Need some supplemental materials or new ideas? The website links below offer a wealth of excellent free resources for English as a Second Language teachers, tutors and students. They provide lots of practical tips, teaching ideas and downloadable resources. Check them out!
Dave’s ESL Cafe
http://www.eslcafe.com
One of the most comprehensive websites for ESL/EFL students and teachers of all levels from around the world. For teachers, it offers such resources as a bookstore, a page with ideas for classroom activities, a job center, and a variety of ways for teachers around the world to connect electronically, including message boards, chat room, topical discussion forums, and a help center.
The Internet TESL Journal
http://www.iteslj.org
Articles, research papers, lesson plans, teaching techniques, classroom handouts, teaching ideas and links.
Breaking news English
http://www.breakingnewsenglish.com
This site contains free English lessons based on current event or news stories written in simple English. Each story comes with free language activity handouts related to each of the stories (reading comprehension, listening gap fill exercises, multiple choice, spelling, putting the text back together, scrambled sentences, discussion and writing activities are included.)
About ESL
http://www.esl.about.com
This is a comprehensive website for both ESL students and teachers. It offers all levels lesson plans, learning and teaching strategies, language activities to practice all language skills as well as vocabulary, grammar and pronunciation practice. It also features short ESL videos students can watch to practice listening comprehension along with targeted grammar structures.
Boggles World ESL (Lanternfish)
http://www.bogglesworldesl.com
This site contains free printable teaching resources for language arts, ESL, EFL and TESOL. Click on “ESL for Adults” and five levels of ESL materials for adult ESL classes can be found. It contains resources such as: communicative activities, grammar-related worksheets, ESL games and much more. The worksheets are ready to be used with your students.
Voice of America Special English
http://www.voanews.com
This is a public radio program which features a section called “Special English”. This section contains a wealth of stories geared towards ESL/EFL students. The short sentences, limited vocabulary and slow pace of speaking make the stories easy to understand for ESL/EFL students. Another section called “Words and their Stories” present short stories related to idiomatic language used in every day American English. The selections not only lend themselves to providing listening and reading practice but engage students into lively discussions as well.
Using English
http://www.usingenglish.com
This site provides a large collection of free ESL tools and resources for students and teachers. It offers free downloadable ESL lesson plans for all levels along with handouts. Topics also cover reference to grammar structures, verb tenses, idioms and phrasal verbs, ESL forums and useful links on ESL/EFL information.
Interesting Things for ESL Students
http://www.manythings.org
This web site is for people studying English as a Second Language (ESL) or English as a Foreign Language (EFL). There are quizzes, word games, word puzzles, proverbs, slang expressions, anagrams, a random-sentence generator and other computer assisted language learning activities. Even though the primary focus is for ESL, native English speakers may also find some interesting things on this site.
Activities for ESL Students
http://www.a4esl.org
This project of The Internet TESL Journal (iteslj.org) has thousands of contributions by many teachers. It offers ESL/EFL students help in learning English through multi-level quizzes, tests, exercises and puzzles. It also has a link on ESL Podcasts and YouTube videos for students to study the language.
EL Civics for ESL Students
http://www.elcivics.com
This comprehensive English Language Civics site provides an easy way to learn about American history, geography, and culture. Lessons, worksheets, PowerPoint presentations, and videos are added to elcivics.com almost every week. It also features free “Lifeskill lessons” for students and teachers. These Lifeskill lessons teach key vocabulary words, phrases, and questions so students can successfully complete day-to-day tasks. These lessons are designed for beginning to intermediate ESL students. Each lifeskill theme contains downloadable multi-level story handouts to practice reading comprehension, vocabulary, writing, problem-solving and discussion. These activities can be assigned as computer lab tasks or taught verbally to the whole class.
EL Civics for ESL Students
http://www-tcall.tamu.edu/litresources/elcres.htm
TCALL is a Center of the College of Education and Human Development at Texas A&M University. Its purpose is to provide leadership and service to those meeting the literacy needs of adult learners and their families. It offers a wealth of literacy resources for ESL, Family Literacy and EL/Civics teachers. Check out the EL Civics link for useful resources.
Communicative ESL Board Games
http://www.esl-galaxy.com
The ESL board games on this site are ideal communicative English grammar, structure and vocabulary teaching materials. Teaching English grammar and structure to beginner, pre-intermediate and intermediate level students becomes great fun with these resources. These board games are downloadable and can be adapted by teachers to suit their students’ language needs. This website also features a section on teaching English through music. It contains music lyrics and worksheets to practice a specific grammar structure through music.
English Page – Grammar Practice
http://www.englishpage.com
This website provides students with tutorials on English grammar with full explanations, exercises and self correct quizzes related to a specific grammar structure. It also serves as a great resources and reference for ESL instructors.
English Club-Grammar Practice
http://www.englishclub.com
English Club is an ESL Learning Center for ESL students to help them learn English. It has useful online English lessons to learn or revise all aspects of English. Teachers, too, can find materials of use while teaching English.
Student English Practice though the web
http://www.englishbaby.com
Students learn English free with daily online English lessons. These ESL lessons help students study English slang, basic English, business English and have streaming audio to listen to natural conversations and videos.
ESL America
http://www.eslamerica.us/
This website has activities for beginning, intermediate and advanced ESL learners, all of which have an audio component. The pages are Reading, Grammar, Writing, Vocabulary, Life Skills, Pronunciation, Holidays, Pronunciation and Conversation.
