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earnFeel like polishinq your French, spanish, chinese or even Cebuanoskills,but don't want the hassle of sittinq throuqh traditionallanquaqe classes? Then Mynqle is just what you've been waitinqfor - lanquaqe lessons that come to youWOROS: ANNEMARIE HOEVE PHOTOGRAPHY FRANK RUITER

TEACHER: vou Xinyan

I TEACHES: chinese (Mandarin) ILOCATION: Qinqdao, China

HANDY TO KNOW: Nihao and

Ixiexie (heIlo and qoodbye)

ABOUT MYNGLE: "Besides

earninq money, I enjoy talkinq

I with students from all over

I the world. I can also introduce Ithem to Chinese customs,

culture and daily life."

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The cloek reads1O:55amand my French lesson is dueto start in five minutes. Still potteringaround at home this late would normallymean missing the class. Today, however,there is still plenty of time - enough evenfor a cup of tea, because switching on thecomputer only takes a minute. With afew clicks the screen flickers into life andLaurent, my teacher, appears.

Laurent is ene of a new generationof teachers who have said adieu to thetraditional, physical classroom andnow teaches solely online, thanksto a brainwave three years ago byentrepreneur and linguaphile MarinaTognetti. That brainwave has sincegrown to become a prize-winningstart-up called Myngle. Through thisinteractive Internet platform, peoplefrom all over the world can onnect witheach other to teach or learn a language -any language. Seroil down me w . e'

language menu and you'Il find one foralmost every letter in the alphabet, fromAzeri (spoken in Azerbaijan), Bislama(Pidgin English) and Cebuano (spokenin parts of the Philippines), rightthrough to Punjabi, Swedish, Tagalog,Thai and ending with Vietnamese. Infact, there are currently 51 languages tochoose from, not forgetting the 'bigthree', English, Spanish and French, aswell as rising star Chinese.

"I was my first customer,"Marina says from Myngle's Amsterdamheadquarters. The idea for Mynglewas bom out of Marina's frustrationwith existing courses when learningChinese, her fifth language. She foundprogress too slow in group lessons andindividual tutoring was too expensivedue to a lack of enough local teachers.She realised that in China there arethousands of qualified teachers. ~~

Mynqle'sfoundinq partnerMarina Toqnetti

"lts like eBayfor lenoueoe

1/courses

EASY LISTENING

TEACHER: Laurent Boquet

TEACHES: French

LOCATION: Amiens, France

HANDY TO KNOW: Oui est en

qtève aujourd'huP (Who is on

strike today7) "tt's what

always amazes foreiqners

most about the French - their

willinqness to qo on strike."

ABOUT MYNGLE: "I love the

freedom it offers me. It'S a

revolution in education which

I think many people can

learn trom.'

~ ~ "While working at eBay, Ilearnedthat the Internet cuts out distancescompletely. That's how J ca me up withthe idea. It's like eBay for languagecourses, complete with memberfeedback ratings," Marina explains. Heridea has proved so popular that she hashad to put her own Chinese lessons onhold. She simply doesn't have the time.Since Myngle's launch in 2007, some70,000 students have registered, with afew hundred active students everyrnonth, and around 300 teachers.

So, how does it work? Teachers likeLaurent in France can determine theirown hourly rates and content. Mynglethen employs a couple offull-time staffmembers to make sure th at the teachersmeet their quality standards. Studentscan book a lesson with a teacher of theirchoice via the Myngle website. At thegiven time, you enter the virtualclassroom which connects you with yourteacher, and then the lesson begins.

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Marina likes to stress how hercompany offers equal opportunities at agloballevel. "Teachers in developingcountries can really earn a significantwage. AH they need is a computer and abroadband Internet connection. Thenthey can earn Western prices - far morethan they could ever earn workinglocally,' she says. She receives manyemails from teachers all over the worldtelling her how Myngle has changed theirlives. "One teacher in the Philippineseven wrote us a love poem. How manycompanies receive love poems?" she says.

Originally, she believed the conceptwould appeal mostly to young people;the Internet generation who have grownup with computer games and socialnetworking sites like Facebook."Actually, it turns out that most usersare in the 30 to 45 age group, includingmany business professionals. It's great ifyou have to travel a lot, because you'renever at home enough to followtraditional classes. But we get al! sorts ofpeople. Our oldest student is 78. He's anEnglish teacher who moved to Portugal.His son gave him Portuguese lessons onMyngle as a present," Marina says.

J tested how Myngle works by signingup for a French lesson. I'rn sitting at myscreen and the interface indicates thatLaurent, my teacher, has 'entered theclassroorn'. Panic sets in. My secondaryschool French, sadly, has been left almostuntouched except for those labouredholiday phrases involving ordering abaguette, or wh en I'rn feeling extraadventurous, a pain au choco/at at thebakery, or boulangerie.

Via the webcam, Laurent appearsfrom behind his desk in Amien , "150kilometres north of Paris,' he say inFrench. Vocabulary lists memorisedas homework years ago are buried deepin the recesses of my mind and

"what makesthe lessons so

interestinq is thatyou also learn alot about eachothers culture"

miraculously, Iunderstand him. He'sbeen teaching online through Myngle fortwo years and ha been given a five-starrating by his students. He teaches about30 lessons a week online, with tudentsfrom al! over the world, includingCanada, Sweden, the Ukraine andGermany. Most of them are realFrancophiles who love the language andculture and want to improve theirFrench for their holidays. "What makesthe lessons so interesting is th at youalso learn a lot about each other'sculture in the process," Laurent says."Take this comic," he adds. A colourfulimage appears on Myngle's interface.It is from Les Profs. They seillike "petitpains", or "smal! breads" says Laurent.Interestingly, in English the phrase is"sell like hot cakes". It looks like the oldschoolbook boulangerie chapter is rathermore important in everyday exchangesthan l imagined.

EASY LISTENING

"It's a parallel process, lessons alone arenot enough," Laurent says.

So, Myngle has thankfully do ne awaywith most of the traditional obstaclesto language Jearning while making theexperience fun as well as inforrnative,but it seems there are no real shortcuts.You still have to do your homework.But with teachers like Laurent, youm ight also make some new friendsin the process. ~ ~www.myngle.com

r

-------------lSTUDENT:Annette östrand ,LEARNING:Enqlish, French, ISpanish and Chinese ,LOCATION:uppsala. Sweden I

MOSTIMPORTANTTHINGLEARNED:"How topronounce 'th' in Enqlish"ABOUTMYNGLE:"l'rn a

I science journalist but I alsostudied Chinese at universityand I don't want to forqet thelanquaqe. As for Enqlish, myteacher is qreat, i've just beenshortlisted for two jobs in theUK.I also tried to learn Spanishon my own but havinq ateacher waitinq for me five

I times a week is easier - it's aI bit like havinq a joqqinqIbuddy. r've taken 110 lessansin l,l, days tt's 50 efficient,there's na commutinq andevery lesson is adapted

to my needs,'

Another imaqe appears on thescreen together with sorne questions.It is hard to come up with the rightconjunctions and tenses on the spot.For a moment that lost in translationfeeling looms by mistaking the wordgrammar, grammaire, for grandmother,grand-mère, until Laurent clears thingsup. He believes it is important not tointerrupt the flow and only co Heetsyou afterwards. "At school, they focustoa much on grammar. It is better tolearn in practice than in theory," hesays. Time f1ies by and after discussingeverything from the mysterious declineoflocal bee populations to the use ofthe English word 'sweatshirt' in French(it is in the dictionary, according toLaurent), the teacher delivers his verdict.Ta real!y improve, he recommendsspending at least half an hour a dayreading and listening to French inaddition to maybe a weekly lesson.

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