Multimedia-English includes a variety of activities and exercises to make learning more effective.

Activities typically have two objectives:

• Work with the language used on the video or with similar language. This helps users assimilate the new language or practise what they already knew.
•  Provide listening comprehension exercises to check understanding and also force users to concentrate even harder on their listening skills.

Activities and exercises can be created by the webmaster or by users, the same as videos. When you open the activities tab, you will see the activities attached to that video. Activities from the website (Official Section) will be separated from activities by users (Open Section), and the latter will mark if they were created by a teacher or by another user, so you can have a better idea of what to expect a priori.

There are 9 different kinds of activities. Most of them come with self-correction (users have to get the exercise right before they can continue, and they can check which is the correct answer if they feel lost). Most also come with a timer to make it more exciting and also to force users to concentrate hard on what they're doing so their assimilation speeds up. The 9 different types are:

1- SmartMemo
2- MasterBlaster
3- Put in Order
4- Multiple Choice
5- Yes-No
6- True-False
7- Fill in the Gaps
8- Drag & Drop
9- Text

1- SMARTMEMO

This activity is designed to help users assimilate the language. A word or sentence is provided and users will try to see if they understand its meaning and if they know how to pronounce it. They then check the answer and mark if they were right or wrong while the application keeps track of their results. The easiest way to check meaning is by translating it into the user's mother tongue, so this activity will accept other languages as translation for the meaning box. If there is a second language other than English, it will be identified, and only speakers of that second language will be able to use the activity. But SmartMemo can also be designed using only English.

2- MASTERBLASTER

This activity will be similar to SmartMemo but more like a game. Random words or phrases will appear and 4 options will be given. Users have to click on the right option to move on. If they get it right but after the timer stops, then they'll get no points for the answer even if it is correct. The timer can be set to slow, medium or fast, but in every case it has the effect of speeding the action up.

3- PUT IN ORDER

Words or sentences are presented in a random order. Users have to drag them and rearrange them so they make a correct sentence or conversation, in the right order. This can help them get familiar with some grammatical constructions they need to practice.

4- MULTIPLE CHOICE

A traditional exercise of Multiple Choice. The correct answer must be clicked in order to move on to the next question. You can have 2, 3 or 4 options to choose from.

5- YES-NO

You are presented with a question and you must click YES or NO. If your answer was right you get one point, if it's wrong you get none, as usual.

6- TRUE-FALSE

Similar to the Yes-No activity but this time you are offered 3 possibilities: True, False or Doesn't say. This activity format makes it more difficult than the previous one and also leaves a smaller place for sheer luck.

7- FILL IN THE GAPS

You get a sentence or a text with gaps. You may or may not be given the words you have to use (in random order) and distractors may also be included to make the exercise more challenging.

8- DRAG & DROP

Similar to the previous one but this time you don't have to write the words inside the gaps, you simply have to click on the words and drag them into the blanks.

9- TEXT

This is not an interactive activity, like all the others, but a traditional activity explained with text. The most obvious use of this format is for teachers to write an explanation on how to use a certain video in class with students. So text activities are not primarily designed for students, but written by teachers to give ideas of class exploitation to other teachers. Nevertheless text activities might also be used to give normal users instructions on how to do with the video to make the most of it.

When you open an activity the first thing you can see is the cover page, with instructions and explanations, and at the top you can find these icons:

1- This icon opens instructions about how to use that activity.

2- The red icon to report problems with this activity as a whole (the same icon inside the activity pages will report problems with only that particular page).

3- This opens the video page associated to this activity.

4- This opens a sheet where you can see, print or download the complete activity. You can print it to do it with pen and paper. If you are a teacher you can print the activity and make photocopies for your students, so they can do the activity even if there is not a computer for everyone of them.

5- If you are a teacher with a Virtual Classroom in M-E you can click on this icon to add the present activity to your students assignment list.

6- By clicking here you will get the link to this activity.

7- Add this activity to your favourites list.

When you start an activity you come to the item pages. As an example, this is the appearance of a MasterBlaster activity:

Here you can see the item, the options, the timer, icons to favourite the activity and for teachers to add it to their Virtual Classroom, another icon to open the video page where this activity belongs and another icon to report mistakes, problems or any other issue about that particular item. Also, the video is present in case the activity needs the video to be played while doing it. Your score is visualized on top of the video and updated in real time. Not many people enjoy doing exercises but most people like playing games, so our activities have been designed with that idea on mind.

Users can create their own activities through a couple of forms that makes the job really easy. Activities with a very good standard will be promoted to the Official Section, the same as videos. On this video tutorial you can see how to upload videos and also how to create interactive activities.

Students can add an activity to their favourite list, same as videos, and teachers can add an activity to their assignment list for their students in their Virtual Classromms, same as videos once more.