Welcome to business English for professionals. Hello, my name is Sarah Skye shooty Thanks for joining us. We are going to look at the course introduction and what you need for this course. So my name is Sarah Skye shootie. I'm the professor and creator of business English for professionals. I'm from Phoenix, Arizona, I studied at the Arizona State University and then I moved to Europe where I continued my studies in multimedia communications.

I have worked and studied in the Czech Republic, France, the Netherlands, and I've been based in Italy for over 15 years. And I've worked in marketing and communications and international communications for different multinationals in different sectors throughout Europe. I've also trained companies and I've taught as a professor for the University of Parma, in business communications and business English. So there's a little bit of background about me. If you would like a little bit more information, you can check out the social media pages. You can also go to the website which is www dot business hyphen English hyphen for hyphen professionals calm there, you'll find links to the social media pages to get more information.

Okay? If you get a chance, check out the pages like us, follow us connect all that kind of stuff. And if you have any questions, feel free to rate us there. So what are we going to look at in this section for our course introduction, we've got a couple areas to cover. I'd like to ask you to concentrate on your comprehension in this section. So you should be following this information and understanding all of the details.

So try to understand 90 to 100% of the content. So be sure that the vocabulary is clear. The requests are clear, and everything else is understandable. Use the resources that you're learning. So in this section, we are going to look at resources and I asked you to make sure that you use them and take advantage of them. Explore them download them all that kind of stuff.

So use them for comprehension. And then please feel free to send me a message if you have any questions, okay, and you can send a message through the website or through the social media pages, etc, or through the platform. Alright, what is in this course introduction? Well, we are going to look at resources. And we're going to look at the learning method. Last thing is tips, tricks and recommendations.

So we're also going to look at those and this is to improve your learning and to maximize what you get out of this course. So with our resources, we're first going to take a look at the language tools that you need to follow this course. And your media platforms and media platforms are where you're going to get your information. And these can be according to your interests, the sector or your business area, your hobbies and interests, whatever you'd like. Okay, so we'll take a look at all of those. So first off our language tools, a couple of things that we need to look out for links Which tools.

When we speak about language tools, you might be a native English speaker, or you might have English as a second language. So we're going to look at the different resources you need whether you are either of those. So first of all, we need one for translations. This is especially important if you're an English as a second language learner, you need to be able to translate from your original language from your native language into English and vice versa. Other than that, we also need to look at definitions. This is especially useful if you're a native English speaker definitions will give you in depth understanding about different terminology in words.

All right synonyms and antonyms. So similar words, and they're opposites. This helps to expand our vocabulary. acronyms. Now, acronyms are used a lot in the English language, FYI For your information, and you need a reliable source where you can look these up and find information about what these acronyms mean. So that's another helpful tool slang expressions of course There's a lot of slang in the English language, a lot of it has to do with you could say, sometimes Cultural references etc.

So it's good to have a reliable source of where you can get information about those expressions and have a better understanding of them. Other than that, we also can take a look at glossaries, which are really helpful. And these are usually multilingual guides or translations in a certain area or sector technical area, generally speaking, where you have the different definitions across the line. So this is helpful so you can you can build your own glossary or work one upon one that is already done. Okay, last but not least, we're going to look at the best business English textbook for grammar practice. It's good to have a textbook where you can get additional practice and have exercises and a quick reference to grammar.

So I'll give you one of the best it's the best one on the market. All right, and I wanted to mention that regarding these resources, we're looking at the best language resources on the market today. And it's regarding business communications in English. So these are the top apps and the best websites out there for best in class information for international communication. So not necessarily American, or British English, but international English. Alright, so for translation, we're going to look at word reference and word references a great tool.

The website is www.pevs.com. You've got the app too, which I highly recommend for use on your tablet or phone some of the features and characteristics of word reference, you've got multilingual translation that is very helpful. So you can choose your source language and your target language with English being one of those. You've got word category and definition so you can understand if the word is maybe a scientific term, maybe it's a legal term, etc. So it's easier to be sure that you are using the correct translation there are sentence examples. So this is useful so you can see the word in context within the sentence.

We also have audio pronunciation with accents very helpful. You can look at the pronunciation listen to it and choose an accent you can choose British accent, Irish American, etc, etc. And so you can understand the differences in pronunciation. Now in pronunciation Generally, the pronunciation changes with the vowel sounds, okay? The vowel sounds are the most important aspects of the pronunciation. Okay, so you can listen to that and see how that changes.

You also have a form with user registration and the forum you have professional translators, which will respond to your questions and give you information and insight into particular technical terminology or particular expressions and phrases. So very useful. It's free. It's a free app and the websites free so yeah, no reason not to use it then. Hmm. And then we've got fully interactive, you can click any word and it will give you additional information about the word you click so you can define or translate the word that you click anywhere in the app or on the website, so that is it for word reference, highly recommend that download that bookmark it, etc.

The next one, which you probably know. So Google Translate is another great tool, and you can download the app as well which gives you additional information. So some of the features and characteristics are multilingual translation. So you can translate from any source and target language, you've got lots of options there. There are word definitions on most platforms. So in most browsers, you will also have a definition of the word you can cut and paste.

So let's say you get a whole email and you want a quick reference of it in another language you can cut and paste it and translate the entire paragraph etc. Now, I'm not guaranteeing you're going to have perfect translation but it is helpful as a learning tool, Annunciation and voice recognition on the app you can do instant translation where it will capture your voice and translate it almost in real time. So very useful video. Capture with instant Translation, you can use the video camera on your phone to film any sort of written text. Let's say you have a cereal box, and you would like to translate it, you use the camera of your phone and it will capture that text and on the screen of your phone, it will translate it for you. And that is a very useful tool.

So if you haven't seen that, check that out. We also have full document translation, you can upload an entire PDF or Word doc or lots of other formats and have the entire document translated. Same thing not it's not going to be a perfect translation it is going to be a literal translation. So there will be mistakes, but it's a helpful tool to help you understand and to have a quick reference. Okay, so there you go. Now, again, great app, great website, download and bookmark these apps and websites.

Make sure you have these because you will need these for these this course for definitions. Now. definitions are variable If you're English as a first language speaker dictionary.com is a great website. Let me tell you some of the features and characteristics. We've got full categorical definitions. So you see the word in all of its definitions.

One word might have 10 definitions, it might have a definition as a noun, as a verb as an adjective, for example. So you can get a very in depth understanding of that word and see its nuances with all of its definitions. So sometimes a word is chosen because it has a primary meaning and a secondary meaning. And that secondary meaning adds colorful, literary allusion, allusion to the article or the sentence that it is using. So that will help you understand those words in an in depth way by defining them fully. You also have audio pronunciation on this app and website.

And that's helpful again, to be able to listen to the word and see how it sounds. We also have fully interactive websites and apps you can again, click Any word and you can define a secondary word or tertiary word or etc, etc. So it's a very useful tool, you've got translations available. So dictionary.com does have a translation service. So it will help you to translate. We have synonyms and antonyms as well, which we'll take a look at in a moment.

So you can have a list of similar words and they're opposites or antonyms dictionary.com. Great tool, make sure that you download and bookmark that. We also have As I was saying, on dictionary, calm under dictionary calm, we have the sourest calm and at the sourest is a list of synonyms or similar words and antonyms opposite words, okay? So this is very useful to grow your vocabulary if you're using the same word over and over and over, that this tower is is a useful tool to give you some alternatives. Okay? So if you're using the word big, big, big, big, big, enormous, grand, giant, etc.

These are all synonyms. They have similar meanings. Okay? So that's a good way to grow your vocabulary and this again, so you can stop using the same words over and over again. Yes. Okay, make sure you download and bookmark these apps and websites, great tools, you want to have these available to you during this course you will need these.

In order to complete this course for acronyms. We have the one website that is particularly good, which is acronym Finder. Okay, we've got the app and this is the way it looks. And then the website which is www dot acronym finder.com. That is a great tool is very complete. It's got most every acronym that you can find in the English language.

So very useful tool for finding all of the options of an acronym. It is categorical so it will tell you the definition of the acronym acronym based on the sector category might be technical, legal, etc. So it will help you understand which acronym to use. Alright, first length expressions, it's good to have a solid resource to understand these particular expressions, which you're not going to find in the dictionary you're not going to find in a translator. The best one here is called Urban Dictionary, Urban Dictionary, calm, great tool. You've got the app, and the website, of course, and that is going to give you more background about where it comes from.

Sometimes slang has to do with cultural references, you know, maybe it's something sometimes it's historical, old literature, or maybe a movie that came out two years ago, or a book that was just released or a song that hit the charts last year, something like this. And there was a term that was coined or used or invented in that book or that song that became common usage, common language, okay, so you'll get a little bit of background about that and a definition. So urban dictionary is great for slang in particular expressions and again, things that you're not finding anywhere else. You see this word, you have no idea what it means you've looked in a dictionary, you've searched for it, can't find it, go to urban dictionary, and it's very likely you will find it there. All right. So last but not least, our glossary is and the glossaries are great for having translations of words and techniques, usually technical words or expressions in a sector.

So let's say you know, maybe you're working with legal English, you can do a legal glossary. Maybe you're working with legal English, but you're a French speaker, but you also work with Italian. So you can do an English, French and Italian glossary in that sector. So that's very useful. And you can do a Google search for glossaries using the word glossary plus field or sector every area of interest in plus your target languages. There are lots of glossaries that are published on Google in PDF or Excel format.

And it's nice when you find them in Excel because you can modify them, you can build upon them, etc. So that's a great tool to have. So Let's say you're working in a certain field or area with certain languages, and you need the terms in English search for the glossaries. And that's a great tool to have. Alright, so that's about all. Now, here is our list of all of the tools the websites and apps have for language resources that you need for this course.

So be sure that you download the apps and keep them maybe in a file or folder on your tablet or phone and that you bookmark the websites because you will need to have these depending on whether you're working on your phone or on your computer. Great tools to have. I'll be sure that this page is available to you with links so you can access them easily. And I wanted to quickly show you these websites. So let's take a look. Okay, so this is word reference calm.

Now here you can see the languages that are available. We've got Italian, we've got Spanish, French, we've got Portuguese and That is about all for these but you do have others available if you go to other at the bottom. So you can see a list of full length of the languages available. So we've got Spanish, French, Italian, Catalan, German, Dutch, Swedish, Russian, Portuguese, Polish, Romanian, Czech, Greek, Turkish, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Arabic. And that is about all so that is a great tool. I chose the word language and we're listening to it with an Irish accent.

Okay, let's listen to it with the US language on its way. Okay, let's listen to it with a UK accent. Okay, so here you can see that the vowels change, but also the intonation of the canons changes a little bit where the accent is on the words. Okay, so it's good to practice those to listen to them. Language is British and then us language, okay, so there's a lot of different ways to say language. And again, it's mostly The vowel sounds that change okay and a little bit of Kevin's here you can see that we've got the areas okay so here we've got programming vocabulary wording dialect okay.

So this is telling you the translation with some reference to the area or sector and we can see it in a sentence form so she speaks two languages part of the dual language Okay, so this one will give you the word in context with the target language and the source language. Okay, so here we have source languages English, we have target language as Italian, it will tell you the form of the word Okay, so here we've got nouns we've got, maybe the verb, etc, etc. And what else we've got the dictionary if you want to define the word so Collins is a dictionary publisher. So you can have the word defined for you. And at the bottom here, we also have, these are terms so these are when you find the word in an expression or term and then at the bottom, we've got The forum.

So this is in a discussion where you've got professional translators who are giving their input into this translation. So you can be sure that you have a reliable translation for that. Okay. So there you go. And the other thing too is on the side here on the website, you can download the app on either Google Android, Google or the App Store for Apple. Okay, so great website.

Okay, so here is Google Translate. Now you can upload a document, you can cut and paste a word, here are the languages you can choose from. So lots of different languages, look at all those. That's a lot of languages right there. This is your source language. Maybe your source language isn't English, and then you can translate into your secondary language.

There's a lot of good tools here. So here's where you can also speak, and it will transcribe your voice into a written form and give you the translation and if you download the app, You have the additional resources of video capture. So there's a little camera and you actually use the camera of your phone to capture still text. So written text, maybe on a box or on a poster, etc. And that will translate that text in real time on your screen on your phone screen or computer screen. So it's a really great resource as well.

And what else do we have and then also, you've got real time translations where you speak and it transcribes your, your voice into text, and then it transcribes that it translates that text into your target language and speaks it back to you. So that's a good tool as well check that on on the app. All right here instead is dictionary.com. There it is dictionary.com. And here you've got where we can define the words here. We've got, you know, on the main page, you've got word of the day and different things like that.

We've got the sourest. And so check out everything that this site offers. Here you can see it'll give you a translation options, etc etc. So this is a great website as well. Again here we can look at the synonyms if you want to look at similar words etc. So really good resource and you can toggle from dictionary to this ours.

So you toggle here. All right, great. Other than that, we've got the Urban Dictionary, okay, here it is right here. And the urban dictionary is the one that will give you insight into slang and expressions. So you can cut and paste your expression here. And it's got all kinds of fun stuff on the homepage.

Up here is our This is our acronym Finder. Okay, here's one NFL. So what does NFL sec stand for here we can find you know, put it in here we say find. And then here we can see it's all definitions, information technology, military, government, science, medicine, etc. So you can see it by category as well, which will help you to find what the right acronym is okay? Then that is about all for our resources.

So be sure that you bookmark those and check them out. Okay, so that's it. So make sure that you have all of those. And beyond this, we're going to take a look at what's next. Now you're set with your language resources. We're going to look at media platforms after this and the best business English textbook for grammar practice.

So stay tuned for that. Have a good one and we'll see you on the next section of business English for professionals. Bye bye