Connect

Sanako Connect (not only!) for Virtual Foreign Language Classes

Kommentare: It's just a great product! Upgrades are standard; they are never satisfied with what they have. They are always improving based on feedback. This year's product will be even better the next year.

Vorteile:

The customer service is hands-down the best in the business. Connect can be accessed on any device anywhere. It's so versatile.

Nachteile:

I can't think of anything I don't like.

It just keeps getting better and better!

Kommentare: This is a great solution for those who want a language lab with out the physical space. We went from a physical lab to a virtual one. I would say one of the best things about being a user is that Sanako is very responsive when you have a problem and does listen to feedback. As a consumer, it's nice to know that they are listening and constantly improving. If it's an idea they're working on, they've always let me know or at the very least let me know it's been added to the list of requests. In a nutshell, it's a great virtual language lab with support to match.

Vorteile:

There are so many features. The two I use the most are the ability to have students record themselves doing a language task or the ability to record a conversation between two or more students. Those two functions have a lot of little co-current features that make the activities better for me as the person planning them. On feature I really like is the ability to put a maximum length on a recording. I have students do short, practice presentations in my Japanese class. Being able to set, and inform my students that they have a limited amount of time helps with encouraging practice and fluency. It also prevents what should be a short recording from going on too long.Not only can you set a maximum length, you can also allow students unlimited recordings or limit them to only a couple of tries. Additionally, you can download the files and then use them as exemplars or discussion of common mistakes. Also, students can also be allowed to download their recording as well. When doing pair/group activities you can set the recorder to record all participants. Super handy. If you're not recording, but instead doing a pair/group activity, you can make announcements to the entire class as the teacher. You can also pop into the group and see how things are going. Or, studnets can send you a message on Sanako and ask for help.

Nachteile:

There are only a few things that I find frustrating. One is the ability to mass delete groups/pairs. I can go through and do them one by one, but I feel there should be a button to send them all back to the main group like the physical labs had. Mayb it is there and I haven't found it yet. I am loving playing around with the Pronounce activity feature. My biggest frustration is Japanese is finicky. I wish there was a feature that would allow me bold or somehow denote what the particles are so when the computer reads the sentences, it would know it's a particle. Also, there have been a few instances where it's reading something in kanji incorrectly, so a way to put in a correction for the reading would be great too. I haven't tried this yet, but if something is put in parenthesis, is it read too? If not...keep it that way. I would love to be able to put something in the target language, and then the translation in parenthesis or brackets, so students know what they are saying. Then if this can be done, it should be in the instructions or somewhere very visable.

Unable to get students to record

Kommentare: Poor, I got support from the company but it did not work.

Vorteile:

It has some neat features but I was not able to use it. Not user friendly.

Nachteile:

Only one time at the beginning of the year I was able to get one student to record from cell phone. Non compatible with laptops.Poor

Sanako Conncet for Conference Interpreting training

Kommentare: Last year (year 1 of the Pandemic) we did our conference interpreting lessons through Zoom. it was adequate, but very stressful and time-consuming.
With Sanako we don't waste almost any time. It's very similar to using the physical lab. Both trainers and students are much more relaxed and we can concentrate on the actual work rather than the technical issues. Indeed students who has work through Zoom only, last year, this year were overwhlmingly enthusiast to use Sanako.
We feel we have been able to maintain the excellent quality of teaching we have given in previous years.

Vorteile:

The main features that I find particularly useful are: 1) Advanced recorder: a two-track recorder that allows to reproduce the master and simultaneously record the student track 2) Ease of use both for trainers and students 3) The possibility for students to work on their own on the platform whenever they want and submit their work for feedback 4) Feedback: it is possibile to give recorded audio feedback. in particular on the advanced recorder task where students have performed a simultaneous interpretation I can record my comments on a specific point of the delivery 5) Template: it's possibile to create a template for an exercise and then import it to a several different sessions (classes). This is very time-saving. 6) It's very flexible: we can create many different and even complex exercises whith several activities and different type of content all in one exercise. 7) In general it is almost like working in the physical lab. (Sanako 100)

Nachteile:

One important feature that I think is missing is a way to save students recordings in a server. At the moment if the student goes momentarily offline all the recording s/he has done till that moment is lost. Some way to save the exercise done would be crucial, especially for exams. Another problem is that sometimes when they work in groups the system is not very stable and every now and then thay can't hear each other anymore. One small improvement would be to have the possibility to organise templates and exercises in groups (sort of like files inside folders) to avoid mixing different templates for different courses or different groups/types of exercises. The integration with our platform (Moodle and Zoom for videoconference) was not difficult at all, although not particulary relevant. We just put the link to the sessione inside the Moodle page of the course.

Sanako Language Lab

Vorteile:

Good features I like the most are the ability of the students to record themselves and leave audio samples. I feel like you are only limited by your creativity and how to use this product. If given enough time to truly craft engaging provoking templates and lessons I feel I could use this product full maximum potential.

Nachteile:

Some aspects that I like the least are the fact that exercises cannot be ordered on the fly. You cannot place them in a session in any particular order. That's a limitation in my view. Secondly the voice chat feature is a bit complicated. I like the idea of grouping students together whether they were in the class or at home asynchronously and having them be able to communicate and talk with one another but in practice. I encountered a lot of feedback and it was difficult. perhaps if there was some master ability to mute.selected students.