Ruby is an expressive, very high-level, scripting language. It is used on the Web mainly as part of the Ruby on Rails web development framework, but also standalone. If you’re curious about what Ruby (not Ruby on Rails) feels like, you don’t necessarily need to pick up a book or go watch a screencast (although those are good ways to learn, too).

Below are three fun, simple ways in which you can try Ruby in your browser, right now, for free, without installing a single file.

Rubymonk

Hailing all the way from India, Rubymonk offers a series of over 50 short, interactive Ruby exercises and it saves your progress. Above is what I saw when I went back to Rubymonk after leaving the website (I solved the first couple of exercises).

Let’s look at what a single exercise looks like:

The exercise starts with a simple explanation, followed by a snippet of code. If you hit the Run button, the code is immediately evaluated and you get to see its output. Next, you get a simple assignment. Write the code you think is the right answer, and hit Ctrl+Enter to run it (or click the Run button). The Rubymonk now spits out an answer:

Once you finish working through some of the exercises, you will be presented with a problem to solve on your own:

You get an explanation of what you need to solve, some template code to get you started, and you’re on your own. This is great, because it’s much closer to actually coding than filling in one-liners in response to narrow questions.  If you get stuck, you can always click “See the Solution” and the solution will instantly appear in the text box.

Once you’re done with the first problem, you are transported to the table of contents, where you can pick and choose what you want to learn (and whether you want a lesson or a problem). Lessons look like this:

And a problem looks like this:

The tags are lessons which you should work through, in order to acquire the skills you need to solve the problem. The whole thing is very polished, and just generally fun to work with. Highly recommended.

Ruby Koans

The Ruby Koans are hosted over at Heroku, and are even more steeped in mysticism that Rubymonk. Check it out:

Say what you will, but this is definitely not boring. Fill in what you think is the right answer (trivial, in this case), and hit Enter. The snippet will be evaluated, and colored accordingly:

The Ruby Koans are a lot of fun, and they seem much more advanced than Rubymonk. They start off with asserts and testing, rather than arrays or other basic concepts. One small niggle is that your progress is not saved between koans, so you’d better bookmark where you stopped for the day. It’s not as AJAXy as Rubymonk, but I think it’s still great, and it’s a project that inspired many imitations, such as the JavaScript Koans.

Try Ruby

Try Ruby was created as a tribute to why’s (poignant) guide to ruby (link to PDF), one of the craziest programming textbooks I have ever laid eyes on. It’s a great book for the Ruby language, and although the author no longer takes an active role in the Ruby community, I have a feeling he would have approved of the project. The website is built as a large ruby prompt, with instructions on the side:

The text is simple and playful (no mystical references here). You type real Ruby code in the prompt, and work through the simple exercises one by one. The whole thing doesn’t take very long.

Final Thoughts

Personally, I feel that learning by doing is one of the best ways to absorb new material. These may not make you into a code ninja, but they will definitely give you a feel for Ruby. If you’re curious about the language, pick the one you like best and take it for a spin! Let us know how it went in the comments.

View full post on MakeUseOf

Right after one of my last articles about online video-making communities, I got to thinking about how special effects is the big thing these days, and over time, I’ve been building my stockpile of tutorial sites to choose from. Veterans of After Effects may very well already know of these sites, but I’m sure that there are plenty of folks around here wanting to learn as much as they can.

So whether you are into motion graphics, action sequences, or artistic animations, these sites right here will teach you some pretty advanced stuff. Take a gander at them, and try out some of these tutorials for yourself!

Video Copilot

This definitive web-location for all things After Effects – Video Copilot – has been a longtime go-to source for VFX junkies. What I really like about this site is the fact that Video Copilot often takes on some pretty advanced techniques and then delivers it into bite-sized chunks for anyone to understand. The tutorials are all very thorough, and I’d recommend them to anyone with a creative mind and some time on their hands.

With that being said, you should recognize that Video Copilot is merely a starting point for most people, a place to learn techniques that you can build onto your own work. From my point of view, I would recommend just playing around with these tutorials. However, don’t apply the exact step-by-step results to your personal projects (for demo reel purposes), but if you are extremely new to After Effects, you should probably jump into the After Effects Basic Training, a nice set of free tutorials to get you started with the application. Furthermore, Video Copilot offers a great deal of production products for sale through their online store.

Motion Works

Motion Works is an Australian-based source for After Effects tips and tutorials that are presented in an easy-to-use format on an easy-to-read site. These tutorials are very detailed, and as mentioned with Video Copilot, you should use them as starting points for your own personal projects. The tutorials are all great exercises, and they even include instructions on how to create effects and motion graphics that you would see on television or in the movie theater.

One of the great things about Motion Works is that it actually provides downloadable presets that you can bring into your own project. Simply change the text, colors, and what-have-you, and you’ll have something presentable in no time. Personally, I would use these presets as a way to explore what exactly each setting and effect can do. Think of it as if you are reverse engineering these video effects, and that way, you can learn to make things from scratch.

AE Tuts Plus

AE Tuts Plus is a pretty solid source for After Effects, and I like a lot of what it has to offer. The tutorials range from full-length tutorials to quick tips, so if you’re easily distracted (like I am), you can learn something in a very short amount of time. With that being said, if you have time to kill, watch some of the longer videos and enjoy the power of self-serving education. The tutorials are high quality and interesting to try, but as always, try to use them only as a foundation for your work.

The unique feature I liked about AE Tuts Plus was the fact that it offers more than just tutorials, for there are plenty of VFX-related blog posts included on the site as well. From DIY gear to inspirational articles, you’ll leave AE Tuts Plus with a whole lot more than just a VFX education.

Conclusion

These sites are great, but there are probably hundreds of YouTubers out there who have dozens of tutorials for After Effects if you just go search for them. By no means should you only use these sites to build your After Effects repertoire. Heck, some of them are only kids, and I would watch them as closely as I would any professional – sometimes even more so.

With that being said, what other sites do you go to for After Effects tutorials? Any favorite tutorials from the ones mentioned here? Do you have any personal tutorials to share with us here at MUO?

View full post on MakeUseOf

class="align-right" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/java_logo.jpg" alt="" />There are plenty of people I know who’d like to know how to program, yet they’re confused by how to start and what the general ideas of programming are. In addition, there are a href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/programming-language-learn-software-development/">large number of programming languages to choose from, so choosing the right one to start out with may be a little difficult for the inexperienced programmer. This article will help you get started with a relatively easy to learn language.

Why Java?

href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tags/java/">Java is my programming language of choice when trying to learn the concepts of programming. This is because Java is very cross-platform, has a fairly readable syntax (compared to other languages), and there are many tools that can make developing in Java a fairly easy task. Before we begin, make sure that you have the href="http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/java/javase/downloads/index.html">JDK installed, as you won’t be able to do a thing without it.

Parts Of Java

Java programs are separated into classes. Technically each class is its own program, but you can work with numerous classes to make a larger, more complex program while maintaining good code organization. At least one of those classes needs to be the main class, or contain a main method. A method is a chunk of code that executes when you simply call the name of the method. The main method is required as Java looks for this method to start the program. You can pass parameters to other methods if you’d like, allowing the method to take input and do something with it.

Variables

More than likely you’ll also need to store information at certain points. These are variables, or sometimes called fields, that hold the information. You have to specify the type of variable so that Java knows what you’re trying to hold. This includes things like true/false (boolean), numbers (int, long, double, etc.), and much more. As Java can support object-oriented programming, you can even hold instances of a class in a variable.

Example

As an example, here is a class that would simply print out the number 6 onto the screen:

public class makeuseof /> { /> public static void main (String args[]) /> { /> int myNum = 6; /> System.out.println(myNum); /> } /> }

2 Recommended Applications

There are two applications I would recommend that will help you during your programming adventures.

Greenfoot

class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/greenfoot_running.jpg" alt="" width="580" height="412" />

href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/learn-write-programs-java-greenfoot/">Greenfoot is a very fun way to get the hang of programming, as you can see any changes you make to the code in a video game setting. Additionally, there is a great community that can give help, ideas, and much more. So if you want a visual programming experience, Greenfoot is a great way to get started.

Geany

class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/geany_open.jpg" alt="" width="572" height="502" />

For those who want to have a good enough editor to do the nitty gritty programming, I recommend using href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/geany-great-lightweight-code-editor-linux/">Geany. It is available for all operating systems, is relatively lightweight, and simply gets the job done. There are indeed lots of other editors that people can choose from, and they’re welcome to use those instead, but my recommendation stays with Geany.

2 Recommended Websites

There are a couple of websites that can help you out if this introduction didn’t make much sense.

class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/javanotes_content.jpg" alt="" width="580" height="416" />

First is “ href="http://math.hws.edu/javanotes/">Javanotes 6.0” which provides a much more lengthy but complete explanation of basic Java programming concepts. Here you’ll find loads of information and some programming exercises. If you have the time for it, it’s a great read.

class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/howstuffworks_java.jpg" alt="" width="580" height="433" />

Lastly, you can also check out href="http://computer.howstuffworks.com/program.htm">HowStuffWorks’ page on Java. It also includes some information and guides you to making your first program. This is another interesting read, and involves a different first problem than the traditional “Hello World” example.

Conclusion

Getting started with Java isn’t as hard as it seems. With some time and practice you’ll get the hang of it, and from there you can build more complex programs that provides more functionality. Additionally, if you master the programming concepts, it’ll be easier to learn other programming languages as a large portion of the learning process is simply different syntax.

Let us know what your Java apps and tools are in the comments below.

View full post on MakeUseOf

class="align-left" style="border: 0px none; margin-left: 20px; margin-top: 5px; float: right;" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/00-SymbalooEDU1.jpg" border="0" alt="virtual learning environments" width="220" height="220" />The Internet is dubbed as the largest library in the world. And just like any other traditional library, it’s a great place to find information and to learn about anything that interests you. Everything is just a few clicks – and a search engine – away, provided that you know how to find it. But the problem with the Internet is not about finding information. It’s about managing those mountains of data that you find.

There are many methods that you can use to manage the results of your quest for information. One of them is by creating your own “Virtual Learning Environment” using the help of class="vt-p" href="http://www.symbalooedu.com/">SymbalooEdu. This is the educational version of a similar service called class="vt-p" href="http://www.makeuseof.com/dir/symbaloo/">Symbaloo, which will help you to discover, manage and share your favorites sites from one elegant place.

id="more-58078">

Let’s Make It Personal

From the academic point of view, SymbalooEdu is a perfect place to organize classroom resources and also to show off teachers’ and students’ works/projects by sharing their Symbaloo pages with classmates and friends – either within a small closed community or a larger scale group. This Edu version also lets users easily embed academic-related materials like TeacherTube, Slideshare, and Google Docs.

Anybody can register to the service for free, and the company claims that there are already 50,000 SymbalooEDU-user teachers on their list.

After the quick and easy registration process, you’ll get instant access to SymbalooEdu.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/01a-Create-your-Symbaloo-EDU-account1.jpg" border="0" alt="virtual learning environments" width="580" height="370" />

Then you’ll land in a place called “Webmix” (more or less similar to the first page that you see every time you open a new tab on any modern browser – but on steroids). This is where you can arrange all of your learning materials for easy access. Your first Webmixes (EDU Teachers and EDU Tools) come with several default tiles that you can use right away. Clicking one of the tiles will open the related website in a new tab (or window).

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/01b-Symbaloo-Main-Page.jpg" border="0" alt="learning environment" width="580" height="411" />

If you think two are not enough, you can create other Webmixes to group and collect materials from different genres. For example, you can use one Webmix for all materials related to learning classical guitar and another one to collect your regularly visited websites.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/03d-Symbaloo-Add-Webmix.jpg" border="0" alt="learning environment" width="580" height="320" />

There are two options that you can choose when adding a new Webmix. To create your own collections, choose “Add an empty webmix“. Another possibility is searching and adding ready-made Webmixes that you can find in the Symbaloo Gallery.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/03e-Symbaloo-Add-Webmix.jpg" border="0" alt="learning environment" width="580" height="340" />

Adding tiles within one Webmix is also easy. You can use the search function to find tiles related to the topic that you are currently building.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/02a-Symbaloo-Search-To-Add.jpg" border="0" alt="main features and tools of virtual learning environments" width="580" height="210" />

SymbalooEDU will present you with several results (or none). Browse and choose one from the results, or do another search.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/02c-Symbaloo-Search-Result.jpg" border="0" alt="main features and tools of virtual learning environments" width="580" height="220" />

After you find what you are looking for, you can drag and drop the result tile to one of the empty slots on one Webmix.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/03b-Symbaloo-Center.jpg" border="0" alt="main features and tools of virtual learning environments" width="450" height="270" />

You can also create new tiles for websites that you can’t find. This is a great way to add your own (or your friends’) websites to your Webmix. Teachers can utilize this feature to create a Webmix which consists of the result of their students assignments and projects.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/03a-Create-a-new-tile-for-your-webmix.jpg" border="0" alt="03a Create a new tile for your webmix.jpg" width="580" height="390" />

I suggest you play with Webmixes and discover for yourself how fun the building process is. You could get some creative ideas to use them, either for your classroom or for your own personal life.

Let’s Make It Social

Now is the time to show your tile collections off to the world (or just to friends, classmates, and/or colleagues). There’s the share button on the top right part of the interface.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/04a-Symbaloo-Share.jpg" border="0" alt="04a Symbaloo - Share.jpg" width="400" height="250" />

The share page is quite self-explanatory. It lets you choose whether you want to add your Webmix to the Symbaloo gallery or to share it directly to your friends.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/04b-Symbaloo-Share-With.jpg" border="0" alt="04b Symbaloo - Share With.jpg" width="580" height="340" />

If you choose the latter, you can choose what method you want to use to contact your friends.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/04c-Symbaloo-Share-With-Friends.jpg" border="0" alt="virtual learning environments" width="580" height="350" />

To summarize, SymbalooEDU gives you the ability to create Webmixes, put and organize useful tiles within them, then lets you share Webmixes to your friends and the world while discovering new collections from other Symbaloo users. I myself discovered many useful tools that I’ve never known before from the default collections that come with SymbalooEDU.

I think this tool could be very useful, not only to enhance the teaching and learning process, but also to organize our Internet life. To optimize the use of this tool, Symbaloo’s developer suggests that users use their personalized Symbaloo page as their default browser home page.

I have barely scratched the surface here. You should try this tool yourself, and then share your thoughts and opinions using the comments below. />
/> Hey Facebookers, make sure to check out href="http://www.facebook.com/makeuseof">MakeUseOf page on Facebook. Over 24,000 fans already!

href="http://www.facebook.com/makeuseof"> src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/fbfeedfooter.png" />

/>

 

href="http://api.tweetmeme.com/share?url=http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/create-personal-learning-environment-symbalooedu/"> src="http://api.tweetmeme.com/imagebutton.gif?url=http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/create-personal-learning-environment-symbalooedu/"> href="http://digg.com/tools/diggthis/login?url=http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/create-personal-learning-environment-symbalooedu/"> src="http://www.makeuseof.com/images/rss-buttons/diggme.png"> href="http://www.facebook.com/sharer.php?u=http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/create-personal-learning-environment-symbalooedu/"> src="http://www.makeuseof.com/images/rss-buttons/fb.jpg"> href="http://www.google.com/reader/link?url=http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/create-personal-learning-environment-symbalooedu/&title=Create Your Own Virtual Learning Environment Using SymbalooEDU&srcTitle=MakeUseOf.com"> src="http://www.makeuseof.com/images/rss-buttons/gbuzz-feed.png"> href="http://www.stumbleupon.com/submit?url=http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/create-personal-learning-environment-symbalooedu/"> src="http://www.makeuseof.com/images/rss-buttons/stumble.png">

 

Similar MakeUseOf Articles

class="st-related-posts">

href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/6-top-reference-sites-write-winning-research-paper/" title="6 Top Reference Sites to Write a Winning Research Paper">6 Top Reference Sites to Write a Winning Research Paper (6 comments)

href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/sites-free-video-lectures-top-colleges/" title="6 Really Good Sites with FREE Video Lectures from Top US Colleges">6 Really Good Sites with FREE Video Lectures from Top US Colleges (14 comments)

href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/improve-your-memory-with-free-flash-cards-for-pocket-pc/" title="Improve Your Memory With Free Flash Cards for Pocket PC">Improve Your Memory With Free Flash Cards for Pocket PC (5 comments)

href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/gradegurus-top-ten-student-tools-2010/" title="GradeGuru’s Top Ten Student Tools for 2010">GradeGuru’s Top Ten Student Tools for 2010 (22 comments)

href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/3-great-online-tools-to-improve-study-skills-and-get-better-grades/" title="3 Great Online Tools to Improve Study Skills & Get Better Grades">3 Great Online Tools to Improve Study Skills & Get Better Grades (8 comments)

href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/use-memoriser-to-memorize-information-fastduring-your-work-day/" title="Use Memoriser to Memorize Information Fast During Work Day">Use Memoriser to Memorize Information Fast During Work Day (8 comments)

href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/uberstudent-custom-operating-system-students-linux/" title="UberStudent – Custom Operating System For Students [Linux]">UberStudent – Custom Operating System For Students [Linux] (12 comments)

href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/top-10-downloaded-educational-software-movers-shakers/" title="Top 10 Most Downloaded Educational Software [Movers & Shakers]">Top 10 Most Downloaded Educational Software [Movers & Shakers] (7 comments)

href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/educational-youtube-channels/" title="The Five Best Educational YouTube Channels">The Five Best Educational YouTube Channels (16 comments)

href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/pelement-chemistry-study/" title="Study Chemistry and its Elements the Right Way with pElement">Study Chemistry and its Elements the Right Way with pElement (21 comments)

View full post on MakeUseOf.com

Many people have a real knack for teaching even the most complicated concepts to people. Other people are avid learners who are always looking for new information to read about, or new skills to acquire.

Here at MakeUseOf, we’ve covered a variety of choices for when you want to find resources for online learning, like Einztein online study courses, Justin’s review of free online college courseware, and of course there’s FreeVideoLectures, where you can watch videos on over 700 course topics.

However, there is one online learning resource that goes beyond all of those sites, by providing not only online course materials – such as lessons and tests – but you’ll also find an entire community of like-minded students with a thirst for knowledge. Nuvvo is an online learning community that offers all of those things and more. Whether you’re a student or a teacher, you’ll want to check out this creative learning resource.

Creating Your Account & Profile

Signing up at Nuvvo is free and easy to set up – all you need is a valid email address. Nuvvo combines online learning tools with the look and feel of a social network, however it is primarily for creating online learning areas where students can read lessons, take tests, and participate in discussions about the subject with other students.

You can judge the credibility of an instructor, or the activity level of a student, by their “authority” level. Authority is broken down into both teaching activity and student activity. To improve your curriculum and teaching authority, simply get active in the many areas of Nuvvo.

Finding Topics To Learn About

Just about everyone has a subject that they are very interested in learning more about. For me, those include blogging and web design, computer programming and investigative journalism. Brainstorm the subjects that you’d love to learn more about, and start typing in keywords into the search bar on Nuvvo’s “Learning Communities” page.

I’ve always wanted to learn more about the Java programming language, so I decided to searching for Java learning communities, and discovered several. The “Java/J2EE Development” learning community had 70 other students participating and looked pretty interesting.

Joining a learning community, you’ll discover lessons, tests, trivia, discussions and more. These communities are created and run by experts who love the topic so much that they offer free lessons and other learning tools, so you’ll discover that there’s a lot of very useful information embedded into each of the lessons. For example, the lesson on basic Java concepts was detailed and provided a decent background on Java basics.

Once you’re done studying the lessons, you can take the tests that instructors created for the material, try your hand at answering some of the trivia questions, or discuss specific questions you have with the instructor and students in the discussion areas.

Becoming A Nuvvo Instructor

Now, if you have an area of expertise that you’d love to share with interested students, you can create your own learning community. I decided that I would create a learning community about how to blog, so clicking on “Start a Community” in your workspace takes you to the area where you can set up your learning area and associated subdomain.

Creating your first lesson is as simple as using any WYSIWYG web page editor or blogging platform. You can format headers, add bullet lists, include pictures and more.

When you create a lesson, you have the option to offer it as part of your overall learning community, or you can attach it to a “course” as part of specific courseware. You can do this in the right menu bar by selecting to publish the lesson privately in your courses.

Creating a course is an excellent way to offer a targeted lesson plan following a structured outline of lessons. If you plan to put a lot of effort in creating high-value courseware with instruction videos, lessons and more – you can opt to charge students for the course. Students pay (and you receive payment) through Paypal. Or, if you simply want to include free courses as part of your Nuvvo learning community, then leave the cost at $0 and select the community you want to attach it to under “Course Material.”

In the course area that students gain access to, they will see you as the instructor, as well as the curriculum you’ve created and a discussion area for students to ask you (or eachother) questions. Courses are similar to learning communities, except they are more focused on a particular sub-topic, and they include an outlined curriculum students can follow to learn new skills.

Whether you decide that you want to be a teacher or a student, Nuvvo is a very cool online community devoted to people with an interest in education and a thirst for information and new skills.

Have you ever tried taking lessons on Nuvvo? Do you know of similar online learning communities? Share your insight in the comments section below.

Image Credit: Harrison Keely

Similar MakeUseOf Articles

• Make Classes Fun By Teaching History CSI Style (15 comments)
• How To Add Quizzes To WordPress Blog (10 comments)
• 10 Interactive Games To Teach Your Kids Alphabets & Numbers (14 comments)
• Use Memoriser to Memorize Information Fast During Work Day (8 comments)
• The Best Free Online Grammar Resources (14 comments)
• Students: Free Apps To Help You Excel at School [Mac only] (32 comments)
• Pauker – An Easy-To-Use Freeware Java Flash Card Program (14 comments)
• Improve Your Memory With Free Flash Cards for Pocket PC (5 comments)
• Improve Your Language Skills With Google Translate and Dictionary (9 comments)
• How To Make A Kid Friendly iPod Touch Or iPhone (17 comments)

View full post on MakeUseOf.com

Hola, amigos y vecinos. As with any language, if you want to learn to speak Spanish, it can be very challenging. But there are several useful resources that can help you get started, or are useful if you‘re taking a Spanish course or need a refresher. These resources are a mix of websites and Apple mobile apps that are very accessible, especially if you‘re planning a trip to a Spanish-speaking country.

Apple’s iTunes Store has more than a few resources for free that can help you learn to speak Spanish.

24/7 Tutor

The 24/7 Tutor site provides two free language learning applications for Apple’s iPhone and iPad. These apps teach the language using a variety of methods, including games, multiple choice quizzes, and flash cards. The interactive lessons include audio pronunciations of selected Spanish words. While the app itself is not very appealing in its design, the lessons are direct and easy to follow. The included lesson categories—Food and Dining, Town and Country, Opposites, Basic Phrases, Questions—are great for tourists and as a refresher course.

Learn to Speak Spanish Podcasts

For a little more extensive resource than 24/7 Tutor, Learn to Speak Spanish with Discover Spanish [iTunes link] has posted over 25 ten minute podcast lessons which are a mixture of tutoring, conversational Spanish, and games. The pace of the recordings is good and clear, and the lessons cover various topics, from greetings and the names of family members, to what do you do for a living. These lessons, which are broken up in units, are great for tourists and beginners.

Spanish A+ and Spanish Pod

Edufone’s Spanish A+ [iTunes link] podcasts feature over 30 recorded lessons on varied topics such as directions to the dentist office, discussing your favorite drink, holiday, and when to use certain verbs. I would say these podcasts will be more useful for those wanting a refresher course. The lessons are basically set up as listen, learn, and repeat. They are a little fast paced, but you are instructed to pause your device and repeat what you hear. 

SpanishPod [iTunes link] is similar Spanish language podcast, featuring about 20 lessons. The presenters and teachers use a conversational style in both English and Spanish, with a mixture of direct lessons. It sounds great for beginners.

StudySpanish.com

StudySpanish.com has hundreds of traditional lessons for learning Spanish words, phrases, and parts of speech. The interactive lessons consist of speak and repeat, but you can jump around and focus on topics that you want to practice. This site is great for self-learners or for students taking a course in Spanish. The site includes free and paid membership, but the former has plenty of useful tools including quiz generators, grammar tutorials, and verb drills. The site is also set up so that lessons can be printed directly or emailed. Signing up for a free account enables you to take tests and record grades, as well as receive the site’s newsletter.

If you want to practice the Spanish you’re learning with a Spanish speaker, check out this MUO article about the website, MyIntercambio.

Let us know if you find any of these resources helpful, or tell us about websites and tools that help you learn to speak Spanish.

Similar MakeUseOf Articles

• 7 Great Games To Learn Spanish, French & Other Languages (20 comments)
• 3 Innovative Ways To Learn Or Improve A Foreign Language (8 comments)
• Top 3 Tips To Motivate Yourself While Learning A Second Language (36 comments)
• The Best Free Online Grammar Resources (13 comments)
• Pauker – An Easy-To-Use Freeware Java Flash Card Program (14 comments)
• Learn A New Language With Anki’s Flash Card System (8 comments)
• Improve Your Language Skills With Google Translate and Dictionary (9 comments)
• 4 Reasons Why Google Translate Beats The Other Services (15 comments)
• 18 Great Sites to Learn a New Language (81 comments)
• Who Is Connected To My iTunes Library? (Windows) (12 comments)

View full post on MakeUseOf.com

Visit PCWizKidsTechTalk.com for more tips. The Window registry has been tweaked, haved and configured in my previous videos for improving your Windows experience. Now we review how its setup so you understand what your actually editing.

Looking for something to spice up your web site, Backgrounds, Wallpaper, Tutorials, Graphics, Websets and Templates. There are links to it all. Some pages will also contain graphics. I made the cool graphic links websites as I was tired of looking for website graphics and dealing with the adware involved with a lot of graphic sites. You will find links to just about everything except clipart, though some sites will have some.

SEO is Search Engine Optimization. If your pages are not optimized correctly, they will never be found by the search engines. This page is the most important page of this site for building a website. The tools here are essential to making your website rank higher in the search engines. Check out our SEO page. It’s a page that should not be missed.

If you do not know about keywords and keyword density, you will be in for a lick of trouble. Keywords are what the search engines search for.

For example: Lets say you have a website on Italian Recipes. Your keywords would be something like “italian recipes”, “pasta”, “foods of italy”, “rigatoni dishes” etc. Its best if you also make the website name part of your keywords. Example: Sophias-foods-of-italy.com. I like to add the dashed between words so the search engines can read them easier, but it is not absolutely necessary. Each page of your website should have its own keywords as well.

Keywords density is how many times your keyword is used on that page. If you don’t have enough, you may not be found, but if you have to many the search engines will ban your site for keyword spamming. There are links to keyword density checkers below.

This is just a small example of some of the tool you can find at Cool, Graphic Links.

Make sure you check out the free trials page also. There are some great tools I am sure most can use.

If you’re just starting out with computers and have never used a mouse before, this demo is for you. You’ll learn how to move the pointer on your screen, how and when to use the mouse buttons, and how to use the mouse to select text in a document.