by Maggie Sokolik, Ph.D.
UC Berkeley, College Writing Programs
sokolik@socrates.berkeley.edu

Real English is a CD-ROM series for beginning level English learners. It would be appropriately used either as part of a traditional English course or for self-study. Lively videos, man/woman on the street interviews, the opportunity to practice speaking and listening, and a variety of good listening activities make the Real English CD-ROM series an excellent resource.

The course structure looks like any beginning EFL course. The lesson topics are:

 

Disk 1	Disk 2
1:Hi and How are you? 2:Hi, How are you? and What's your name? 3: The alphabet in four English-speaking countries 4: Where are you from? & What's your nationality? 5:What's your name? How do you spell it? 6: Revision Plus (Review of lessons 1 to 6)	7:Numbers (number chart, "how old are you?", telephone numbers and license plate numbers) 8: What time is it? 9:The Jones family (to be + adjectives) 10:What's your job? 11: What's the weather like? 12:Directions: "Can you tell me the way to?"

The use of video to illustrate these themes, however, takes them from predictable, elementary topics to engaging and entertaining ones. In particular, the presentation of a variety of English accents makes the video engaging on many levels, and affords the user a rich English learning experience.

Basic Features

To set up the program, the user must select the language for directions (English, French, German or Spanish) and the level of audio use (voice recognition or not). The user then chooses the lesson s/he wishes to study. A progress bar at the bottom of the page shows how far along in the lesson the user has reached. A 'quit' and 'home' icon appear on each screen. The CD-ROM is easily navigated with clear and commonly used icons for controlling audio and video features. 

Video

Students can watch the videos in "presentation" mode, or broken down phrase by phrase by speaker. Listen and repeat activities accompany the videos.

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System Requirements:
Windows 95/98 or Windows 3.1 only (no Mac)

With voice recognition:
Pentium 120Mhz, 16MB RAM, 12 MB hard-drive space; Double-speed CD-ROM, High-color graphics (64,000 colors), Sound card, microphone, headphones or speakers

Without voice recognition:
486 DX4 100, 8MB RAM, 10 MB hard-drive space; 4x speed CD-ROM, High-color graphics (64,000 colors), Sound card, microphone, headphones or speakers

Version Reviewed:
1.0

Price Info:
$65.00

Availability:
Commercial software available from the publisher.

Quick Summary:
Videos of native speakers from a variety of English-speaking countries form the basis of the content of Real English. Listening, speaking, grammar, spelling, and other activities are integrated into this rich and interesting approach to beginning-level English learning.

Sample Video:
Click the image below to see a short sample of the video. (Quicktime 3 or above; 33K; low-resolution version)

(Click for Sample Video)