This YouGlish lesson plan is designed to help students connect with learning content while leveraging an online digital tool to help them achieve their learning goals.
YouGlish is an amazing video platform that focuses on sharing content in a wide variety of languages. While it is similar to YouTube in that it hosts hundreds of thousands of videos, YouGlish offers a space to learn, focus, and practice pronunciation and contextual factors of words and phrases.
For more information about the components of the YouGlish video platform, please see What is YouGlish and how does YouGlish work?
This sample YouGlish lesson plan can be used for all age groups. What would change is the level of words and phrases, depending on what stage of language learning the students are at.
Subject: Foreign Languages
Issue: Pronunciation
Learning objective:
By the end of this lesson, students will be able to:
- Pronounce target words and phrases in the language they are studying.
- Recognize target words and phrases in the foreign language they are studying.
YouGlish lesson plan: beginner
To begin the lesson, create a list of key words or phrases that you want students to focus on. Show students the pronunciation and provide different examples in related contexts.
It might be helpful to use a rowed or a similar educational technology tool to organize the lesson content. You can use the columns feature to have the different words and phrases, a definition, and then a link to the YouGlish website.
YouGlish lesson plan: practice
Give students time to practice pronouncing their language on YouGlish. Students should use the selected words and enter them into the search box. There are thousands of videos available for students to review, so if they are not interested in the first one, they can click on the next one until they find one that interests them.
Ask students to listen to the videos first, either a segment or the entire video, depending on the length. Students can control the pace of the video to choose a speed that works best for them.
Next, ask students to watch the video again, but this time to read along. During class, ask students to use headphones, as they will likely be listening to different videos. If practicing at home, headphones may be optional, as long as students have a space where they can concentrate.
YouGlish lesson plan: recording
As a formative assessment activity and as additional practice for students, ask them to record themselves saying the specific words and phrases that were modelled for them in the YouGlish videos.
To record themselves, you can use VoiceThread or another voice recording tool. With VoiceThread, students can easily stop and start recording and can demonstrate progression in their pronunciation. You can also share a class link to VoiceThread which can capture and store each student's recordings.
Additionally, if a student is struggling with pronunciation, you can record on the same screen as the student so they have another model available. Words of encouragement from you as the instructor and from other students can also be shared on VoiceThread.
What languages does YouGlish offer?
In addition to English, YouGlish offers videos in Arabic, Chinese, Dutch, French, German, Greek, Hebrew, Italian, Japanese, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, Swedish, Thai, Turkish, Urdu, Vietnamese and Sign Language.
Can you use YouGlish to practice more than just pronunciation?
Absolutely! YouGlish can be used to guide teaching to language learners of all languages. They can focus on syntax, sentence formation, speech fluency, and much more. Each video also has subtitles, so that students learning all languages can follow along. Teachers of English learners, bilingual education programs, special education, and speech therapy may find YouGlish to be a particularly useful educational technology tool.
Most students seem to enjoy watching videos online. With YouGlish, they can search for videos of interest while practicing how to pronounce words or anything else related to language learning. Students can forget that they are in class and stay focused on the learning experience!
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