 Welcome. Are you interested in human speech? Would you like to know how humans produce and perceive sounds? Well, then this is the perfect open online course for you. The Virtual Linguistics Campus Massive Open Online Course Linguistics 102 Speech Science. If you have a Virtual Linguistics Campus account, which is of course free, accessing the class is simple. Just log in with your personal data and you will find the class on your personalized VLC start site under your current classes on the VLC. A click on the class name leads you to the class start site, where after class activation you have access to several class-related links, for example to the bibliography, the link section and links to the social media, for example to the Facebook group associated with this class. Furthermore, you can select whether you want a graded statement of accomplishment or not. I'll come back to this later. The class consists of 14 units, where the first one, the class preliminaries informs you about some general aspects of the class and discusses what it means to study online on the VLC. Well, and the last one is your option to evaluate the class. The remaining units exhibit the content of this class. And if you wish, you can retrieve an overview of each unit's content by means of a click on these information symbols, even if you're not logged in or if the class is inactive. The linguistic content can be subdivided into three main parts. The first part looks at the production of speech, also known as articulatory phonetics. Then we will deal with the physics of speech, alternatively labeled as acoustic phonetics. And the third part focuses on the perception of speech, also referred to as auditory phonetics. These central parts are surrounded by an introductory unit, the speech chain, and a unit that leads from phonetics to phonology at the very end. Well, in our teaching and learning concept, well, studying online on the VLC simply means go through each unit at your own pace. Study the virtual session, watch the corresponding educational videos, and optionally use our practical sheets with additional tasks and model solutions. And if you wish, you can discuss further problems using the class-related forum, which is open for all registered users of your class or the Facebook group MOOC Linguistics 102. And depending on your involvement and participation, you can obtain a class certificate. There are three options. The simplest one is the statement of participation issued by the Virtual Linguistics Campus. You will receive such a certificate for regular and active participation and of course for free. The second option is the statement of accomplishment, also for free, and issued by the Virtual Linguistics Campus. To be given such a certificate, we not only want your regular participation, but we also want you to do the worksheets, our electronic tests, one for each e-learning unit, and we want you to achieve an overall score of all worksheets of at least 60%. The most advanced option is the graded statement of accomplishment, which includes your precise grade, the workload in hours, and a complete list of all the tasks you successfully submitted. This certificate is issued by Maaberg University in conjunction with the Virtual Linguistics Campus and it involves a fee of currently 45 euros. To obtain such a certificate, you have to make your choice on the class start side using this option. Well, that's it. In case you have more questions, do not hesitate to ask us. For example, in our Facebook group. So, please join us. Right after class activation, you will be contacted by the Virtual Linguistics Campus team and you will receive your preliminary instructions. The rest is up to you. So, thank you for your attention and see you soon.