“Tell Me More” program was invented by Auralog Company, which is recognized as the global leader in multimedia solutions for learning and teaching language. This software is aimed at increasing language fluency through pedagogically grounded, yet highly engaging methods.
The Tell Me More software is offered by multiple languages, such as English, Spanish, Dutch, and Italian, and is designed for beginning to advanced levels language learners. The immersion method of Tell Me More is grounded in years of academic research and is aligned for ease of use. The program centers on developing the specific skills needed to success in a language, including: vocabulary and grammar, listening comprehension, oral expression, written expression, and cultural understanding.
It has two lesson modes: Free-to-Roma Mode, and Guided Mode. In the Free-to-Roma Mode, the language learners are allowed to create their own lesson by choosing the activities and workshops they would like to do. And in the Guided Mode, it offers personalized curriculum based on language learners’ specific objectives and time constrains. The language learners need to follow the instruction and fulfill the tasks to continue to the next step, however, they can skip to next activities by clicking the skip button. During the excise, there has no time constrain for the students, they can re-listen the dialogue, and also are allowed to use correction function or solution function to help them to complete the task. The learners can also access to the Explanations of Grammar to learn the grammatical rules or the Glossary to learn the vocabulary. The activities, such as crosswords, riddles, patchworks, and mapmania etc., can stimulate the language learners’ interests of participation. And also the language learners can check their credits or quit the program whenever they want. So basically, the Tell Me More is a convenient and target-aimed program, it offers language learners freedom and interest to practice their targeted language features at any time.
Moreover, the Tell Me More program utilizes the world’s most advanced speech recognition model, S.E.T.S. The “Spoken Error Tracking System” identifies speech deficiency by highlighting the portions of a spoken sentence that need additional attention from the learner, this interactive and targeted technology can be used to reduce accent, improve listening comprehension, and enhance target language literacy.
The Tell Me More offers more hours of content, in a wider variety of activities and skill levels. Equally valid for the beginning learner or the advanced speaker. And it encourages the language learners’ all stages’ advancement. The program captures the language learners’ interest in ways that are relevant to their experience motivates ongoing study. The result showed that the more the learners are engaged in the learning process, the more likely to success in their language acquisition.
However, the program is not 100% perfect, and some items cannot fulfill their goals. For example, in the crosswords section, the learners will listen to the word, and then find the hidden word from the letters. In this section, it aims to practice students’ vocabulary literacy. But for learners who have high level of phonological ability can still spell the word correctly without really know the meaning the word. And also for the reading part, if the learners had accent, there would have more portions of highlighting, etc.
Despite of a few deficiencies, this software is by and large valid and reliable. And has been using by many teachers as technology in education. By using the Tell Me More, teachers can control students’ progress by accessing summary of students’ work, as well as the answers and marks for each excise, whether written or oral. And the Tell Me More can be printed in excise book format for revising lessons or quizzes. Moreover, the teachers can also create their own educational paths by selecting the themes and activities they want their students to address. The software is really helpful in both teaching and learning language, and should be considered by language learners and teachers.
