Designing and developing multilingual e-learning materials: TUFS language education pronunciation module - introduction of a system for learning Japanese language pronunciation

We discuss the design and the development of the multilingual e-learning materials covering 17 different languages. The project is now being carried out by the graduate school of Tokyo university of foreign studies (TUFS) under the auspices of Japan's ministry of education, culture, sports, science and technology. The system covers four modules such as pronunciation, dialogue, grammar, and vocabulary module for 17 languages. Taking p-module as an example, as the integration of language teaching and linguistics, the materials are based on two teaching methods mainly used in the classroom, and on the findings and theories of phonetics and phonology. As the utilization of informatics, we utilized high technologies in sound recordings and Web site designing. Such utilization and integration will enable us to accomplish to create the new domain of research, "linguistic informatics".