Website Review- the End

Watching the foreign blogs is a special experience. I seldom surf on foreign website because the words in it are always very small. And each article is as long as a river. I can’t afford it. So, I chose blog to follow. I consider blogs around the whole world are all the same- using simple grammar and writing short which in Taiwan, the Chinese blogs I’ve watched. However, at the end, I’m wrong. Yes, the grammar is not difficult but the American likes to write long, long and long articles! It’s the conclusion.

As a second language learner, I feel so difficult to keep English learning after I entering university. I am in English department, and the teachers here seem to consider me as a good English user and keep ask me to read a big pile of articles and book and other data. It totally drives me crazy. Therefore, I start to think about the problem. What’s wrong with me? I loved to learn English before, what’s wrong now? I figure out one possible reason. That is a problem of the level.

Compared with my writing and speaking, my reading and listening are bad. Someone else once told me that keeping reading would help my English well. Maybe it’s true—I’ve never got the sweet fruit from it—but to me, it’s not of efficient at all and worse of all, makes me feel learning English is a cruel torture.

After following the blog website, I have some conclusion about making an English learning website. For my target audience is those who feel learning English is boring and torturing but want to advance poor English skill, I have three short thought: first, don’t put many things together in one website. It may get the readers overload. Just focus on something I am familiar with. It would help me to build an interesting website. Secondly, using pictures or videos is good to some learners who have difficulty with reading text only. And the third one is make the articles short. It would be easier to understand for readers.

Long or Short? It's a queistion

http://www.travelblog.org/Oceans-and-Seas/Indian/blog-344059.html

This is one blog I get in travelblog.com. The blog has been on the top featured blogs for many days from I've found this website. The author doesn't write many words about his own experience. He just maks a short article but posts on a lot of pictures below it. And he also posts the video on the top of his article. The readers can not only read from words but also the film. It makes the whole article more interesting! No wonder he has been the top for so long.

But to a language learner, is it good to watch short articles all the time? I mean, does short article help learners a lot? Or, maybe it does sometimes but not always. That's the question I want to discuss. For myself, I am a quick-reader. I don't spend too much time on reading a long article. I have no patience, exactly. So, reading a long article is a torture for me. And it keeps me from going on. Therefore, the advancement of my English skill is not very good. (In English department, teachers always ask me to read long long long article or even a book!) I know I have to do it. But I can't reach the level now. Maybe it's too guick for me to get it. So, should an article be long or short when I build a website for language learning? Hum...

Another Traveling Heaven!

http://www.travelblog.org/

This is another website for traveling blogs. For me, it's better than the previous one.

Firtst, in its homepage, you can find out a small map. Just follow your favorites, click on any spot on the map, and then you will enter another page in which there is information of the places you are most interesting in. The content includes blogs, pictures and forums. I don't like to spend too much time to surf in the whole website just for searching for the things I want. "Time is gold." Haha. Secondly, travelblog.com shows its every function clearly in its homepage. I can get familiar with it quickly. It has built up almost every useful tags that I need in its homepage. I feel it's easier to use the website so that I would become more interested in digging the website.

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The arrange of the English website is very important. Especially for the EFL readers, it's more important!! It's because to EFL readers, there has alreaby been an obstacle between the readers and the website which gives the readers first difficulty to get in the content. So, if the arrange is confusing and not clear, it would build up another, one another ......difficulties betweem the two.

So, if I'm going to set up a English learning website, I must take the arrangement into great consideration.

Action!!

Usually, the bloggers of the blogs about traveling post words and pictures or even words only. It's seldom to find out videos with them. You can still find out someones but there isn't much. However, travelpod.com overturns this "tradition". In travelpod.com, you will find out a lot of videos showing different countries. It's not rare any more here.

Posting videos makes the website more fun. Viewers won't read articles and pictures only anymore. They can watch exacter images and enjoy in the world's actions!!

However, till now, I've never found out some videos with voice-over. It's pity. I am a person who really loves to watch traveling programs. It's joyful about watching moving images with a host's words introducing more about the image.

Therefore, I think, if I am going to set up a website about learning English with traveling, it's to have videos with voice-over! This way makes the learning funner. And for some learners who do not like to read too many words, voicing videos will give them a better way to learn language.

Taiwan, In World's Eyes

http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/naysay/1/1200924180/tpod.html

When I was looking for some interesting traveling blogs about other countries in the world, I found a small title reading "Travelers from Taiwan." It's so cool to find out traveling article about Taiwan. I can re-see my own country through foreign eyes.

In this one, the author introduces a lot of detailed things about Taipei, such as traffics, famous landscapes and so on. And she posts not only words but also some photos she takes. Posting pictures asides the words is not a new thing. You can find out that many bloggers write their articles with it. But to an EFL reader, it makes articles more easily understood and interesting.

Travel Around World!

Though I don't have enough money and time to make my traveling dream come true now, I hope one day that I can make it! Recently, I found an cool traveling blog site. There are a lot of travelers from different places around the world. And this is the website link: http://www.travelpod.com/

In this website, people can choose the blog of their favorite themes to read. And besides the blogs, there are many traveling forums built for everyone to discuss traveling things. If people have any questions about traveling, such as hotel, traffic and so on, the professional travelers can give the answers soon and precisely.

Though the bloggers come from different countries, the main language they use is still English, and the english articles they write are not difficult to read except of some special traveling terms which you have to look up for. So, the range of target audience can be very wide.