ITunes U.doc

ITunes U: a new way to improve your EnglishDate: ITunes U: a new way to improve your EnglishInternational students have become a large group in university of Leicester in recent years. Different cultures and different languages build up a multicultural environment in campus. International students always mixed with domestic students in a classroom, and they attend the same lectures. In this case, international students might be in a tough situation because they have a low language competence in comparison with domestic students. In fact, most of international students have some problems with note taking. They can hardly make notes and keep listening at the same time. Relate to the information above, iTunes U seems to be an effective tool to help international students solve this problem. This paper is going to introduce this application and critically evaluate the effect of it.The iTunes U is a software-based online digital lecture store operated by Apple Corporation. It is available on both iPhone and IPAD. This application includes three columns. Firstly, students can use it to download lectures from all over the world for free. Over 600 universities share their iTunes U through the iTunes store and some of them are elite schools, such as Harvard, Stanford, Yale and Oxford. Students can feedback their lectures by using this application. Secondly, there is a column called “beyond campus” which include a lot of social media, such as MoMA, New York Public Library, Public Radio international. In this way, students can listen to the Standard English and practice their listening skills. Thirdly, there are many learning materials for students. They can download the materials they want and learn it for free.It is seems that iTunes U provide a practical way for international students to improve their listening skill as well as English ability. This application is not only a way for international students to feedback their lectures, but also a personal tutor for their own study. Students can easily find out the suitable materials and practice in anytime. In conclusion, ITunes U can be a useful application for international students. However, language learning is a long-term process. All the applications are just assistance; internation