知っておきたいお役立ちサイト

By James Watt, Freelance Writer

　ネット・サーフィンは効果的な英語勉強法です。興味のあるページを楽しみながら巡っているだけで、自然に英語に親しむことができます。連載締めくくりの今回は、筆者お薦めの便利なサイトをまとめて紹介します。

　Well, folks, I have spent the last year and a half scouring the net for Web sites, interesting people, and good English resources for you, the lovely Asahi Weekly readers, and I hope that I have helped you become a bit better prepared to surf the Web's wild waves.

　I had a great time -- I got paid to surf the Net after all -- and I hope you did, too. In preparation for this final column, I've been going over my mistakes and mistranslations, and rereading the pieces I've written to see if anything is missing. To make up for my omissions, this month I decided to highlight all the best resources that the Web offers.

　Whether you are learning English, interested in other cultures, or just want a break from work, there should be something here for you.

Online Tools

　I must admit that I am a Google man. I downloaded Google Earth when it first came out (http://earth.google.com) and love looking at maps and pictures of places around the world. I use Gmail (http://mail.google.com) as my second e-mail provider, and every search I make is done at http://www.google.com.

　But that isn't all that Google offers. To prove to you wonderful readers that I actually follow my own advice, this article is being written in a somewhat special way. I'm using Google Docs (http://docs.google.com) to write the article in Microsoft Word format, and I'm writing it on Linux on my PlayStation S3 (see September's Surfin' English at http://tinyurl.com/35rcbb).

General Information

　For all of your informational needs, you only need a couple of Web sites. Wikipedia at http://en.wikipedia.org is a great starting point for any question you could ever have because of the legions of people who edit it daily. From how many people live in Hokkaido, to how far away the Moon is, the answer to almost any question can be found painlessly. If you want a different point of view (or more detail) on something, you can check out Wikipedia's sister site at http://www.wikia.com, or the BBC's online encyclopedia at www.bbc. co.uk/h2g2.

　Every time you hear an odd rumor, check it out at http://www.snopes.com before you tell your friends. They have covered most of the big urban myths, and you'd be surprised how many things that are considered to be common knowledge are completely false.

English News

　You can probably guess that the big networks offer good sites. Sites such as http://www.cnn.com and http://www.bbc.co.uk are good for a more Western point of view, and http://english.aljazeera.net is good for the Middle East. Hong Kong's South China Morning Post at http://www.scmp.com (you will need a subscription) and of course, Asahi's affiliated paper the International Herald Tribune at http://www.iht.com both have a good look at issues in Asia. If you just want a quick look at the headlines of the moment, you can always check out Google News at http://news.google.com.

Fun

　For a quick laugh in the morning, check out http://www.comics.com/ and click on the comics tag for all (most anyway) of the comics offered in the major U.S. newspapers. Then head to http://games.yahoo.com for a thrilling chess battle or sweaty game of checkers against a random opponent (often a 14-year-old girl in Slovakia who will likely beat you).

English Language Learning

　I have a couple of sites that I use daily as English language resources, and my favorite is http://www.alc.co.jp. ALC has a Japanese-English dictionary that is better than any electronic dictionary I have seen. When you translate a word, it will give you up to three pages of different uses of the word, including modern slang, idiom and polite usage.

　Another site, http://dictionary.reference.com, is great if you are a bit more advanced (it offers only English definitions), but its sister site at http://thesaurus.reference.com is useful for everyone. (I believe that a thesaurus is the only tool an English learner needs once they reach an intermediate level. It's always good to learn synonyms.)

　Finally, if you are looking for grammar help, http://www.englishclub.com/grammar/ has some good examples, and if you run a search for "TOEFL practiceﾓ or "TOEIC practiceﾓ on http://about.com/, you will get a few good pages with links to helpful sites.

　And that brings us to the end of our column. The Surfin' English column has run its course, but the Web site will stay up at surfin-english.blogspot.com for the foreseeable future. Come by to read about my insane infatuations with outer space, the English language, and our coming baby, or just to say hello.

　Remember that anyone can learn English, but it takes hard work. Don't get discouraged when you make a mistake -- just learn from it.

　Good luck and safe surfin'.

• scour(ing)　…（for 以下）を探して〜を調査する
• To...omissions　省いてしまったところを補うために
• legions of　多数の〜
• urban myths　都市伝説。口コミで伝わるまことしやかなウソ話
• things...knowledge　常識と思われていること
• Western...view　西洋的な考え方、意見
• random opponent　無作為な組み合わせによる対戦相手
• synonym(s)　同義語
• has...course　終了した
• for...future　近い将来の間は
• infatuations with　〜に夢中な状態

　（Surf 'n' English は今回で終了します。ご愛読ありがとうございました。）