BAS editor Raúl Sánchez Saura
Learning languages has always been a part of the human experience. Whether effortlessly or after long, strenuous effort, billions have discovered the pleasure of communicating with others in a code that used to be unfamiliar. It has therefore made sense to include foreign languages as part of the school curriculum.
Like other subjects, the arrival of the internet (and now AI) has reformulated their teaching and learning. The lay linguist is quite familiar with apps such as Babbel or Duolingo, but in the classroom we find a richer ecosystem. Innumerable students and teachers have found the likes of Quizlet, This is Language, Language Gym, Language Nut or Linguascope helpful, entertaining and perhaps even fascinating.
It’s clear that language platforms are here to stay. Indeed, some MFL students have grown up with them and are now starting to create their own, even before leaving university (or starting it!). A new generation will live next to, learn from, and maybe even influence others.
Today we will discuss three of these platforms with their founders: Iacopo di Rico of Estudi-amos (estudiamos.co.uk), Mariella Satow of SignUp (signupcaptions.com), and Olive Halsall of Olea (oleaeducation.com). Our aim will be to discover the unique features of these sites and what they bring to the field of MFL.
Iacopo di Rico is currently studying International Management and Modern Languages at the University of Bath, after completing his schooling at Epsom College. Born and raised in Italy, he is bilingual and has always had a soft spot for Spanish. It was actually one day in the Spanish classroom, while doing his A-Levels, that he felt he was at risk of falling short of the grade he needed. If he could focus on exam technique and have instant feedback, perhaps his revision could prove more efficient. All the more so with a self-marking, exam-specific platform. That was the birth of Estudiamos.
As he embarked on his university studies, he and his team conducted market research and tested their conceptualised features, ensuring that users would find the benefits they needed. He was greatly helped by Bath’s Dragon’s Den and its various start-up events. Indeed, he would go on to receive funding from them and associated companies to fulfil his dream. In March 2023 Estudiamos was launched, offering worksheets and reading activities in Spanish for GCSE and A Levels. Dozens of schools have already signed up for it, generating much positive feedback ahead of new features emerging from the pipeline.
SignUp is a quite different project. Mariella Satow, a Rugby School alumna who is currently studying English Literature and Computer Science at Stanford University, has always wanted to learn sign language. Driven by her lifelong passion for decoding, she taught herself American Sign Language while sheltering from the pandemic in New York. Soon enough, she thought about helping others to learn. This would be the growing seed for SignUp. In her words, “An idea that began as an educational tool for sign language students has actually morphed into an accessibility tool for the deaf.” Accessibility would prove crucial, given the very reduced amount of resources and attention that the deaf community receive in her native country: “I learnt that fewer than half of deaf children in the United States reach the expected standard of reading by middle school, which meant that either they could not read the closed captions or read them fast enough. Three-quarters of hearing parents do not learn to sign with their deaf children.”
Her research involved interviewing deaf people, asking what their needs were, and doing online polls and cold calls. After much effort, SignUp was up and running in August 2021. It is now a free Google Chrome Extension that provides a pop-up window with a sign language interpreter signing the content. It is available through the Chrome store with a simple one-click installation for movies and TV shows on Netflix and Disney+. Thanks to it, she has facilitated her dream: that families with deaf members can all sit together and watch a film. And users turned up for it – SignUp would crash out of the sheer number of downloads, a challenge quickly fixed by its hard-working IT department. Quite a nice problem to have so early on, and understandable, given that the platform and Mariella have been featured on the BBC and in The Times. The testimonial section at https://www.signupcaptions.com/ says it all.
Mariella is quite pleased with the educational dimension to SignUp, as the platform is used in schools for the deaf both in the US and the UK. They are also used in sign language teaching programmes and now eye the Indian market. Quite the journey for a company initially launched thanks to Mariella’s savings from dog walking!
Much like Mariella and her movie interpretations, there is an overt entertainment dimension to Olive’s project. She came into contact with foreign languages during her family vacations in Calais, mesmerised by her mother’s efforts to speak French. The possibility of being fluent soon took root in her imagination, and some 20 years later she holds a 1st Class BA (Hons) in Modern Languages (French & Mandarin) with Business Management, in addition to an MPhil in Education from the University of Cambridge.
She founded Olea in June 2021. It comprises both a card game, Private Joke, and a free online version. The goal of Private Joke is to invent new words for shared human experiences, igniting any user’s inner linguist. Private Joke rewards creativity rather than perfection, an approach which Olive has found to work with non-conventional, underdog linguists, including dyslexic and neurodivergent people. The online game is suitable for Year 7 students onwards.
After kickstarting Olea through crowdfunding and her Olea Ambassadors and producing the game’s first edition, Olive dreams of expanding it into more languages and seeing it become a household game like Scrabble or cards. She warms to the idea of developing the game into new themes such as Girls’ Night In, New Dads or Children’s Private Joke.
Iacopo, Mariella and Olive are excited about what lies ahead for their ventures, which, despite their differences, are all driven by the desire to help people communicate better. As members of the first generation of language platform-educated entrepreneurs, all three express hope that their users will find their companies useful, enlightening, and entertaining.
As they prepare to move onwards, they are organising their companies as follows:
Iacopo – Estudiamos
• Is your platform free? No
• Do you currently offer content for more than one language? For now, just Spanish, but we are adding French, German and English
• Do you have specific content for GCSE, A Levels, etc? Yes
Mariella – SignUp
• Is your platform free? Yes
•Do you currently offer content for more than one language? American and British Sign Language, and we are about to launch Indian Sign Language. Our next launch after that will be in Australia with Auslan.
• Do you have specific content for GCSE, A Levels, etc? Yes, now that a GCSE in British Sign Language is being introduced.
Olive – Olea
• Is your platform free? Yes. The physical game is priced at £33 excluding shipping.
• Do you currently offer content for more than one language? Yes. Private Joke (Limited Edition) comprises around 15 languages.
• Do you have specific content for GCSE, A Levels, etc? No
Strong points
Iacopo – Estudiamos
• Fully self-marking
• Exam specific
• Lets teachers customise and create their own self-marking worksheets
Mariella – SignUp
• Employment for deaf people – an underemployed section of society.
• Language acquisition for deaf children and sign-language students.
• Providing entertainment and inclusion for the deaf community who have been poorly served by Big Media.
Olive – Olea
• We elicit curiosity for languages. There is no pressure to find the perfect word – the funniest word will do.
• Encourages out-of-the-box thinking – popular with neurodivergent and dyslexic players. Our font was designed specifically for dyslexics.
• The platform is still in its early stages, but it should be intuitive for MFL teachers.
Readers can check them out at estudiamos.co.uk, signupcaptions.com and oleaeducation.com
Bulletin of Advanced Spanish 