There are two languages that would come in handy if you live in the United States and like to travel to neighboring countries: French (for Montreal and Quebec, Canada) and Spanish (Mexico).

Our middle son is currently taking Spanish and when I saw the language learning site trymango.com this morning, he was the first person who came to mind. Could this help him with his Spanish studies? I signed up and took a peek inside.

But first, a hat tip to Jay at Dumb Little Men who also shares two additional resources at the end of his post for learning foreign languages for free: FSI Language Courses and the foreign language podcast collection from openculture.

Signing up for Mango (oddly it’s not called Try Mango, it’s called Mango) involves only your email address. Why does a site like this need your email address?

Privacy Policy: We will NOT sell or provide your email address to any third party. We will only use this email address to authenticate your access to the Mango Language application and provide you with update information. You may unsubscribe at any time.

Authenticating access with email only is hopelessly insecure, but we aren’t trading military secrets or stock information, so maybe this is cool. The first email address sent thanking me for signing up, however, did not provide unsubscribe instructions (CAN SPAM compliance). The site is too new to have a rating from SiteAdvisor yet, so we have to take this one on faith.

Mango is a flash-based learning environment with voices that are clear and hover overs with your mouse to indicate the pronunciation of each word. After showing you a few common sentences, the system will test you by giving you the English word and seeing if you know how to say it in the language you chose.

Today’s Hmmcast #173 takes a look at the language learning process, particularly the importance of repetition.

BTW, if you haven’t noticed, I’ve fallen off the 4:20 schedule a bit this past week. I’m still working through the wonders of HD video. Things should be back to normal the first week in October. Hang with me and it should be worth it — at least visually — no matter what resolution you view the show at.

Hmmcast #173 downloads
PSP .mp4 (480×272) iPod .mp4 (640×480) Windows .wmv (1480×1080 HD)

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