 I'll start the video in one minute. And once the video ends, you can start, right? Yeah. Okay. Good afternoon, everyone. I am Kalpana Karnan. I am the project coordinator of education services for outreach at scale project at the IIT Bombay. And I welcome all the participants who have joined this live session. I hope you and your family are doing well during this pandemic. And welcome to this session. And in this session, the instructors will answer your questions. And they will first take the questions which we have already posted on the Google form. And later on, they will also answer the questions which you can post on the chat. So I have some important announcements and some guidelines which will help all of you. So I want you to know that these courses which we have offered on IIT Bombay X platform, they are offered in a self-paced course. That means you can take this course at your own pace. And we opened it on January 26. And these courses will be opened until May 7. So within this period, you can take the quizzes and you can go through the course material. And we encourage you to go through the course material in a sequential manner. Because there are some courses have four weeks of content. And some courses have more than that around 8 to 12 weeks. So we want you to go through these courses in a sequential manner so that you can understand the content better. And please attempt all the quizzes. The graded quizzes will be counted towards your grades. And only when you clear the requirement, each course has a grading policy. And please go through the grading policy. And only if you clear the spring, you will get the certificate. And the practice, there are also some practice quizzes on the course. So these practice quizzes will not be counted towards your grade. But the graded quizzes will be counted towards your grade. So we request you to attempt all the graded quizzes. Then only you will be eligible for certification. So the certificate will be available only after the course ends. That is, even if you finish your course earlier, the course, in our platform, we don't have the facility to give you immediately the certificate. So only when the course ends on May 7. So after that, the certificate will be generated. It will be an e-certificate, honor code e-certificate, which you can download. And you can also share it with your friends and colleagues and other, your future employers. And so these certificates are quite valuable. So you can please try to attempt all the graded quizzes so that you can get the certificate. And I also want to tell you that your course, your scores will be available, will be visible to you on the progress bar, which is there on your IT Bombay X course page. So whenever you want to check your progress, please click on the progress bar, which will give you the, your progress made in the course. So on, so after the course ends, the course will be archived. And even after that, the course material will be always available on your dashboard. Only thing is you will not be able to attempt the quizzes after the deadline, but the course material will be available on your dashboard. I think many people have this question, whether the course material will be available. Can you please mute your, your mic? I'm not able to hear. Otherwise, you can ask the question after I finish. Thank you. So I also request you to spread the word about these courses amongst your friends and colleagues. And some of these courses are also beneficial for high school students. And please remember that any subject related queries, you can always post it on the discussion forum. Our course instructor and TAs will are there to answer your questions. And if there are any administrative related questions, you should email it to us at course support at the rate IIT Bombay X.in or eoutreach at the rate it.itb.ac.in. So if you have any login or administrative related queries, please email us. And one last important announcement that our courses are also open for bulk registrations. So in case your college is interested, please tell them to contact us. So the contact information will be shared on the chat. So anyway, they can always write to us at these email IDs, the course support at the rate IIT Bombay X.in or eoutreach at the rate it.itb.ac.in. So if there are any questions, I can answer now in general questions. Otherwise, I'll ask. So today we have two instructors, Ritika Banerjee. She will answer the queries related to soft skills and workplace. And we have Rama Kulkarni and Ritika, both of them will answer the queries which are there for the English oral and written communication. So I welcome both Ritika and Rama. So first 45 minutes we'll spend on answering the questions related to soft skills and workplace. And then English will be taken over. So I welcome all of you again. So if there are any questions, please post them on the chat and we will answer. So if there are any important questions which you want to ask me, I'm there throughout and also I'll be available till the end of this interactive session. Are there any questions? So if there are no questions, I'll ask now Ritika to answer. I welcome Ritika and she will answer the questions which are posted on soft skills and workplace communication. Welcome Ritika. Hi everyone, I'm Ritika. So I'm a course instructor for the English courses and I'm also handling the soft skills and workplace communication courses. Okay, there's a question from Gayatri. How's the grading done in total? Which course are you referring to Gayatri? Soft skill. Okay, you can refer to the grading policy because it's different for every course. So soft skill I think there's one graded quiz in the end that's counted and I'm not sure exactly. No, actually there are nine quizzes I think. And like I want to ask whether in every quiz there should be more than 50% or in total the percentage is considered? Total the percentage is considered. Okay, fine. Thank you. So this is a very common question actually even on the form most of the questions are about the certificate. So as Kalpana ma'am said go through the grading policy and you need an aggregate of 50% in all the graded quizzes, not in each grade. And then you can get a certificate. Also you will get certificates after the course time date is over. So even if you finish the course now you will get the certificate later. Okay, so I'll start by answering the questions on the form. Okay, so there are four questions about the certificate itself which has been answered. Okay, there's just one subject related question. It says that what are the three most important requirements for a job? So very subjective question. I'm guessing you're asking what's important? What are the three most important factors which should be important when you have a job? So I think there's no specific answer to that. But according to me, the most important thing would be your work ethic, obviously, which is you should be hardworking, your integrity and your commitment to the job. And then comes soft skills, your behavior with your colleagues, with your seniors, with each other. So this was a generic question I think. Are there any questions here live? Because we haven't received too many on the phone for soft skills and workplace communication. I'd also like to tell you that this time we have many discussion forum moderators who've been initiating activities on the forum. So please participate. These are really fun activities. Does anyone have a question? Hi, we have Brahma here. Okay, hi. So I also do some part of soft skills. And depending on, I mean, the question that was put to add to what Ritika has said, I also feel that pleasantness in one's personality is also counted. One has to be extremely pleasant. You know, you have to, so it includes your speaking skills. All right, your overall, so when she says that you have to follow work ethics. All right, so in work, so see how these two things merge in some sense. Okay, so when we do speaking as part of oral communication, we also mean pleasantness, you know, when you're communicating with your colleagues and other people around. So also, please remember to be pleasant. You should also be presentable. So being pleasant, being presentable. These things also count. All right, because one tends to make an impression when it comes to, you know, when you are in job, it's not so. Okay, the funniest part is when you are at home. Okay, most of you have been working from home. And when it comes to work from home. It's a different scene altogether, right? But when you are at workplace, which hopefully soon one should be. Okay, these things definitely count. So being presentable and all these things matter. So along with your academic qualifications and excellence, there are other things also which are required as far as soft skill is concerned. So please make sure that you incorporate these things. You should not be losing your temper. You should try and understand being patient. These are few things that are incorporated as far as soft skill is concerned. So far so much from my side. Thanks. Thanks. So is there any question, like I want to ask? Well, I also understand that you must be just into the course since it has just started, right? So there might not be too many queries, but whatever that you have done as far as the course is concerned, as of now, rather than jumping into what are the essential requirements for a job or whatever. We would appreciate if there are questions based on whatever course the lectures and the videos that you have seen as of now. Okay, so you can definitely ask questions related to whatever videos that you have seen till now. Also, the reason we ask you to interact on the discussion forum is so that we get to know you better. So last time there were very few active people and we knew them by name and their weaknesses and all. So please do interact. I have to join the course. I think this is a technical question. Can Urmila take it up? Someone has asked how to join the course. You'll have to register for it on the IATX portal. Okay, I see yet another question that says that how could I improve my skills in punctuation and pronunciation? There seems to be a question for the English part. We will take this up in just a short while to begin. So please be patient. When will this going to end? One, you need to improve on your English and also be patient with us. There is a time slot which was mentioned. Okay, so whoever has asked how to join the course, are you facing some difficulty? This question has been posted on YouTube chat. So I think that person has found a clue. So you have to log into a lecture. So we will post a website here and then you have to log in there and then register for the course. I'll just do that. Thank you. So you need not ask questions. You can also share your experience with the course so far. How it's going. There's any part that you liked or disliked. Harish will answer your question when we deal with the English courses. I'd like to know how many have actually started the, have you seen any of the videos first week or something? Do you have any questions in the first week of the course? Either in workplace or in soft skills? Okay, Jayashankar has said that the videos seem to be short. I think the reason we kept short videos is because long videos tend to get monotonous. When videos are shorter, you can grasp more. Short videos are the basic thing for any MOOC. Take whatever MOOC across any platform. So these are, after doing a lot of research, people have found out that people have a very less attention span. That attention span is only around less than 10 minutes. It's actually around six minutes. So these videos are purposely kept short to 10 minutes or less than that so that people can view and get interested and they can watch. The bulk registration details have been posted. So in case anybody is interested, you can note down the email ID and the phone number and you can contact us. Thank you. So I'd like to reiterate that this session is for workplace communication and soft skills. If you have any doubts related to that or any observations, please share it with us. So someone said that he has completed MOOC. If he's around, would he want to share? I'm here. Voice is breaking. Ramayana, your voice is not very clear. Can I just check your mic? Can you hear me? Am I audible now? It is very slow. The speed. Yeah, yeah. Am I audible? The audio speed is low. Okay. Samarth has mentioned that he has completed module one. So in that case, would he want to share his experiences? How did he like, how did he take the first module? Samarth, if you're here. Okay. Am I audible, Ritika? Yeah, now it's much better. Yeah. So Jayashankara says that problem is not with time. It seems that to make it short, few things seem to be escaped. All right. So as Kalpana has just mentioned, these videos are meant to be short. There are major topics that are being covered. Please try and understand that the most important and major topics are always being covered in the MOOCs platform. And that is why it seems that a few things. So we have basically focused on major, not just topics, but related knowledge, related stuff as far as the given topic is concerned. And of course the rest of it will be for reference reading. So it is expected from the students to do some amount of extra reading, some amount of extra net surfing, of course, when it comes to certain topics as well. So that is one of the reasons as to why they seem to be short. And we can't cram everything into those 10, 15 minutes. Okay. So that's basically the only reason as to why it seems to be incomplete somewhere. Yeah. And adding to her point, I don't think you've checked the additional information section because that has links related to each unit. Okay, Santosh has shared that he likes that there are two attempts and quizzes. That's good to know Santosh. Oh, would you like to share your experience so far? Jai Shankar, did that answer your question? Okay, Harish says modules are easy to learn. Are you glad that you're appreciating the efforts because we definitely try to keep it at the basic level. These modules are particularly the ones that are being run as of now are meant for the basic learners, the beginners basically. And that is why the modules seem to be that easy to learn. But thank you so much. That's good to know, Santosh. Thank you. Yeah, we typically always want to hog this kind of appreciation. The IITBX MOOCs platform is definitely elated to see you appreciating the efforts that have been collectively put together. Thank you so much. So Santosh, would you like to share which parts of the modules you liked? Why you found it helpful? Okay, you're talking about the English courses. We'll get to that in a bit. Anyone else for soft skills or book plays? The session for late courses will be later Harish. This is for soft skills, workplace and English courses. All the same, thanks for the appreciation. It will be conveyed to the related person. It's nice to know that you're enjoying all the courses that you have registered for. Okay, Jatin, what issue do you have? Okay, this is a technical query. I think Urmila would be better to ask. Jatin, I didn't get it. What paper do you want to download? Jatin, can you please unmute yourself and let us know what is the issue in downloading? Urmila has been asking, can we skip this quiz for now and submit later? So you can submit it by 7th May. You can skip any quiz and submit it by 7th May. Yeah, there's no individual deadline for the quiz. But what is the loading issue? Can you unmute yourself? Can you hear me? Yes, yes. Yeah. Okay, so there is a... So in the second problem I can see that there is a link for this paper. I mean, there is a question. The question is like this. Consider this paper and then in that this paper has a PDF link to it. So whenever I click on it, I couldn't download that PDF. Post the link on the chat so we can directly go and check. Post the IT Bombay link of the quiz which you are referring to in the chat. Okay. Can I ask one question please? Yes, please do. If someone couldn't get 50% marks, is he or she eligible to extend his time or we registered himself or herself? So you cannot extend the time. So the last date as I told you is May 7th. So you have to finish all your quizzes before that. And it's not very difficult to get 50% marks. So it's because it's weighted average. So in some quizzes you may not be doing well, but in other quizzes you may do well. So I don't think there's any thing that you'll, it's very easy to clear actually. Due to burden of work, I think few of us couldn't see the videos and attend quizzes. You are registered. Can I ask you in which course you have registered a soft skill or a place or both? Soft skill only. So it is not very difficult because it's only four weeks of content and now it is only February. So you have till May. So you can attempt these quizzes anytime from now till May 7th. How many quizzes are there? I don't know. I have to check. So there will not be more than seven or eight quizzes. And these quizzes are not very difficult. So I'm sure like if you give, even if you are not regular, you can still think attempt. They're not very difficult. The quizzes are basically always from the videos that is videos. On the basis of that quizzes are designed. So as Kalpana rightly says, it is not really very difficult. You can always go back to the videos. Repeat videos, see them again and come back to answering the quizzes. Because this is self-paced, you can definitely keep doing this back and forth. Thank you. Whenever you have time, please go through the videos and maybe you can take one day or two days just to answer the quizzes. Before answering the quizzes, maybe you can revise the videos and then do that. So it's not very difficult. So there is no, that's what I told you, till May 7th you have enough time. So you can answer these quizzes. You can answer one quiz today. You can answer one quiz after one month. It doesn't matter. So only thing is you have to finish all the quizzes before May 7th. Okay. So I'm getting a lot of messages asking, can I leave? There are exams going on. You're free to leave. This video is available on YouTube. So you can check it. So those who have semester exams going on, you can leave. My request will be to complete the session as far as English communication for oral and written purposes. In a short while, another 3-4 minutes will be starting the English course also. Those who have doubts and queries, please, this will take another half an hour, 45 minutes of your time. And then you can, of course, leave. Ma'am. Yes. Ma'am, my question is for workplace communication. I have completed all the quizzes and all the course, but at the last, there is no such option to finish or end the course. Yeah, that's because the last date is May 7th. So the course will end then. And then, so you must have received your score. Yeah, ma'am, I received it. So if you're eligible for the certificate, you'll get it after that. Ma'am, as I checked in the progress, there will showing all the quiz result in the bar format and total of, but there is not any such option that you have just completed. I will say that because the course will end on 7th May. So even if you've finished it before it won't matter. Okay ma'am. Thank you. Is it necessary for the soft skill participants to attend the next part of your Zoom meet? It's not necessary. Yes, you registered for yes, yes. Only if you're registered for the other part, the written and oral communication skills. In that case, the request was for all those candidates who have registered for oral and written communication, please wait. The rest can of course leave. Again, the question is again for these soft skill participants. As of now, yes. Are there any more questions for soft skills and workplace? Otherwise we can move to English. So should we move to English now? Okay. I'll be fine by that because it's almost around 40 minutes. Okay. So now we'll start the session for the English oral and written communication courses. Should we give them some time to join? Yeah. In the meanwhile, there have been a few questions that were asked on the chat here. Maybe we can address those. Okay. So the first one here was how could I improve my skill in pronunciation and preposition? Punctuation, sorry, punctuation and preposition. Shall I take this one, Ritika? Yeah. Okay. Punctuation and preposition is a part of the written part of communication skills. Are these all courses running simultaneously? Ritika, are they running simultaneously? Yes. So if you go to the communication part, one can always see videos on what are punctuations, why they are necessary and how punctuations help you, not just in written work, but also as far as speech is concerned. The same applies to prepositions as well. So my request would be that you go to the communication and go through the videos. That will help you in punctuation and preposition part. Punctuations are typically, you know, the pauses, the responses that one has when it comes to speech. You cannot be speaking in one flow as such and when he could take pauses, these pauses are in some sense reflected by the punctuations. So when it comes to good speech, okay, you listen to several videos on TEDx and also certain good leaders, you know, who have given good speeches and you would realize as to why these pauses are important. And according to that case, you know, that will help you as far as punctuation is concerned. Preposition are the filling words which also help in completing the meaning of a sentence. In that case, what I would say is, so supposing to say the book is kept on the table. Now on the table will tell you as to where exactly the book is. You can't say the book is stable, right? So the book is on the table or the book is under the table. So under, on, below, above, these are prepositions which make this thing complete, which make the sentence complete. And so it is kind of required to know prepositions. I hope that answers your question. Yeah, and add into that as you said that punctuation is for pauses and tell you how to break up a sentence. But also it's very specific. I mean, even commas, commas and full stops can mean pauses. So you should know when to use what. So just see what we have two videos on punctuation actually, where Shariq has specifically explained where to use what. So just go through them. Okay, should we move on to the next one? Yeah, to improve English oral communication skills. So this basically is a question that relates to the complete module as such. The module is divided into four parts and basically major chunks are covered in oral communication as far as listening and speaking is concerned. Oral communication, why is it that we have basically divided it into two parts is because oral is when you speak. All right. And what you speak is what you have heard what you have listened that has processed in your mind and accordingly you communicate. All right, you understand and you communicate. So when it comes to improving oral communication, it also means that you have to listen carefully and learn receptively. And in that case, once that process is done, whatever you want to communicate, we'll start forming in. Okay, so you pick up words, you understand how a sentence is formed, and accordingly then you communicate. Okay, so it's basically a process. It's not that it's kind of a dish that can be prepared with various ingredients. You need to know, you need to understand the ingredients and accordingly then one can. So please patiently go through the complete oral communication module and that will help you understand as to how one can improve on oral communication. So when it comes to speech, it also means the accent, the way you articulate certain sounds, certain words, certain letters. All of this is included when it comes to speech. All right, so oral communication is not just one aspect. It has several things involved in it. Okay, so carefully go through the module and I'm sure you will be satisfied once you go through the videos. Anything you want to add, Ritika? I think that's it. The main thing is that oral is the foundation. I mean, how you learn a language by speaking at first and then comes writing. So it's important everywhere, even in your soft skills workplace, everywhere that you go, you need to learn to speak properly. So, yeah. Are there any more questions on the chat? Okay, there's another question which says how to practice speaking English and how to ensure that what I speak is right. Yeah, this question was on the form as well. Maybe Santhosh has asked. Okay. Yeah. Yeah, what do you want to, yeah. Should I take it? Yeah, take it. So how to ensure that what you're speaking right? That's a good question because then you're dependent on people around you. But the thing is, as Rama said previously that you should watch Tech Talk videos, read more than you won't be dependent because you might not always have people around you who can correct you and tell you that you're pronouncing this incorrectly. Yeah, I mean, if you have such friends whom you can talk to, that's great, but you shouldn't be dependent on that. So I think start by watching videos, watching movies, watching whatever content that you like in basic good English, and then it will come automatically. I mean, then you will know, you know, you will say something and in your head you will correct yourself. Okay, this is not how that person said it. That happens with time and with practice. So it's, and we are here. We have these live sessions every month, but ultimately you will have to help yourself. So I think we do this and reading is the best way to do that. Rama, if you want to. A small thing. My, okay, sorry. My laptop just, yeah. Yeah, so the question says that do I practice English speaking basically is what he's trying to ask. Just one sec. One sec. Just give me one minute. All right. I think I missed out on that question somewhere. Yeah, he says, how do I practice? How do I practice speaking? Right. So the thing is that one can always find a friend as Ritika has rightly said, you may also look up into the mirror and talk to yourself that sometimes can sound very ridiculous. There's yet another way which I very strongly believe one should do is talk to yourself in your mind in the sense that if you start framing small, small sentences in your mind, it can help. So for example, pick up the glass, you know, so pick up the glass. Most of the components of a sentence are covered. All right. So if you just say pick glass, you'll realize that it's there's something missing. All right. So try to understand that as is for any local language that you would have studied. Same is true for English also the language is made up of noun, verbs, adjectives, prepositions. So all of this will go into the making of a sentence as far as English is also concerned. So once you have understood as to how a sentence is formed, in that case it becomes rather easy to then make a complete sentence as such. The other thing is that you should not be worried or scared when you're talking to someone. Half the battle is won when you are not scared while speaking. Generally, you are you one feels rather nervous, you know, when one has to one is to ask even to put a question, right? One tends to feel a little nervous and that is where because you have no confidence, the learning does not happen fast. So just to make sure sometimes it's okay to make mistakes. It doesn't matter. There are people who would correct you, make sure that you take it in the right in the right way and not feel humiliated or not feel insulted that how could somebody kind of tell me, you know, that I went wrong or whatever, be humble enough, be polite enough to say, oh, okay, I realize or whatever it is and that itself will help you as far as improving your language learning skills. Okay, so yeah, just keep it up basically also use a thesaurus. Okay, so your vocabulary will improve when you start using a thesaurus. All of these things are definitely mentioned in the video. Find out what is a thesaurus. A thesaurus is something that will give you options of several words with the same meaning so that a sentence is not repetitive so that your paragraphs are not repetitive. You should also know how to pick up words, certain words are apt in certain situations, whereas it is not in certain situation. So to give you a small example, it is very nice to say that XYZ passed away because of Corona rather than saying that XYZ died because of Corona, you know, so these are a few things as you learn and as you mature into, you know, the language learning, you would probably have also polished your understanding of the language. Okay, so just hang on. It will come. It will definitely come. Okay. Should we take up questions on the form now? Yeah, yeah, yeah. To this I think we've answered how to understand while speaking whether we are maintaining grammar or not. May I come? Oh, yes, yes. Madam, please elaborate these two words passed away and died. Yes. I'm so glad you asked. Okay. Passed away also means the person is no more. See, now I'm using yet another word for the same meaning. All right. So died is also being no more. Pass away is also being no more and no more is basically being dead. Okay. So what I'm trying to say is when you have to improve your vocabulary, when you have to, you know, no more words for the same action. All right. These are, this is one place that will give you these words. All right. What I'm trying to say when I say rather than saying dead or died, see, there are certain consonants which are rather very harsh on the years. Okay. These are also called as plosives and they are very harsh on the years. So passing away when there is a hissing sound, it doesn't seem to be so harsh or he is no more when you say, okay. Again, the effect of those words is rather soft on your years. Okay. So of course it means one and the same. There is no difference. Supposing to say you're writing something. Okay. Supposing to say you and when it become, so let's take another example, education. Okay. You're asked to write about the current state of learning. All right. Now I already use the word education. I've already used the word learning. Right. Learning, teaching, education, study. What I'm trying to say is that once you know that there are a variety of words that can be used for the same, it doesn't become repetitive. All right. And when it becomes repetitive, the interest can, the interest of the listener or the reader, okay, can reduce. And you're looking that, we are looking at the fact that the interest of the reader and the listener should not go down. Okay. So, well, does that answer your question? Quite good. Thank you. Yeah. Thank you so much. Yes. I'm glad you asked that question. Thanks. Yeah. There's a question from the YouTube chat from Rahul Pawar. It says that it's hard to understand high level English without using hard words. Sorry. High level English like some use hard words. So it's hard to respond to them. I think that will always be the case even if you perfect your English, you will come across words sometimes that you don't know the meaning of. The thing to do is to make a mental note of it. That okay, I have to go back and look this up. That's what we do. I think we all do whenever we come across some new words, either you look it up on your phone immediately or you go back and look it up and that's how you build on your vocabulary. So don't get scared or don't don't get overwhelmed if you come across new words. That's okay. You're just learning. Okay. Harish has said that while watching English movies, it's difficult to catch their sentences without subtitles. Firstly, I think you should watch with subtitles when you're starting off because their accent is difficult even for for most Indian viewers, I think. Would you like to add to this? Yeah, watch English English movies. Don't go for movies. So the the the pronunciation of the British English is rather close to us. I mean, we definitely understand the way they speak. Of course, there is a little bit of an accent there too. But I definitely agree that initially, as you start off watching Hollywood movies, it is a bit tough. Well, what you need to do in that case is watch the movie twice. First, understand the subtitles and then go back and watch the movie for its content then. So I think that that it will take some time. But well, after several movies, you know, watching of several movies, I'm sure, you know, you could have become a pro at not having subtitles and just getting what is, you know, so. Yeah, basically there are times when these guys also handle very tough things. So if you go for interstellar or some such thing, you know, I mean, it's it's very, you just don't know what's happening. You know, you can't relate, you know, to what is happening on basically on screen and, you know, so. I definitely understand it can get a little tough, but I think you'll have to dice it for these two things, you know, some way. There will be a time when you would obviously, you know, when you're listening to them, certain words and the action, whatever is happening on screen, you'll be able to blend those things together and it will start making sense. Another YouTube question is, oh, what, by Dilesha Bhagat, what is preferred US or UK based English? What's the major difference? This is a very good question. On a daily basis, I think everyone faces. Yeah. So Indians use UK based English. They say differences only in spelling. So it's not something, I mean, there's no logic as such, you know, it's just that some word in US English will have one less S and in UK, the double S is and so on. So I think that only with practice, you know, if you read and you have to be conscious of what English you're reading. So if you're reading like a British novel and you should know, this is UK based English and pay attention to the spelling. But yeah, as Indians, we use UK based English. To add to what Ritika has said, today, of course, everything has almost become interchangeable. So mind you, when she says spellings, all right, the Americans, when it comes to color would drop the U. So it is C-O-L-O-R and it's not C-O-L-O-U-R. Now, why is it that we get confused? Simply because two reasons. One, we are a colony of the Britishers. They brought English to us and we learned the British English. So always remember as to why that confusion happens. Today, we learn the Queen's English and so we are taught, even today in schools, we are taught the Queen's English. And that is the reason as to why the confusion is there. But surprisingly enough, most of the MNCs, so in 1991, when the policies in India changed and the MNCs were welcomed here, these MNCs are more or less in the U.S. And that is where the U.S. English, then we started realizing the difference between the two. So depending upon what company you are working, you will have to mold yourself and adapt yourself to the kind of English that they practice. If it is a U.S.-based company, you will have to know that it is expected that you know U.S.-based English. Otherwise, it's basically universally, it is the U.K.-based English which is acceptable. I hope that answers your question. Okay, so one question on the form is, how are you going to correct our pronunciation? So again, like I said for the previous question, we won't be able to be there at every step even though we have these sessions. So I think our previous answers sort of answer your question that be your own teacher, watch the videos, watch TED talks, read more and we are always there to answer your doubts. But unlike Arama suggested, talk in front of a mirror and after the point with practice, you will come to know pronunciation is something that you have to just learn with practice. It's not something that you can read and learn. We are done with all the form questions. So now you can ask any question live or on the chat. Also I'd like to urge you to do all the ungraded quizzes as well. We've given many letter writing, essay writing, email writing exercises. It will really help and we've tried to cover all the topics because graded quizzes can't really cover every topic. And we are there. I mean on the discussion forum, we'll give you feedback. So please do that. It will really help with your writing. And also respond to the activities posted by our discussion forum moderators. I think we have three, four activities. So are there any more questions? Okay. So another YouTube question. It's similar to what we took from my Sanjeev Kumar. I just started watching this live session. My question is how do we practice of practice of speaking English when no one is around to speak with you? Hello. Yes. Yeah. I am a discussion forum moderator. And I'd like to pitch in by saying that you could always, it always helps if you go, talk in front of a mirror and record yourself. Since you can always watch your own reflections in the mirror and after you record yourself, you can always listen to the mistakes that you've made in your conversation. And after you replay that audio back, you can always jot down all the mistakes that you've made in the process. So this is one of the better tools that I have utilized myself to acquaint myself to, for instance, when I'm in an interview or such, I always use such techniques so as to acquaint myself with the situation even when I'm not there. Yeah. Yeah. Also, it helps as far as your facial expressions are concerned. So when you look at yourself in the mirror, you also come to know the kind of, because when you are speaking to someone, what happens is you're not aware of the facial expression. But when you look into a mirror and you articulate sounds, your facial expressions, you know, the movement of your eyeballs, everything, everything can be seen, all right? And that also helps you improve on, you know, the gestures basically. So all of these things are rather important. Thank you so much. That was really nice of you to take up that question. Thanks. And I like the point you raised about recording yourself. That's really good. In fact, the great request that we've given is we've asked you to give a recording because then you hear yourself and you realize where you've gone wrong. Yes, that seems to be the case. Thanks. Any other doubts or observations? Those who are attending this session, do you have anything to share? Do you think certain things could have been added into the videos or have you done some extra reference which you want to mention here? You're welcome to do that. Also, please look at the additional information section too. We've added a lot of links there. Yes. Ma'am, I just wanted to ask, you just talked about non-verbal communication, like facial expressions and articulations. Could you explain a little bit more about since we don't usually have a control of how we are presenting ourselves in public. So can you elicit it, how we could control our facial expressions and articulations so that it could, like we could present ourselves better since most of that is usually ignored by many of the people. They believe that the spoken communication is the key but could you please explain in detail how facial expressions and such are also important? Yeah, yeah. So basically what happens is it also reflects on the composure of the speaker. Now, if the speaker is rather excited or the speaker is in a sour mood, in a bad mood, all of this will be largely reflected in his speech but it will also be reflected on him. So there are certain gestures which have been identified as nervousness. There are certain gestures that are identified as being agitated. So what happens is when you stand in front of a mirror and you say a few things, so if you pick up, let's say some novel, some certain dialogues and you start reading it out on the basis of what is the mood of that particular paragraph or the dialogue. You would automatically see as to how the gestures change. Now, pleasantness, as I would always insist, is the best way when it comes to communication. If you're not pleasant, if your voice is not toned down, if you're not pleasant, the listener, there can be mistake as far as... So as you put me the question, the language is sober. There are doubts and you want it to be clarified. Now these are things which can be understood but had you been a little rough, then it shows. So one-on-one communication, it matters the most because you don't want misunderstandings. You don't want people to have wrong impression when I say misunderstandings. You don't want people to have wrong impression about you. An excellent person, but just because you cannot communicate correctly. So there are some people who have a very plain kind of look on their face and we hesitate approaching them. There are times when we feel, let it be, I don't think I want to ask something. Isn't that so? Why is it that we decide on what basis do we decide that? These are things which definitely matter. When it comes to speaking, when I said eyeballs and all, there are times when you widen your eye, there are times when you crease your eye, you're trying to make people understand. So there are times, in fact, when there's also a smile on your face while speaking. So when I say, oh, did you get it? And there's a smile on my face. Now see, these are a few things which will also put the listener at ease. It is an indication that you are incorporating the listener into your speech and that is why when I say pleasantness or facial gestures, so they basically go hand in hand with what you're speaking, with the message that you're trying to give. So it is definitely essential to have your gestures, facial gestures, facial expressions right. Does that answer your question? Hello. Yes, thank you very much. All right, yeah. Okay. Phrases and idioms. There's a question on phrases and idioms. It says, are they meant to be used only in writing or can be used in daily speaking? Yes, phrases and idioms can be used in daily speaking also. See, these are, as I have said in the videos also, these are embellishments for language, all right. So the way you would have flowers on your angoli or you have colors in your angoli, right. Phrases and idioms do exactly the same. It decorates your language. These are words which in short will give you a whole gist of what is meant to be said. So you don't waste too many words, you know. So of course it can be incorporated in both places while speaking as well as while writing. I hope that answers the question. And that said, it should come naturally because sometimes people just for the sake of using phrases or phrases or idioms, use it in the wrong way. So just make sure you know the meaning, know the context and then you can use it anyway. Yeah, yeah, they also create humor sometimes, okay. So careful, yeah, yeah, yeah. A little humor in a serious situation is fine, but not all the time because then it becomes quite embarrassing. Okay, so just make sure that you know the right phrases and idioms and then they are being made use of. Okay, we still have another 10, 15 minutes to go. Do we have any more questions? We appreciate a responsive kind of an audience. So please come up with questions. No, so Dan, the course so far you can share your experience too. It will be also nice to know what are the new phrases and idioms that you learned while doing the course and how apt did you find it? Yeah, it will be really nice to know that. So if you can mention a few, or if you can add some more phrases and idioms that you know from the local language and it definitely fits into the English language, you can always show those comparisons as well. We'll appreciate that. In the meanwhile that we get any more questions, I would like to draw your attention to the fact that if you're doing both these courses simultaneously, the oral and the written communication, I would rather advise to finish the oral communication first and then move on to the written communication because our personal experience also is the fact that as we learn any language, it is the listening part that happens first. The oral communication incorporates listening and speaking. So the point is that if you give a thought, you'll realize that when a baby from that stage in the infant stages, when the child learns to speak a language, it is those words that are being hammered on the child's head or on his brain and that is where the baby learns to basically put these words together and move on. Now that is exactly what we look forward to from you as well. So please try to understand the fact that when it comes to learning a language, you have to listen carefully first and not just listen carefully, you also have to pay attention to the articulation of the sound. So there are people who would bring in the local flavor of the accent to English. There is nothing wrong with it. The only thing is that it might get sometimes a little jarring to the ears. So please make sure that you learn to do away with that accent and only on the basis of that can you move on to the next module. So my suggestion would be to first do the oral communication and then move on to the steps one by one. Don't be too curious about what is this and what is that. You have ample time to finish your courses. So please make sure that you don't run these courses simultaneously, do one thing at a time. So we have basically designed it in a way to take you step by step ahead into the coursework. Okay, so this is just a suggestion. Thanks. Yeah, also in the written communication course we are taking references to the previous course. So it would help if you do that. Yeah. Any other questions? What the discussion for our moderator would like to share something in terms of taking this course? I think our time is just ticking. It's around another last five minutes or so. If there are questions, we are here to take those questions. How to boost the confidence? Okay, Harish, this is something I struggle with when it comes to speaking in front of people. But I think the only thing is practice because personally that's what's helped me a lot because earlier I couldn't stand in front of two people and talk without trembling. But now it's much better. So I think firstly, perfect your language. I mean that's a different thing. Watch videos and read like we keep saying. But then confidence boosting comes only with interaction. You know, you need to keep doing it. You do it once, do it twice, you'll still be nervous. But it will happen with time. Any other questions? Are there any admin-related questions? So if anybody has any administrative-related questions, we'll be happy to answer. I think I answered this question before. Any particular book recommendations for reading to improve our English? I think there's no particular book as such. It depends on your interest rating. So if you like fiction, pick up a book. If you like fiction, choose that. It has to be something that interests you and makes you read the entire book. See, every religion has one book. Be it whatever religion. But mind you, language is not religion. It is a thought process. Our thought process grows. There are several things that one wants to basically communicate. There are several things that people have opinion. And there are stories to be told. And that is the reason why you do not have one particular book as such to improve. It is a growing thing. It is a continuous process. So please try and understand that. You cannot really pinpoint on one particular thing that this is like a Bible and I can pick it up and start reading and I'm going to learn English. If there is anybody who is giving you that kind of a promise, mind you, it's a false promise. So please do not buy. Please do not take that. There is really no book that can teach you in one go. Pick up something that you like. Now there are, in my whole career of teaching, I've realized that there are students who do not like fiction. There are students who do not like motivational books. There are students who do not like inspirational books. So there are various categories, depending upon what is it that you like. Pick up those books and start reading. Words will automatically start making sense to you. And once the words start making sense, they talk to you, you start understanding. And that is where language starts improving automatically because those thoughts are basically fitting into your mind. You are analyzing, you are thinking, overthinking, knowingly or unknowingly. It doesn't have to be a very conscious effort where you're trying to think about a book or a novel or a motivational speech or be it whatever. So these days there's not one book. You can also listen to certain talks as we have been insisting. And those also, anything that can make your mind think or analyze and then there's a response that comes from you. And I think that is how we improve in anything. So just make sure that you do not look for that golden key to whatever doubt that you have, but it's a process. So be a part of the process is what I would say. You can basically pick up books, which are translations from your local language. There are times when even that helps because the story you know, and you can relate to it. So once a person can relate to something, it becomes easy to understand what is being told, what is being narrated. So yeah, thank you. So there's a discussion forum thread that we've started where we are asking you what you're reading so that way you can see what others are reading. And last time this was pretty successful because everyone was looking at these other recommendations. So just go to the discussion forum. Are there any more questions? So we are almost towards the end of today's session. So if there are any questions that you can ask now, otherwise we'll close the session. If there are any questions, one or two. Let's both answer this. Good books. Okay, I'll start first. Then she'll give you her suggestions. What I normally understand is that as children, we read books that help us to escape into an unrealistic world. We are taught to imagine things. We read books like... So even in the Indian scene, Ramayana and Mahabharat for us is something which does not happen around and we imagine these things. But slowly as you grow up, the context changes and your selection of books will change. So what I'm trying to say here is as children, you read books which will help you to escape into an unreal world and as you grow, it will bring you back to the real world. Real issues, real problems, real fights, real struggles or even successes as a matter of fact. So my suggestion will be to pick up books that narrate a story. Whatever your likes are. Pick up a book, read the last page. There's some kind of recommendation that is given some lines to create some kind of curiosity in you. That is what is mentioned there. Always visit when you're visiting a bookstore or whatever. Always visit a section which has fictional books also. Don't go just for non-fictional stuff. Also visit the books which are kept on the fictional book section and pick up what you like. I mean, I don't see any reason as to why one should insist on reading a particular kind of books. But generally what happens is despite the fact that we are grown-ups there are still certain books dealing with children that we appreciate. So pick up books by Ruskin Bond, pick up books by... In fact, even Sudha Murthy, I would say that she narrates something that happens in the Indian scenario and it becomes easy for us to establish a connect with the stories that she's telling. Pick up those books. In fact, even books by R.K. Laxman. So is it Laxman? It is Narayanan. R.K. Narayanan. The brothers I was thinking of a cartoon basically in mind. So R.K. Narayanan, his books also are exactly how the Indian system is. So you'll find a lot of connecting dots between our situation and what is narrated in those books. So try and do that. Of course, there are certain books written by foreign writers also and that also introduces us to several other cultures and it's always nice to have diversity when it comes to reading. I think Ritika will have some good recommendation when it comes to foreign writers as such. Actually, even I was going to suggest R.K. Narayanan and this one. Siddha Murti. Especially if you're starting off, those are very easy reads. And then you can move on to complex writers like Amitabh Goswami Chitravali. Another thing is you know something like if you're a Harry Potter fan, then read the series because if you're familiar with it, you know the story and the reading will be much easier. And you can start off with something like that. So Harry Potter, Overdiver, Lord of the Rings. Anything that you like, watch him. Sometimes it helps to go the other way. Watch first and then read. So then you won't have to struggle with the story. You know the story. Books like maybe Animal Farm although that has many complex layers but that's easily written. I mean that's easy to read. Yeah, I think start off with easy reads and first keep your interest in mind because that's what matters. If you get bored then there's no point. Are there any other questions? Otherwise we'll close the sessions. Thank you Rama and Ritika for patiently answering all the questions. I'm sure like all the people who joined would have benefited a lot. And thank you all the participants for joining this session. So we will have such live interactive sessions once a month. And we will inform you to email and through the course to join whenever it happens. And if you have any questions during the course please post it on the discussion forum. The discussion forum TAs and the instructors will help you answer the questions on the discussion forum. And if you have any administrative related questions there are two email IDs so you can always send an email to us. Thank you all. Thank you once again Rama and Ritika for your patience. Thank you so much. It's always a pleasure to answer questions. Yeah, we have to be more interactive because you are doing both the courses as well as English communication they all require communication. So the best way to start is to practice from this course itself and in the interactive session. So I should not feel shy and ask questions whoever is I know that it is difficult to come out of your shell and always sometime you have to start. Yeah, let's hope that we are overloaded soon enough you know so they come, yeah, they make advantage of this and there is a variety of questions basically you know so I mean of course even today there were different questions that were asked there was not much of repetition and also we really enjoy answering such questions it's nice to be here. Thank you all for joining and have a good day Yeah, yeah, thanks a lot. Thank you