The language trainer gives learners the opportunity to boost their language skills on their own or in a group. Please find a description of the individual features of the language trainer in the navigation menu on the left.

• The language trainer is free of charge.

• Most icons used in the language trainer are taken from the K Desktop Environment® (three cheers to this valuable OpenSource project!), or have been created by ourselves.

• Buttons to execute specific actions are usually located at the bottom right in the light blue bar.

• We set up two forums especially dedicated to the languge trainer. Here you can search for people to set up a study group or you can ask questions regarding the language trainer (in the 'RE: LEO trainer' section). These forums are open for all users irrespective of their language combination. If a problem concerns a certain language in particular please phrase the subject of your query accordingly. - For all questions regarding language and translation please use the appropriate section of the normal language forums.

Thanks in advance for your comments, your help is much appreciated!

• Single-user vocabulary training: You can either make use of LEO's ready-made word lists or select and save content in your own private word lists. There are various ways to passively or actively learn and memorize the word pairs in your word lists (cf. the relevant sections in the user guide). If you only want to use the language trainer on your own, you can ignore all comments regarding group learning.

• Group learning: Members of a group may either have equal status or they are supervised by a master user (e.g. teacher). Users with equal status and master users can upload lessons so that other users can exercise their language skills. The lessons currently may contain reading, dictation, translation and gap-fill exercises as well as related vocabulary. Members can communicate with each other on a private discussion forum which is set up automatically when a group is created.

• You have to be registered to use the language trainer. Registration is free of charge, as is the use of the language trainer.

• Existing logins and word lists will remain active.

• Since this is the first version of the language trainer, we will be grateful to receive constructive comments regarding usability etc. We apologise in advance if our workload may not permit us to reply in a timely fashion and if we cannot realise all suggestions.

• You can only save words in your language trainer that are listed in the LEO dictionaries. This is due in part to the fact that the software does not save the actual word pairs but references to the dictionary entries.

• You have to be a registered user to use the language trainer. To register, click on the registration link at the bottom of the Login box on the left.

• Registration provides you with a login and password which gives you access to the language trainers for all language pairs LEO offers. This means you only have to register once to make use of all our services, including the forums and the full version of Lion shareware.

• You must have cookies and JavaScript enabled in your browser settings.

• If you tick the box 'Save login data as cookie' you only have to log in once unless you delete your cookies or access the trainer from a different computer. If you do not tick the box you have to log in for each new session. A session ends when you log out, close your browser or do not use the trainer for a certain amount of time.

To select and save entries in your private word lists, follow these instructions:

• Log onto the language trainer. If you cannot log on despite using the correct log-on data, check your browser settings and make sure to allow cookies.

• Type in a word in the dictionary and hit enter.

• Tick the box next to an entry if you want to save the word pair. Please note: if you cannot see any boxes you will probably not have JavaScript enabled in your browser settings.

• Click the 'save' button (top left-hand corner of the results table); you will see an overview of the words you selected on the next page.

• File the words in specific word lists (these can be defined in the section My vocabulary); after filing your words or if you have not yet defined any word lists or want to sort your entries at a later date, click the button. The words will then be stored in your general word list.

Use the flash card slide show to easier memorize new words or words that you struggle to remember. Select your learning content from your private word lists, if you have any, or from LEO's ready-made word lists, and in case you are member of a study group, shared word lists.

How to start:

• After clicking on Memorize select the list of words you want to memorize under the tab 'select words' by clicking and then ticking the boxes before the icon. The entries of the selected word list(s) will be displayed in the vocabulary preview (you will either see a list of German or English words, depending on your language order).

• Clicking on the 'Settings' tab gives you the possibility to set parameters for the slide show as follows:
  Word order: We recommend selecting 'random word order' to memorize new words; words that you struggle to remember, e.g. those you statistically get wrong most often, can be marked to be displayed first.
  Testing mode: You can choose between continuous slide show and manual slide show. When selecting the latter, you can reveal the right answer by clicking on the flash card. Another click displays the next flash card.
  Maximum number of flash cards: You can split up your word lists in smaller portions and set a limit of flash cards to be displayed.
  Language order: You can set the language order to 'German -> foreign language' and 'foreign language -> German'.
  
  Changes only apply to the current round of testing. Permanent changes can be effected under the link Preferences

• After you have chosen a word list and possibly adjusted your 'Settings', click the button, to start the slide show.

You will find details about the different 'Settings' if you click on the Help link for this section. The display interval between flash cards in the continous slide show can be changed in the Preferences in the navigation menu.

Select your learning content from your private word lists, if you have any, or from LEO's ready-made word lists, and in case you are member of a study group, shared word lists.

How to start:

• After clicking on Vocabulary drill select the list of words you want to use for your drill session under the tab 'select words' by clicking and then ticking the boxes before the icon. The entries of the selected word list(s) will be displayed in the vocabulary preview (you will either see a list of German or English words, depending on your language order).

• Settings: Under the 'settings' tab you can set certain preferences for the learning session:
  Word order: allows you to change the order in which the words are presented to you.
  Mode of testing: choose from different options such as reveal solution, type solution or untangle a jumble of letters, etc.
  Maximum number of words: You can split up your word lists in smaller portions and set a limit of words to be tested.
  Language order: You can set the language order to 'German -> foreign language' and 'foreign language -> German'.
  Stringency: Different levels of stringency can be applied depending on how strictly you want to match your translation to the original entry (e.g. you can choose to ignore special character notation, accents, articles).
  
  Changes can only be applied for the current round of testing. Permanent changes can be effected under the link Preferences.

• In the French, Italian and Spanish vocab trainers it is possible to practice verb conjugation of verbs contained in your word lists: Click the link 'Vocab drill' in the navigation menu, select the tab 'Verb Conjugation' and choose the tense you want to practice. You will then be required to fill in the correct endings to complete the randomly requested verb forms.

• After you have chosen a word list, and if necessary adjusted your 'Settings', click on the button to start the slide show.

You will find details about the different 'Settings' if you click on the Help link for this section.

In this section, the language trainer stores information regarding your learning progress.

• History: This section contains a history of your memorizing ("M") and drill ("D") sessions. Click the magnifiying glass to see the settings and words of a particular session, and the refresh button if you want to repeat a session.

• Statistics: The statistics provide an overview over the learning progress regarding individual word lists. By default you will receive a statistical analysis of your learning progress regarding your private word lists. The filter symbol bottom right also allows you to access statistical information for other word lists (by clicking the appropriate icons and ).

Unless you select a target word list, new words are filed into your General word list. If you collect a relatively large number of words and/or words from different domains, the best thing to do is to create different (e.g. domain-specific) word lists into which you can file your words. You may file words into more than one word list.

Instructions:

• Click on My vocabulary in the navigation menu. Existing word lists in your language trainer will be displayed together with their contents. If you are only interested in the contents of specific word lists you can select the relevant word lists via the filter icon . Alternatively, the filter feature also allows you to select all words that are not yet filed into a word list. Click on to create a new word list and on to delete existing word lists (after clicking on the icon you can select the word lists).

• The printer icon takes you to the printer feature which allows you to print out your vocabulary as "flash cards" or lists. In both cases the word pairs are exported into a PDF; duplex printers will print the flash cards automatically with German words on one side and words in the target language on the other side. When using a printer without duplex facility, print odd pages first and then even pages (make sure your printer does not cause problems when printing on used paper). A maximum of ten flash cards can be printed on a sheet of paper. The easiest way to print flash cards is by using perforated business card paper (e.g. sigel® Art.-No. SW 674) which allows you to separate the cards without having to use scissors.

• Entries in your language trainer will be displayed in groups of 50 per page. By clicking on the boxes next to the entries you can sort them into word lists or delete/change existing allocations.

• Clicking the remove button on the left of a word pair deletes the entry from your trainer content; clicking on the edit button allows you to add a comment to a word pair which will be displayed on the flash card in the Memorize mode or next to the solution in the Drill mode.

Essentials

In addition to vocabulary building, the language trainer also offers learning activities including translation, dictation, and gap-fill exercises. Click the link Learning activities in the navigation menu to complete an exercise which may form part of a lesson or may be intended as a stand-alone exercise. The overview shows lessons on the left side and stand-alone exercises on the right side:

Left side - lessons
There are currently two types of lessons:

• LEO's ready-made lessons are available to all users. They have been uploaded and, unless otherwise indicated, designed by the LEO team.

• Study group lessons: Learners may form study groups as part of which they can create learning activities and lessons for their peers. The master user (administrator) of a study group hands out the login data to group members so that everybody has access to the lessons (for more information about learning in groups please read the section 'Study groups'').

• Learning activities without a set deadline: these may either be publicly available or restricted to members of a study group. They may be completed at any time with learners having access to the solutions immediately after completion.

• Learning activities with a set deadline: These learning activities are part of lessons which have been created for a certain study group and can only be accessed by members of that group. The learning activities are listed indicating the type of learning activity (dictation, translation, etc.), date of creation and name of author. After completing the exercise, learners can send it back to the author for correction. Please note that it is currently only possible to set deadlines for learning activities that form part of a lesson!

As explained in the section 'Essentials', learning activities can be uploaded into lessons as exercises with or without a set deadline for members of a study group (you can join) a group in the study group directory providing you have the correct login data.

How to start:

• Learning activities without a set deadline:
  Click to choose your course and the unit and then select learning activities. You will then see the learning activities of the selected lesson, the first activity will generally be a reading exercise. The tab 'Vocabulary' reveals the words for the lesson which you can study in the or mode, or print as flash cards via the printer icon (for details on how to print please read section 'My vocabulary' of the user guide).

• Learning activities with a set deadline:
  Click the exercise you wish to complete, fill in the solution in the appropriate text field and send your solution back to the author or click the reveal solution button, depending on the type of learning activity. As soon as the author has marked and sent back your solution, you can access it in the Review section.
  The lesson of which a learning activity forms part can be found by clicking in the yellow box for the respective learning activity in the overview.

Types of learning activities:

	Reading text: The reading exercise is a comprehension exercise and does not require further action. You can listen to a text with Voice Reader.
	Dictation: Dictations are either available as MP3 files recorded by a tutor or they are read out by the Voice Reader read aloud feature. Click the dictation file, start the exercise by clicking 'Start' on the integrated flash player and type the text in the appropriate text field. Depending on the instructions of your tutor, click to send the text to the tutor for correction or click to see a corrected version of your text. In the latter case you can correct sections that come up as wrong before the correct text is finally displayed.
	Gap-fill exercise: Type your solutions in the gaps and proceed as described under Dictation Correct answers are highlighted green, wrong answers are highlighted red. Unless you are sending your solution back to the author, you can revise a wrong answer before the solution is finally displayed.
	Translation: Insert your translation in the appropriate text field and proceed as described under Dictation. Clicking shows a sample solution for comparison with your own translation. - The Voice Reader read aloud feature allows you to listen to a translation text.
	Multiple choice: In the multiple choice test, tick the boxes to indicate which you believe are the right answers (more than one correct answer is possible). Click the button to find out if your answers were correct. Green shows that you were right in selecting or not selecting an answer, red indicates that your selection was wrong. In the latter case, you have the possibility of revising your answer before the solution is displayed.

Vocabulary for the lessons can be found on the appropriate tab in the lessons section. If you click the tab you can study the vocabulary in the or mode (cf. the relevant sections in the user guide).

• Marked learning activities: Under this tab you will find all learning activities which you have submitted for correction and which have been marked.

• Learning activities to be marked: This tab shows all exercises which have been submitted to you for review and which have not yet been marked and sent back to the student.

Preferences

You can set certain preferences for your Memorizing and Vocab drill sessions under the relevant tabs. These "global" settings may be overwritten for individual memorizing/drill sessions in the 'Settings' tab.

• General:
  Word order: We recommend selecting 'random word order' to memorize new words; words that you struggle to remember, e.g. those you statistically get wrong most often, can be marked to be displayed first.
  Maximum number of flash cards: If you want to split up your word lists in smaller portions, you can set a limit of words to be tested.
  Language order: You can set the language order to 'German -> foreign language' or 'foreign language -> German'.

• Memorize vocabulary:
  Testing mode: You can choose between continuous slide show and manual slide show. When choosing the latter, reveal the right answer by clicking on the flash card. Another click displays the next flash card.
  Display interval: You can adjust the display interval between flash cards in the continuous slide show to suit your needs.

• Vocab drill:
  Vocab drill preferences: You can choose from different options such as reveal solution, type solution or untangle a jumble of letters, etc.
  Words per page: This setting allows you to change the amount of words displayed per 'page'.
  Expiry: You may want to apply 'expiry' criteria to define when words will automatically be taken off your test list. Tick the boxes above the criteria you wish to apply. Please note: These settings can only be applied in this section as it would not make sense to activate them for individual test sessions.

Essentials - Video:

If you want to learn in groups, you have the possibility to provide exercises for study groups of up to 40 members in the form of lessons.

Types of groups:

• Non-hierarchical study group: This type of group is ideal for a team of work colleagues, students, pupils, etc., who all want to jointly provide a large number of exercise material for the whole group.

• Tutored study group: This model is geared toward teachers, for example, who want to provide lessons beyond a particular textbook and set their students exercises. Group members may send the completed exercises, such as gap-fill exercises or translations, "electronically" to the tutor for correction.

• Modules and lessons: Modules (reading exercises, gap-fill exercises, etc.) can be combined to create lessons.

• Study groups: You can set up individual study groups and assign lessons to the different groups.

• Solving exercises: All exercises that are available for a study group, be it exercises for practising purposes or exercises set in a specific time frame, can be found by clicking the link Learning activities in the navigation menu on the left.

• Communication: Group members have the following possibilities to communicate with each other:

  • Master users may add comments to learning activities and lessons to give group members tips and instructions

  • group members can send finished exercises back to the Master user which in turn can send the corrected exercise back to the student

  • each study group has the opportunity to make use of a private forum

How to join a study group:

• To join a study group, you need the group ID and the group password. These data are available from the master user.

• Open the directory Study groups in the navigation menu on the left and then click the link Join and fill in the relevant fields. After you have joined, you will be able to make use of your group's learning content and take part in discussions with other members of your study group on the forum.

Leaveing a study group:

• Open the directory Study groups in the navigation menu on the left and then click the link Leave. You will see a list of study groups in which you are member. Clicking on ends your membership in the respective study group.

In this section, users may create learning activities and lessons for their respective study group. Learning activities may be uploaded as independet exercises or as part of a lesson. In the latter case, it is possbile to set a deadline for exercises that are to be completed in a certain timeframe. Each exercise can be complemented with a list of words that are relevant to the exercise for ease of understanding. Members of non-hierarchical study groups can create lessons for the whole group, uploading learning content for tutored study groups remains restricted to master users.

Create a new study group by clicking on manage in the study group directory and then on the icon or click to edit or to delete an existing study group.

New study group:

• Clicking opens a form where you can choose between the different types of groups, i.e. tutored study group bzw. non-hierarchical study group (cf 'objectives') as well as define the group name and password for your group members. Once the data has been submitted, the list of study groups is updated.

• Since group names do not have to be unique, each study group is automatically assigned a unique ID (group ID) which is displayed together with other group details when clicking on one of your study groups. Master users need to pass on the group ID and password to new members that want to join their study group.

• If you select an existing study group, you can see the group name, group ID, group password as well as learning content available to the group and a list of all group members. Clicking on of a certain lesson displays an overview over the learning activitiescontained therein. Master users may set a certain learning activity as exercise for students to complete and send back by clicking the -sign of the learning activity. The sign is then replaced by the symbol and the date on which the exercise was submitted to students.

• If group members click solve exercises they will see which exercises still need to be completed. As soon as members complete an exercise and send it to the tutor, the tutor will see the solutions below the tutor's Corrections. Similarly, students will see the tutor's corrections below their Corrections as soon as the tutor has sent the corrected file back. (The language trainer will take the e-mail addresses from the database.)

Learning activities are the basic components of lessons. At present, learning activities can be sorted into the following categories:

Reading exercise - dictation - gap-fill exercise - translation text - multiple choice

To edit or create a learning activity please click the relevant link in the learning content directory. This will give you an overview over the learning activities according to the categories mentioned above. Please choose your category from the available tabs. Once you have chosen a category, you can change or delete existing learning activities as well as new templates. You can attach tags to an exercise to indicate level of language and subject area, for example. For changes to take effect, click .

Adding vocabulary:
Each learning activity has a 'vocabulary' tab which allows users to collect translations for words in their text. Clicking on a word in the text shows the translation, alternatively you can search the translation in the search field of the dictionary. Translations for inflected words and their basic forms will be displayed providing they are contained in the dictionary. Click to the left of the entry to add the entry to your vocabulary; click to delete a word pair from your word list. Please note: In the current version of the language trainer it is only possible to add entries to the vocabulary that are contained in our dictionaries.

Details on the different categories:

	Reading exercise: A reading exercise contains a text and possibly also a picture. Users may type the text into the text field by hand or 'copy&paste' it from an existing document. Clicking in the text field displays the available HTML tags, including (bold) and (italics), as well as language-specific characters which are not available on all keyboards (umlauts, etc.). To add HTML tags to a passage, highlight the text with the mouse and choose a HTML tag. The tag will then be wrapped around the highlighted text. Special characters are inserted at the cursor position. Adding a picture: It is possible to add JPEG files (files with the extension: jpg or jpeg) to reading exercises. Maximum file size: JPEGs may be no bigger than 50KB and 360 pixels along each side. Within a lesson, the picture is positioned at the end of a reading exercise. In the preview, the picture is reduced to 150 x 150 pixels and will usually appear distorted.
	Dictation: A dictation exercise contains a dictation text which may be accompanied by an MP3 audio file. Along with the language, details regarding the level of language and subject area may also be provided The text for the dictation can either be typed into the text field by hand or copied across from an existing document using 'copy&paste'. A dictation may be accompanied by two audio files (with and without pauses/repetitions) recorded by human voice or it may be read aloud by the text-to-speech software Voice Reader. In the latter case, the text is read once in full and a second time with pauses and repetitions. Please note: Audio files can be played using the integrated flash player. Maximum file size: MP3 files may be no bigger than 5 MB. If you choose not to provide the text for the dictation, students will not be able to check their text against the correct solution. You may also choose to provide text only if you want to allow students to check the solution to a dictation set in class.
	Gap-fill exercise: Gap-fill exercises contain a title and a text and may be tagged to indicate subject area and level of language, for example. When creating an exercise, you may type the text into the text field by hand or 'copy&paste' it from an existing document. Any sequence of characters may be marked to create a gap, this means it is possible to select character strings like it's or d'abord as a gap. To define a gap, highlight the relevant words with the mouse and click on the gap icon . The highlighted characters will appear as a gap to the student.
	Translation: A translation exercise contains a source text and a sample solution and may be tagged to indicate subject area and level of language, for example. When creating a translation exercise, you may type the text into the text field by hand or 'copy&paste' it from an existing document. As regards HTML tags cf. Reading exercises above. As author of the exercise you may ask for translations to be sent back to you. In this case you do not need to provide a sample solution.
	Multiple Choice: A multiple choice test contains questions and a choice of answers of which at least one is correct. It may be tagged to indicate subject area and level of language, for example. When creating a multiple choice test, type your questions and answers in the text field, starting a new line for each question and answer. Individually highlight your answers with the mouse and click to mark an answer correct or click to mark an answer wrong. Correct answers will be underlined (for ) while wrong answers will be crossed out (for ). If you clicked the wrong button, highlight the answer again and undo the selection by clicking the same button again.

A three-level architecture (coarse to granular) ensures a structured layout even for large amounts of lessons:

Course -> Unit -> Lesson

Lessons are made up of learning activities and their word lists. If a learning activity is set as an exercise for a study group, the tutor may leave comments for the students.

New course/new unit/new lesson:

• For a new course please click the bottom-left icon , and the same icon on the bottom right for a new unit within a new course. Afterwards, you can add a description to the course or the unit.

• To create a new lesson click the relevant course and unit and again the icon bottom right; of course you may also add a name and description to the new lesson.

Completing a lesson:

• Open the relevant course and unit and select the lesson you wish to complete by clicking . You will receive an overview over the components of the lesson, i.e. name, comment, available learning activities and the name of the study groups to which the lesson is or can be assigned.

• Lessons can be assigned to study groups by ticking the relevant boxes; other changes can be applied by clicking the icon. This opens a form where you can change names and comments or delete and add  learning activities. Word lists of learning activities are automatically integrated into the vocabulary for the lesson. For the changes to take effect click .

• Under the link manage, you can identify group-specific parameters relevant to the completion of the learning activity of a lesson.