Stop talking, Start doing !

N.E.P.T.U.N.E stands for "Naval English Practical Training Using New E-learning". It is a CALL (Computer-Assisted Language Learning) piece of software that I have been designing for over 6 years now.

There are few pieces of software that are specifically designed for "maritime English". One of them is MarEng. MarEng is a great piece of software that was designed for merchant navy professionals. The scenario of the software is very well thought-of. The learner follows a ship (MV Marina) on her voyage from Santander (in Spain) to the Netherlands. All aspects of the specific maritime flavor of the the English language are covered.

There is, however, no equivalent for military navies. NEPTUNE is just that.

NEPTUNE is currently organized in 13 chapters, of gradual difficulty. these chapters correspond to those of the Maritime English Basics handbook, that I have edited, for Officers Of the Watch. This is a collective work, written by the professors of Ecole Navale, the French Naval Academy, and used for all OOW courses at Ecole Navale.

The chapters are as follows:

1. ABC, 123
2. Sailors and Mariners
3. In port
4. ships
5. Welcome on board!
6. On a sea chart
7. Movements and position
8. Welcome to the bridge!
9. The weather ans shipping forecast
10. Health matters
11. VHF: basics
12. VHF: Routine conversations
13. VHF: Priority conversations

On top of these 13 chapters, the program also contains an appendix where sentences from the SMCP (Standard Marine Communication Phrases) are gathered by theme (pilotage, entering port, weather, etc). Each sentence is recorded and can be listened to for correct pronunciation, and all sentences are integrated in a tool that can be used to memorize them.

The software is published under the Creative Commons Licence. This means that anyone is free to copy it and pass it around. Distribution online on any other website than my own or that of my school is not allowed however. If you'd like to distribute the software, please link to this page.

The following restrictions apply:

- BY: this is the attribution clause. It means that you are not allowed to remove my name from the software or any of its parts.

- NC: Non commercial profit. This means that you are not allowed to make any commercial profit from the software. This includes making the software available within a paid course. If you use the software with your students, in class, in a course for which they pay, you should be paying me (contact me, it is very cheap). If the course is free, however, the software is free as well.

- ND: no derived work. This means that you are not allowed to create derived work from my program or any of its parts. do not reuse my artwork, videos or audio without my written consent.

If you get the "YOUR LICENCE HAS EXPIRED" page, and would like a personal licence number, fill in the form below. Write your institution in the "message" field.