Links to useful sites for learners of English and also for students and researchers who need to write academic and technical papers and theses in English, as well as some excellent links for pronunciation.
Spelling
Short summary of British versus American spelling by Oxford dictionaries: http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/words/british-and-american-spelling
Lengthy detailed description of British versus American spelling, including Greek and Latin roots: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_and_British_English_spelling_differences
Pronunciation:
How to pronounce words and use them (by EmbedPlus)
- Add words, listen and learn!
Concordancers
- The Web Concordancerfrom the VLC, Hong Kong, is excellent, has corpora available in several languages and is free of charge. You can use it on the Web for searching for structures and vocabulary in various languages, or you can download it for free and use it for your own tailor-made corpus. This concordancer is also used for data-driven learning at http://132.208.224.131/
- Online BLC KWIC Concordancer is also free andhas a Business letter corpus
- www.google.com is by far the largest concordance nowadays, and excellent if you want international English.
Dictionaries and Thesauri
- ALPHADICTIONARY.COM the quickest and most complete link for searching for meanings; it comes up with “most common” first, with the rare meanings following. It lets you search 992 dictionaries in English, and will also send you the stories of words if you subscribe, free.
- American-British British-American dictionary
- ARTFL Project Roget’s Thesaurus Search Form
- Bi-lingual Dictionaries (a long list)
- Collins Cobuild Student’s Dictionary
- Dictionary of computer hardware and data communications terms
- FOLDOC On-line dictionary of computing
- Interactive Terminology for Europe (for translations from and into 20 EU languages)
- Merriam-Webster OnLine dictionary and thesaurus
- Merriam-Webster New VISUAL Online Dictionary
- Newbury House Online American English Dictionary ( contains pronunciation hints, photos and cultural notes:)
- One Look Dictionaries – a very large and varied collection of dictionaries and glossaries
- Paderborn Dictionary Link– a very good collection.
- Wordsmyth English Dictionary-Thesaurus
- Web of 600 online dictionaries (in about 150 languages)
- WWWebster’s Dictionary
Machine Translators
- Babel Fish page for translating Web sites and texts
- http://lingro.com/ will process the page and then allow you to click on any word on the page to get translations. Just go to the web page, enter the URL of a web page you would like to read.
- SYSTRAN translation engine
Writing numbers in US and UK English
The system for writing numbers used in the U.S. is not as logical as that used in the UK and throughout Europe. In Europe, a billion (bi meaning two) has twice as many zeros as a million, and a trillion (tri meaning three) has three times as many zeros as a million, etc. The scientific community seems to use the American system.
| Number of zeros | U.S. & scientific community | UK and European countries |
| 3 | thousand | thousand |
| 6 | million | million |
| 9 | billion | 1000 million (1 milliard) |
| 12 | trillion | billion |
| 15 | quadrillion | 1000 billion |
| 18 | quintillion | trillion |
Style Guides
EU Publications Office > Interinstitutional style guide
Common mistakes and tricky questions
Guide to Grammar and Writing by Charles Darling
Interesting things for ESL students – Word games, puzzles, quizzes, exercises, slang, proverbs and much more by Charles and Lawrence Kelly
Know your keyboard symbols – an excellent list with many alternative names included
Online English Grammar by EduFind.com
Online Writing Lab at Purdue University
Self-study Grammar Quizzes – a very large and professional collection by Charles Kelly
Advice and instructions for writing a doctoral thesis at TKK
Citation Styles : APAand MLA by the Rensselaer Writing Center
Common Errors in English by Paul Brians
Common Mistakes and Tricky Choices
Dangerous words – words over-used by writers!
Dr Grammar’s Frequently Asked Questions
Guide to Grammar and Writing : Dedicated to the memory of Dr. Charles Darling.
How To Write A Dissertation: Bedtime Reading For People Who Do Not Have Time To Sleep
Interinstitutional style guide – the official EU Style Guide. Highly recommended by Ruth!
IT and Communication by Jukka “Jukki” Korpela
Keep it simple (The Fog Index)
Online Technical Writing: a textbook on line by David A. McMurre
Plagiarism
Purdue Online Writing Lab (OWL)
Resources for Technical Writers
Style guides:
| Style guides |
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Technical Jargon in a BBC China article
The Airy-Fairy and the Nitty-Gritty – a collection of colloquial language collected by Tim Johns, Birmingham University, during academic lectures. Highly practical and recommended by Ruth!
Writer’s Web is a free, public-access handbook designed & maintained by University of Richmond students & faculty.
A.Word.A.Day (AWAD) A community of more than 600,000 linguaphiles in at least 200 countries. You too can sign up.
Human Brain Cloud – a multiplayer word association game
International English – from a British point of view, by Michael Quinion Originates in questions asked by subscribers to the World Wide Words. Free subscription available!
The New VISUAL Online Dictionary (Merriam Websters)
Unscramble, find, rhyme or define that word! Also, dictionary, crossword and rhyme finder.
http://forvo.com/ is a great site for practising pronunciation, listening and learning. You can also help to develop the site by adding and requesting new words, and pronouncing them in your mother tongue.
Links to help you to learn English by watching and listening to videos.
How Stuff Works http://www.howstuffworks.com/
A brief history of the Internet by TIME
together with a video from You Tube
and notes for use in the classroom by Karenne Sylvester)
http://kalinago.blogspot.com/2009/02/history-and-future-supplementi…
Astronaut Quiz http://science.howstuffworks.com/astronaut-quiz.htm
ESSAYS and ARTICLES
HOW GRAMMARS OF ENGLISH HAVE MISSED THE BOAT
There’s been more flummoxing than meets the eye” Charles-James N. Bailey