Do you love languages? THOUGHT SO! Your face may light up just like mine did when you hear about the Indo-European Cognate Dictionary! In this new reference book for language learners, you can look up how one (proto-or-not-) indo-European root has evolved to show up in up to 32 different languages.

No matter if you're learning German or Swedish or Portuguese, this book is guaranteed to help you remember and understand vocab more easily. You'll thank us for this one, polyglot friend.

Mini Vocabulary Notebooks

Lindsay bought her notebook in Korea and here are a few similar ones from YesStyle UK and Amazon.com. Handwrite your vocabulary lists, then memorize them and review your vocabulary by covering up one language with the little flap.

By the way, here's a little more information about the miraculous benefits of keeping a language learning notebook.

Quizklip

Do you read articles in your target language in Chrome browser and want a nice and easy way to look up vocab? Then Quizkip has your back. This handy little extension helps you find a translation for words you don't know, and it builds a list that you can export straight to Quizlet or Anki.

Master Any Language

This website offers a large supply of free language courses, language games and vocabulary list in a wondrous range of languages. If you are curious and want to dabble in a lesser-known language like Breton, Komi, or Uyghur, you'll find lots of materials here.

LingoLog

LingoLog is an online notepad with a calendar, giving you a library of interesting prompts for language learners. Every time you write na entry in your target language, the calendar records it so you can build a habit streak.

This is perfect if you want to write in your target language and you like a very simple interface. You can also share what you've written with friends and teachers to get feedback and corrections.

Honorary Mentions

• Lupa, an app for learning Spanish with Radio Ambulante
• The Language Learning with Netflix extension for Chrome browser

What Do You Think?

Listen to the podcast episode to hear how we ranked each one of the resources in this blog post and which one is the best.

You can get in touch with us and tell us what you thought by commenting below or finding us on Twitter and Instagram.

5 Hilarious Games for Learning Languages in a Group

It’s an open secret among experienced language teachers: We love playing games!

During my retreats and lessons, I’ve had so many experiences when an hour of Articulate in German helped my students speak fluently with more ease than a hundred other lessons. In this guest post, Italian teacher Gloria presents her top 5 games for learning languages.

Many of these games will be a lot of fun for learning other languages, too. Over to Gloria…

Among the tools we can use to learn languages, games are surely the ones I love the most. I know it sounds weird said from a teacher, but I’ve never really liked traditional learning methods. Sure, when I was learning languages at school, these traditional methods made me feel like I was doing the right thing. Still, I found them endlessly boring and energy-consuming. All those drilling activities, fill-in-the-blank exercises, multiple-choice quizzes… they just made me feel anxious and in the end, they weren’t contributing to my learning.

The Problem With Traditional Study Methods

When you feel tense or anxious, you are pushing yourself away from your learning goals. Why? Because we need to create positive memories if we want to store new information into our brain. If we want to secure a long-term learning or, in other words, if we want to truly acquire new information, we need to be in a relaxed and stress-free state of mind. Stress prevents new information from coming in. Conversely, happiness and calmness open us up to letting new information in.

This is especially true for Italian.

Italian is known particularly for its charm, but also for being quite a complicated language. If English is your first language, you might have experienced a few tough moments when approaching Italian for the first time.

Group Games for Language Learners

Below you will find some creative group games which will help you add some fun to your Italian practice and secure yourself a stress-free and efficient learning.

1) Strega Comanda Colore (Witch commands colour)

This game comes straight from my childhood and is a part of the Italian kindergarten-games tradition. Here I would like to propose it with a small variant. Originally, we have one person who plays the witch and who says “strega comanda colore…” (witch commands colour…) and then he or she adds one colour of their choice. Once the other players have heard the colour, they have to run and touch one object with that specific colour before the witch catches them. If someone gets caught, they become the witch, and the game continues until everyone gets caught.

Now, here is the variant I would like to propose to you: When you touch an object, you can also shout the name of that object. This way, you will create an opportunity for learning and revising new Italian words.

You can also stick a post-it note on the objects you haven’t learned yet. After that, you can remove the post-it note and add a bit of a challenge to your game by relying on your memory. If you want, you can use this game to revise words in other languages as well and spread a little bit of the Italian traditions all over the world.

2) The Miming Game

We can use this game for many languages, and for Italian it comes particularly in handy when you want to revise verb conjugations. When you struggle with verb conjugations, the miming game gives you an opportunity to practice Italian verbs in a laid back and fun way.

First, write a subject pronoun like io (“I”), tu (you) or lui (“he”), on a paper or a whiteboard, and mime a verb of your choice. The other players will have to guess the verb and say it conjugated according to that subject. If, for example, you choose the subject “noi” and you mime the verb bere (to drink), the participants will have to shout beviamo. The first player who guesses the right answer will take your place, and the game will continue until you all decide it’s over.

You can then choose which tense you want to revise. You can begin with the present tense and then shift to the passato prossimo or the imperfetto as well. If you want, you can also choose to revise more tenses together.

A round of Pictionary in our comfortable lounge at the Fluent German Retreat

3) Pictionary

It’s the perfect game to play with a language buddy or a small group of friends. One person begins by drawing a picture, and the other participants have to guess what that picture is and say their answer in their target language.

You can draw pictures representing nouns like cane (“dog”), albero (“tree”) and libro (“book”). You can even draw adjectives like felice (“happy”), stanco (“tired”) and triste (“sad”). Then, you can also draw verbs like mangiare (“eat”), dormire (“sleep”) and leggere (“read”). You can use this game to revise what you’ve already learned.

It’s a good opportunity to spend some good time with friends and turn a leisure moment into a learning opportunity.

4) Pronunciation Memory Card Game

Everyone loves the sound of the Italian language, but how many out there find Italian easy to pronounce? So, here I want to propose a variant of the classic memory card game.

You can still match pictures and words, but, in order to help you with your pronunciation, you can focus on tricky words like ciao, chiesa, schiena, sci, formaggio, laghi… When you find a matching pair, shout the word out loud. If you don’t remember how to pronounce that word, the other players can help you with that.

Remember, this is all about teamwork, it’s not a competition. Plus, working to support each other is going to lead you further than competing against each other.

5) Game of the Goose

It’s the famous board game where you throw a dice and move pieces from one box to another around a track. You can build this game gradually, as you learn new sentences and words.

First, print out a blank template for the game of the goose (there are plenty online) and in each square you can write a question you’ve learnt to answer. Once all the squares are filled in with a question, you and your partners can throw the dice, move your pawns and answer the question where your pawn has landed.

Remember this is about team support, instead of competition, especially if you’re shy and you feel a bit intimidated when it comes to speaking.

As you can see, when it comes to learning Italian - and languages in general, applying creativity is the first step towards a new kind of language-learning experience.

You can play these games with your friends and classmates, or you can even involve your family, if you’re learning together. You will see how easy it is to transform a learning moment into an enjoyable shared moment that will bring beautiful and positive long-term memories.

What Are Your Favourite Games for Learning a Language?

Gloria Spagnoli is a playful Italian teacher online and founder of Speakita - Playful online Italian lessons for beginners. She’s committed to helping shy beginners and false beginners speak Italian confidently, with no stress and by having fun.

Episode 38: The Best Tools for Language Learning in Spring/Summer 2016

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Episode 38 is brought to you with friendly support from italki. Do visit their site and check out the awesome Buy 1 Get 1 Free offer to learn from native speakers today.

Kerstin and Lindsay bring you the ultimate Spring/Summer collection of language learning tools. We each nominated three things we regularly use for learning languages and discussed how to make them teach you a language.

"I'm not as good as I think I am - but that's a good thing because it motivates me to work harder." - Lindsay

And if that's not enough, we then went ahead and created our own language learning chart for you.

Listen to the show to find out our absolute top recommendation.

Here's a quick run-down of the charts:

1) Forvo

This is the place you can go if you want to know how to pronounce a word in any language. It's even useful for finding out how to say a word (or a name) in your own language. Forvo's top pronounced words of March 2016 were Cruyff, Slaínte and Leicester.

This one is absolutely perfect for people who are curious and excited about language and how it works. In other words, language geeks like us. If you don't know it, forvo it.

2) Spotify

Do you like one artist in your target language and want to explore more? Then Spotify is your best tool.

Here is our podcast's own Spotify Language Chart, created for the European Day of Languages 2015 live show.

3) Workflow and Evernote (IOS devices)

The app Workflow is a way for you to connect different apps on your IOS device to each other. Use it to save audio from anywhere on the internet and save it, so that you can access it offline no matter where you are.

We recommend Workflow for anyone who loves to tinker and build their own little systems for language learning.

Workflow also talks to the Apple watch - have you used it with the watch for flashcards or uploads? I'd love to hear your stories.

3) Snapchat

Snapchat is a social network that allows you to use your phone's camera and create your day's story with videos and photos. Use it to practice speaking or snap new words in your target language.

This one is perfect if you're embarrassed to speak, because whatever you upload into Snapchat will disappear after 24 hours. We recommend Snapchat for younger learners, and anyone who loves using the camera on their smartphone.

4) Readlang

Readlang is an extension for your browser or an app for your mobile device, and it translates any website. With Readlang you can just tap on any word and it will translate it for you - and then you can save it for later or add to your flashcard system.

It makes language learning so much more interesting because you can look at anything that's relevant to YOUR life. We recommend this one for learners who are intermediate to advanced and want to maintain their language levels.

If you're a Welsh learner, there's a similar system built into the BBC Cymru website ("Vocab" button in the top right).

5) Google Sheets Translate

This is the best for anyone wanting to build word lists in several languages. Google Translate has now been added to Google Sheets, so what you can do is build a simple vocab list in a spreadsheet, then set all those words to auto-translate into another language.

Here's the detailed Google article explaining how to use this function.

If you have a csv file, you can even export from your favourite flashcard app and add it back in to google. It's perfect for polyglot learners who are working on several languages.

Honorary Mentions

Welsh-specific:

• iPlayer
  Korean-specific:
• Drama Fever

Everlasting Classics

italki, Memrise (Anki/Quizlet), HelloTalk

Do You Agree With Our Language Chart?

You can get in touch with us and tell us what you thought by

1) leaving us an iTunes review by visiting our itunes page and clicking "Ratings and Reviews"

2) using hashtag #cllp (or #kerstinyouold) on Twitter (I am @kerstinhammes and Lindsay is @ldlanguages).

And once again, thanks so much to our sponsors Italki - please support our show by visiting them today.

Language learning with Yabla

Today I want to write an article introducing you to some software that might really go some distance to keeping you learning languages online. It's called Yabla, and online at Yabla.com.

What I like about Yabla is that the system is not in a specific learning method or a big method that you have to learn first. Instead, their special software is designed to make that target language video world accessible.

Here's how it works

The materials come from TV, film and music videos in the original language. The system gives access to native language videos and allows language learners to watch things in the original language, understand them, expand their vocabulary and quiz themselves on listening comprehension. So in other words, if you've ever wasted an hour on YouTube this is your thing.

All videos display in the Yabla player, which looks like this:

I've annotated this picture for you so you can work out what the different sections are about. We have

1. Control buttons. The coolest ones are "Slow" which slows the whole video down without sounding like it's creepy monster talk (i.e. it's pitch corrected) so that you can understand the native speakers better, and "Loop" which will run a very short section on a loop until you are ready to move on.
2. Subtitles. These are available in the language of the video (here it's German) and the menu language (here that would be English), but as you can see there is a little "Hide"/"Show" menu on the right hand side so that you can watch the video with or without subtitles.
3. Subtitle Lookup. Every word in the subtitles is clickable, and will show up in the dictionary once you click on it.
4. Difficulty rating. Yabla tells users how difficult it thinks the videos are and rates them from 1 to 5. For example, my French is good enough to watch a 4/5 video without any subtitles, but I want them on for 5/5.
5. Game. The in-video game is a listening comprehension exercise, asking you to find the missing word in any phrase contained in the video. Yabla regularly publishes the high scores so I'm pretty sure you couldn't resist if there's a bit of a competitor in you.
6. Dictionary. Yabla player searches various dictionaries, or Wikipedia, for every word that you click on in the subtitles. This way you get the benefit of several uses and you can see the word used in a sentence straight away.

Here are two of my favourite demo videos:

1. Piggeldy und Frederick - Der Himmel: Piggeldy and Frederick are cartoon pigs and they live and learn, and have done this for as long as I can remember. I used to enjoy them when I was little, and still enjoy them today. Suitable even for early learners (or 2/5 on Yabla's own difficulty rating).
2. Canadian Chocolate Seller - Chocolats: The lady makes chocolate. The video contains chocolate. I think now I'm hungry.

In conclusion, I think you guys should give Yabla a go. A 1-month subscription costs $9.95 and it's refundable within 7 days, so that you can test drive the system thoroughly. The system is great for:

1. listening comprehension: slow it down where you need to.
2. writing skills - take notes and compare them with the subtitles afterwards
3. growing your vocabulary - write down new words and quiz yourself or use the in-built Game and Flashcards features.

Yabla is available for learners of English, French, Chinese, German, Spanish and Italian.

Final message to Yabla: Where is the Russian version? I can't wait!

Final message to you: Fluent Language's blog is an affiliate partner and receives a small commission if you decide to sign up for a Yabla account, so thanks in advance if you do!