Patent Application
20170098389
This invention relates to method and system for children learning one or more languages, and in particular, relates to method and system for children to look at pictures, to read words in one or more formats, to listen to the audios of words, texts, and to develop the reading and writing skills, in consistent with children's cognitive developments. This invention also relates to providing the invented method and system, for improving language literacy through learning knowledge depicted by pictures, words, texts, audios using mobile computing device featuring a suitable user interface.
The human brain of a child is wired to learn languages. It is the child's early experiences that modify the brain, influencing it to be able to learn one language as easily as another. Starting at around age two, young children could develop perceptions for various color pictures, and draw lines and circles with hands. They may also begin to logically connect objects such as alphabets, characters and words with each other. Evidence from behavioral and neuroscience has documented that proper sensory or linguistic input during this time puts the child at an advantage in learning to read when schooling begins.
Effective communication in any language depends on mastery of a relatively limited number of words. A child's vocabulary usually may include about 50 words to start, 100-200 words or more words could be developed, so a child begins to put two, then three and more words together into short sentences. Once this core vocabulary is mastered and used consistently, it provides a framework for accelerated language learning. Hence, this invention relates to method and system for children learning the core vocabulary in one or more languages simultaneously, so children can master the read and write in one or more languages with the least amount of time to become bilingual in early ages of their lives.
One example of providing children learning a language is described in U.S. Pat. No. 6,632,094B1 (Falcon et al.). This computer-implemented technique provides early readers a method to improve reading proficiency by highlighting the words displayed during the audio narration, and a phonetic pronunciation with synchronized highlighting of the phonemes is also available. In U.S. Pat. No. 6,884,076 (Clark et al.) described a system method which playbacks visuals stored on an audiovisual storage in conjunction with printed flash cards for young children to learn reading. In U.S. Pat. No. 6,517,351 (Spector) described a virtual learning system environment that provides for progressive education of children, at their own pace, through enhancement in spelling, reading comprehension and physical skills, including the use of a microphone, video camera, and means for effecting a computer generated response. In U.S. Pat. No. 7,563,099 (Iftikhar) described an apparatus and method for teaching language to young children that comprises a multi-media medium for displaying a set of visual images and corresponding audio in the language.
One example of providing a foreign language teaching aid is described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,486,111 (Watkins). This system provides a user to learn a foreign language by reading words, phrases and sentences in the primary language; then read the word-for-word translation in the foreign (secondary) language, then followed by reading in the foreign language according to proper syntax and grammar rules of the foreign language. In U.S. Pat. No. 7,257,366 (Maldonade et al.), both a first and a second language are presented in audiovisual and printed format, such as books, toys, to present consistent images to reinforce the bilingual learning for young children.
Unlike languages in the western world, the Chinese language is made up literally of words, of which each word has just one syllable and represented by its own unique character picture. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 7,689,407 (Yang et al.) relates to a method of learning a second language through the guidance of pictures that enables users to learn multiple languages through computers. U.S. Pat. No. 8,142,195 (Guo) relates to a system of learning materials that facilitated teaching Chinese characters in progressive stages independently of the fluency of a teacher. U.S. Pat. No. 7,848,919 (Yang et al.) relates to a method of editing communication sheets allowing users to insert pictures, expressions and vocabularies to assist the learning of Chinese. Learning Chinese as a native language presents some serious challenges for young children, especially when the child is borne in the western world.
With the advancement of computing devices offering images and voice processing environment, this invention takes advantages of a mobile computing environment for displaying pictures and playing audios of words, texts, allowing children to learn the concepts of words, texts non-linearly, and becoming part of their knowledge, in consistent with children's cognitive developments.
This invention also includes the process of applying the unique property of Chinese words as pictographs, during learning multiple languages, by offering the invented method and system in relating Chinese character pictures to words in other alphabetical languages.
The summary of the invention is provided to introduce concepts of learning words in multiple languages that are further described below in the Description of the Preferred Embodiments. This summary is not intended to identify key features or essential features of the claimed subject matter, nor is it intended to be used as an aid in determining the scope of the claimed subject matter.
Embodiments of the present invention relate to allowing children to learn multiple languages easily and effectively by looking at the pictures (static or motion), listening to the syllables and tones of characters, words and texts; reading the characters, words and texts in the printing and handwriting forms, and writing the alphabets, characters, words and texts to learn the language, in consistent with children's cognitive developments.
One aspect of the present invention is offering a language learning process, allowing a child to look at a picture representing a word; read the 1st word and its related 2nd word in a printing form of a language; look at the 2nd picture representing the 2nd word; and listen to the audios of words, texts depicting the relation of the words; then, to read the 1st word and the related 2nd word in another form of the language, and listen to the audios of words, texts depicting the relation of the words.
A second aspect of the present invention is offering a language learning process, allowing a child to learn several descriptions of a word by learning different 2nd words with pictures, texts depicting the same or different relations repeatedly. The process enables a child to look at the 1st picture and read the 1st word with one or more 2nd words in a language; to listen to the audios of words and texts depicting one or more relations of the 1st word and the 2nd words; to read the 1st word and the same or different 2nd word in the same or different form in the language, and to listen to the audios of words and texts depicting relations of the words.
A third aspect of the present invention is offering a language learning process, allowing a child to learn the writing of a word by looking at a picture representing a word, reading the character, word in one or more printing forms of the language; listening to the audio of the word, looking at the path of one or more strokes of the character, word in the handwriting form, then moving a pointing device or finger following the path in writing the character, word, and listening to the audio of the character, word.
A fourth aspect of the present invention is offering a multilingual learning process for alphabetical languages, e.g. English, Spanish, as well as a non-alphabetical language, Chinese. The process enables a child to look at a picture representing a word, read the word in the 1st language, read the word, as a translation in the 2nd language; look at a picture or a Chinese pictograph depicting the word in the 2nd language, and listen to the audios of the words defined in each language respectively. Then, the process repeats one or more related words in the 1st language, allowing a child to look at pictures representing the related words, and read one or more translations in the 2nd language, look at a picture or a Chinese pictograph depicting the translated word in the 2nd language; listen to the audios of the words, texts depicting relations, in each language respectively; and add another 3rd or more languages for leaning by repeating the above process.
The present invention changes how children could develop an intuitive and rich learning experience to read and write multiple languages, in consistent with their cognitive developments. The present invention also provides for multi-lingual literacy development through learning knowledge depicted by pictures, words, texts, audios in the language of interest, using a mobile computing device featuring a suitable user interface. The foregoing and many other aspects of the present invention will no doubt become obvious to those of ordinary skill in the art after read the following Description of the Preferred Embodiments that are illustrated in various figures.
A preferred embodiment of the present invention for learning a language with words and relations between them could begin with looking at a picture, looking at a word in one form, looking at a 2nd word relating to the 1st word in the same form, and listening to the audios of the words and texts depicting the relations, as described in
A preferred embodiment of the present invention for learning the read and write of a language could begin with looking at a picture, reading the character of the word, looking at the word in handwriting form, looking at a picture depicting the strokes of the handwriting, moving a pointing device or finger following the strokes and listening to the audio of the word as described in
A preferred embodiment of the present invention for learning the reading and writing multiple languages could be described in
An exemplary operating environment for displaying, reading, writing, interfacing with characters and words in multiple languages could be defined as in
Various computer form factors that may be used in accordance with embodiments of the present invention could be illustrated in Fig.5, including wearable devices 501, smart watches 502, notebook computers 503, tablet computers 504, personal digital assistant 505, media players 506, mobile telephones 507, electronic book/dictionary 508, pad computers 509, and the like. Additionally, the computer may be a combination of these types, for example, a device that is a combination of a personal digital assistant, media player, and mobile telephone.
An exemplary multi-language character, word, word-relation and text dictionary could be defined as in ” and “
”, relation “has-property” between the Chinese words “
” and “
”, and text “
” in Chinese. Indications 606 A-F can include pictures depicting SUN and BRIGHT, words printed in Spanish as “sol” and “brillante”, relation “has-property” between the words “sol” and “brillante”, and text “sol es brillante” in Spanish.
Suitable layouts for learning to read multiple languages with pictures, words in different forms, including to learn the handwriting forms in one or more languages, are defined in ” in handwriting form. Indications 702 A-D can include a picture depicting SUN, words printed in English capital letters “SUN” and Chinese “ri”, and Chinese word “
” in handwriting form. Indications 703 A-D can include a picture depicting SUN, an English word “sun” in handwriting form, and Chinese word “
” in printing form and handwriting form. Indications 704 A-D can include a picture depicting SUN, an English word “sun” in handwriting form, a Spanish word “sol” in handwriting form, another picture depicting SOL in Spanish. Indications 705 EFGHI can include a picture depicting SUN, an English word “sun” in handwriting form for moving a pointing device or finger writing the English word, words printed in English small and capital letters “SUN”, and Chinese word “
” in handwriting form. Indications 706 JKLMN can include a picture depicting SUN, a Chinese word “
” in handwriting form for moving a pointing device or finger writing the Chinese word, words printed English small and capital letters “SUN”, and Chinese word “
” in alphabetical form. Indications 707 OPQWX can include a picture depicting SUN, a Spanish word “sol” in handwriting form for moving a pointing device or finger writing the Spanish word, words printed in Spanish small and capital letters “SOL”, and Chinese word “
” in handwriting form.
One skilled in the art will understand that the invention provides a natural and non-linear method and system for children to look at pictures, to read words in one or more forms, in one or more languages, to listen to the audios of words, texts and to develop the reading and writing skills in one or more languages, in consistent with children's cognitive developments. This invention also takes the unique nature of the Chinese pictographs in the language learning process to improving the multi-lingual literacy development through learning knowledge defined by the words, texts in the language of interest, using mobile computing devices featuring a suitable user interface.
From the foregoing, it will be appreciated that the invention has (without limitation) the following advantages:
While the invention has been herein shown and described in what is presently conceived to be the most practical and preferred embodiment thereof, it will be apparent to those of ordinary skill in the art that many modifications may be made thereof which scope is to be accorded the broadest interpretation of the appended claims so as to encompass all equivalent methods and processes.
Although the present invention has been described in terms of the presently preferred embodiments, various modifications and alterations can be made without departing from the scope of the invention. Accordingly, the scope of the invention is not to be limited to the particular invention embodiments discussed herein, but should be defined only by the appended claims and their equivalents.
