Genius.

Talk about using social media to its fullest potential.

In my neverending quest to learn Spanish, I came across Livemocha, a language learning site that combines guided lessons and quizzes with real, and sometimes live, interaction with native speakers.

The site gets users to create profiles based on their native language, and when you finish lessons, Livemocha links you with other users who are native to the language you are trying to learn. You complete assignments and send them to native speakers who can then correct them and give you feedback. You are also able to record yourself speaking passages and native speakers will listen and correct everything from your grammer to your pronunciation. Other users become your tutors, and you become a tutor to others who are trying to learn English. A point system makes it worthwhile to take the time tutoring others, and based on user reviews, the system works incredibly well.

This use of social media allows Livemocha to give users an authentic learning experience at an extremely low cost. The cost savings from users being each other's tutors allows Livemocha to offer many of its courses for free, or a 12 month program for only $149. Definitely something worth checking out if you are interested in learning a new language! Link is below:

http://www.livemocha.com/