Interesting and effective English from TED talks

TED talks have long been considered one of the best resources for learning. of English language. As a teaching aid, it is used by both people who study the language on their own, and teachers in the courses. Today we will analyze how this resource is useful, and give links to various online resources from TED, which are convenient for learning English.

Why Studying with TED Is Good

1. The first and one of the most important reasons is interesting. Here you can find a video, perhaps, on any socially important topic. And if you are an inquisitive person who likes to learn something new, expand your horizons, then these videos are perfect for you.
2. Here you can hear and learn to understand many different accents.
3. In most of the videos, the speakers speak quite slowly, and besides, their speech is very clear.
4. Here, as a rule, they speak in classical English, without using a bunch of slang expressions, as, for example, in films. And if it’s still difficult for you to watch films or TV shows in English, at TED you can learn to perceive English by ear.
5. You can effectively replenish your vocabulary with words and expressions of different subjects, while immediately seeing the use of this vocabulary in context.
6. The video has both English and Russian subtitles.
7. Short duration of performances from 5 to 20 minutes. Thanks to this, classes do not take much time and you can practice at least every day, saving your time.
8. TED has many additional resources for learning English more effectively (we'll look at them today).

At what level to learn English at TED

It is important to keep in mind here that the purpose of the conferences is not to teach English, so these are not classic English lessons for ESOL (English learners). One lecture can be understood by knowing English at an intermediate level, the other by an upper-intermediate level. Perhaps the minimum level for understanding TEDTALKS will be a solid Pre-Intermediate, when the student has almost completed this level. In general, you should include videos with subtitles and see how much of it you can understand. If much of what has been said is incomprehensible, it is worth trying to find a simpler video.

But, there are already ready-made lessons on TED, which are divided into levels. Link in the next paragraph.

Prepared TED Lessons

TED4ESL

This site provides lessons on speaking, which are divided into three levels: Intermediate, Intermediate, and Advanced. To select the level is quite simple in the right upper corner press the LEVEL button and select your level. Here, an improvement in the perception of English speech by ear and vocabulary is being worked out. Each lesson lasts about an hour. But there are also short videos.

Before the video for each lesson you can download PDF files where you can perform exercises to consolidate the material. There is a version for both students and teachers.

Lessons Plan Digger

The Lessons Plan Digger website also has a section for learning English with TEDTALKS. The lessons are divided into several steps that allow you to study the material more effectively. The link to the video itself is given in the first paragraph. Further, each step of the lesson is described in detail, and in order to go directly to the tasks, you need to scroll the page to the very bottom to the Materials section.

All lectures on TED

A complete collection of lectures can be found on this site. Here you can choose the topic you are interested in in the Topics section, the duration of the lecture - in Duration. You can also use the search bar if you are looking for a specific lecture.

Application for mobile

If it is more convenient for you to watch lectures from your mobile phone, you can download the application for yourself. Here you can download them to watch when there is no Internet access. In addition to lectures, you can also listen to celebrity talks on NPR and TED co-produced radio. If you suddenly cannot watch a performance, you can save it to your bookmarks.

TED Ed

Here are collected interesting animation lessons on various topics. Each lesson lasts about 5 minutes. After watching, you can check how much you understood what you heard in the Think section.

Ideas TED Blog

Do you want to practice reading skills? Then you can read interesting blog articles from TED. All articles are really very interesting, but to understand most of them you need to speak English at the Upper-Intermediate level. They will be especially useful for people who are preparing to take an international exam, since they contain a lot of useful academic vocabulary.

Today's TED Talk

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Learning English from TED talks is not only useful, but also very interesting. Lectures will help train English by ear, learn new words and broaden your horizons.

Description:

Let's take a look at one interesting media app today. The TED App (Ideas Worth Spreading) features talks from some of the most amazing people in the world - tech geniuses, educational pioneers, medical mavericks, music legends and business gurus.
The program contains more than 1000 video and audio performances. TED is available on all Android devices and is updated every week. The program supports quite a lot of languages, each performance contains Russian subtitles or translation. I will say right away that I spent a couple of hours in this application before they could tear me away from the communicator.

There are four tabs on the main screen (inspired, recommended, all performances, my performances). In the "Inspire" tab, each performance is classified into one of the following categories:
- inspiring;
- amazing;
- ingenious;
- informative;
- beautiful;
- amazing;
- bold;
- funny;
- persuasive.

After selecting a category, the application will ask how much time you have to watch the performance (maximum one hour). You will be offered a specially created playlist for viewing. Any performance can be added to the "my performances" tab or downloaded to your device for later viewing. For each video, you can choose the subtitle language. In the TED program, under each speech there is short description, names of translators and editor. In the "recommended" tab, you can watch video performances recommended specifically for you, according to your interests. There is also a sorting of performances: new and popular. In the next tab "all performances" you can select the material you want to watch by tags, playlists or languages. The application contains one more function - this is a radio, which is turned on using an icon in the form of headphones.

Settings:

In the settings, you can change the language of the application and subtitles, set the settings for updating data, view tips for using the application.

At our small, fast-growing non-profit company, everyone is multi-tasking, so productivity apps help us manage our responsibilities, which range from programming and design to holding conferences twice a year. We asked TED staff what apps they can't live without. And in addition to the classics - Instagram, Google Maps, Spotify, Uber, Seamless (US version of Delivery Club) - we've found some great apps that you can use too. (The asterisk means that the application is free or has a free version).

The application shows the weather with amazing accuracy. It displays weather information in message format. For example, "Light rain will start in 22 minutes." It will also show you beautiful weather maps so you can imagine yourself as a local news forecaster. “It’s like a magician,” says our technical director Gavin Hall, “if it existed in the 17th century, it would be burned at the stake for witchcraft.”

Several of our employees love this app. It represents Google Calendar with a number of key improvements. Sunrise makes weather forecasts and birthday reminders for Facebook friends, adding them to your calendar. "It's just cool," says our IT manager, Francia Richards.

Communications manager Samantha Kelly was thrilled with the app because she recently lost her keys to her apartment and couldn't get home. The app makes a digital copy of the key after you take a photo of it. With this copy you can get new key by mail or at a KeyMe kiosk (they recently opened 5 more in New York). A scanned fingerprint is required.

The app will show all the ingredients of the personal care products you are about to buy. You scan a barcode and the app gives you information about harmful ingredients (and suggests an alternative of your choice). It helps to check such labels on packages as “100% natural ingredients”, “organic product”. Kylie Shearer, from our working group on organizing events says: "It helps me make informed choices."

You probably already know about the existence of this application - it allows you to save posts from social networks and electronic articles so that you can read them even when there is no network connection. TEDx Digital Strategist Alex Rudloff says: “It gives me the ability to keep track of all the articles that get sent to me. Since the days of Google Reader, this has been my main way to stay up to date.” Community support manager Morel Pilo added: "They send me an email every week that contains the most popular and recommended articles for me." Another feature that our employees like is the ability to change the font.

An application with a name that is not the easiest to pronounce, turns commonplace pictures into works of art. Janet Leigh from the distribution department says: “A year ago I was checking my Instagram and noticed a lot of unsightly photos. The beauty of this app is that no matter how bad your shot is, it can be easily improved. As a result, you get maximum likes with minimum effort.”

This app has over 200 filters and 10 modes. But the real benefit, according to TED Media Executive Producer Jun Cohen, is the ability to view these photos without posting them online. social networks. “I love that only I can see my Instagram-like photos,” Jun says.

Allows you to create favorites lists - be it restaurants, attractions or movies - that you can then share with friends. But the app is best known for its to-do lists, which can also be shared on social media. networks. "It organizes my life!" says Ankhali Mohan from customer service, “I use it at work and at home. The app even sends alerts to my husband when he needs to clean up.” Production manager Christel Otti is also pleased with the app: "It's only thanks to Wunderlist that I can keep track of every little detail of every production process."

The main function of this application is that with two taps you can send yourself an e-mail with a reminder or ideas that you don't want to forget. “It has saved me a lot of scraps of paper in every pocket,” says Development Officer Bedirkhan Kinar.

The app visualizes your to-do list, allowing you to create boards for different projects and separate lists within them. Each task is recorded on a separate card. “I've tried a lot of planning apps,” says social media editor Nadia Goodman, “I love how easy it is to set everything up, move it, and even change the color. Creating collaborative boards and storing information (files, posts, pictures) is also very easy. The only downside for me is that the app doesn't remind me when the deadline is approaching."

As a spin-off of the Notational Velocity program, the app is popular with techies because it contains MMD function. Developer software Joe Bartlett explains: "I'm naturally scatterbrained and love nvALT for the monitoring and indexing features that I usually record in different places and I still forget: conference notes, mathematical tricks and tricks command line, printer cartridge model. The app also has Extra options settings," he says.

Just like Wunderlist and Trello, Todoist has an app and a web client linked together. “I found it in my never-ending search for the perfect task management app,” says development team member Will True. “It may not be perfect, but it makes it easy to organize tasks by category, importance, project, or deadline. It's not fancy and that's what attracted me the most. It also has good APIs, which allows me to create my own tools with the data provided.”

This application keeps track of all your bills and their due dates, as well as monitors your bank account and credit card. Most importantly, Check will notify you in a critical situation, for example, if you are close to exceeding the limit on the card. “It is much better than Mint,” says IT manager Francil Richards, “thanks to him, I pay everything on time.”

Evernote is an organizational tool that you can use to both create notes and store your thoughts - links, photos, notes - for big projects. “I love Evernote for its versatility,” says Associate Designer Lillian Chen. “You can use it to store recipes, future plans, and meeting notes.”

To move…

This app downloads offline, searchable, zoomable maps of major cities, so even if you're walking around Tokyo and can't read the signs, you won't get lost. “It's perfect for those who, like me, travel a lot but don't like to plan ahead,” says Tu-Huong Ha, one of our editors.

Another great app for travelers. Word Lens translates written/printed text into your language in real time. After you take a photo of a sign or text, the application will give you a translated image. "This is madness! says Kylie Shearer of Events, "The translation isn't always 100% accurate, but what it gives is enough."

The app tracks your every move. It sounds creepy, but it's actually quite useful. “It counts how many kilometers you have walked, run or cycled,” says Patrick Darcy, one of the TED interns, “I don’t care about the calories that I burned, but it’s just interesting to see the route traveled for the day on the map. My friend told me about this app when he got back from Mexico City, showing me his exact itineraries."

The application will allow you to minimize the likelihood of getting stuck in a traffic jam. Drivers send a real-time report of accidents, traffic jams, etc. so that others can avoid them. June Cohen, head of media relations, once mentioned the app in a meeting, and many of us have been using it ever since.

The application will provide you with complete data on the possible routes to your final destination in 50 cities in the US and Canada. “I know exactly when the next bus or train is coming,” says Anna Fergese, Associate Director of the TED Prize. “I like the fact that when I look at the app, I know that the train is 4 minutes away and I can take my time on the descent into the subway.”

The application will help you prepare for the 5K race. It sends audio alerts when you need to start running or walking. Accountant Erlene Maruhom said: “The goal is to run 5K in 9 weeks. We'll see... I really hope so."

To make office work easier…

Highly useful application to work with Gmail. You can set up an alert to be sent if you do not receive a response to an email within the specified time. It also boomerangs important emails to you so they're at the top of your list so you don't forget about them when you need them. Our employees especially love the message scheduling feature. “I usually write e-mail on weekends or late at night, but I don't want to disturb my recipients at that time. It's nice to be able to set a time to send a message,” says writer Kate Torgovnik May.

The application helps you archive and delete emails, as well as postpone those that do not require an urgent response. You have the opportunity to fully see the correspondence, which, thanks to an excellent interface, is presented in the form of a chat. “On the way to work, I check my mail, filtering out the unnecessary. It allows me to start the day with a clear head,” says material processing manager Gwen Schroeder.

This application provides 2-step authentication before sending messages and allows you to protect your correspondence in case the phone falls into the wrong hands. "Google has a similar app, but I like Authy better because of the password protection feature."

“The app will allow you to search and open files and apps on your Mac faster using dedicated shortcuts,” says Branding Coordinator Boyan Filev, “It speeds up the process of working with files that are stored in numerous folders on your computer.”

This application is a godsend for anyone whose eyes are too sensitive to the bright light of the monitor. It makes your computer or iOS device adapt to the time of day and, the screen light becomes softer and more subdued at night. “Now I get less headaches in the evening,” says author Keith Torgovnik May, “I especially appreciate it during TED conferences, when we can sit in a dark theater all day.”

But enough about us. What apps can you imagine your life without? Share in the comments!