BBC Learning English is a department of the

BBC World Service The BBC World Service is an international broadcaster owned and operated by the BBC, with funding from the British Government through the Foreign Secretary's office. It is the world's largest external broadcaster in terms of reception a ...

devoted to

English language English is a West Germanic language of the Indo-European language family, with its earliest forms spoken by the inhabitants of early medieval England. It is named after the Angles, one of the ancient Germanic peoples that migrated to the ...

teaching. The service provides free resources and activities for

teachers A teacher, also called a schoolteacher or formally an educator, is a person who helps students to acquire knowledge, competence, or virtue, via the practice of teaching. ''Informally'' the role of teacher may be taken on by anyone (e.g. whe ...

and

students A student is a person enrolled in a school or other educational institution. In the United Kingdom and most commonwealth countries, a "student" attends a secondary school or higher (e.g., college or university); those in primary or elementar ...

, primarily through its website. It also produces radio programmes which air on some of the BBC World Service's language services and partner stations. It has won numerous awards, including two Eltons from the

British Council The British Council is a British organisation specialising in international cultural and educational opportunities. It works in over 100 countries: promoting a wider knowledge of the United Kingdom and the English language (and the Welsh lan ...

and an

English Speaking Union The English-Speaking Union (ESU) is an international educational membership organistation. Founded by the journalist Sir Evelyn Wrench in 1918, it aims to bring together and empower people of different languages and cultures, by building skill ...

award for innovation in English language teaching. The department was established in 1943. Since then, it has changed names multiple times, appearing as "English by Radio" (or ExR), "English by Radio and Television" and "BBC English", before arriving at "BBC Learning English". BBC World Service began broadcasting English language teaching programmes in 1945 for beginners, intermediate and advanced learners, for adult and children. There were number of series for teaching language comprehension with a help of song lyrics, such as ''Pop Words''. It was usual for the major broadcasters in the 1950s to have a programme teaching the language of the country the broadcaster served. In August 2007, BBC Learning English announced a partnership with

Xinjiang Xinjiang, SASM/GNC: ''Xinjang''; zh, c=, p=Xīnjiāng; formerly romanized as Sinkiang (, ), officially the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region (XUAR), is an autonomous region of the People's Republic of China (PRC), located in the northwes ...

Tianshannet Tianshannet () is the sole official news website of Xinjiang, China. The website was established by the government of Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region and the ''People's Daily'' Online on December 18, 2001. Tianshannet includes Mandarin Chinese, ...

References

External links

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An example of song lyrics to aid teaching language comprehension - from "The Road to Nashville"Language AcademiaTianshannet
1943 establishments in the United Kingdom Learning English English as a second or foreign language Language-learning websites Language education materials British educational websites {{BBC-radio-stub