Teacher Resources
| The links on this page reflect the variety of terms used for learners of the English language. Some common ones include ESL, EAL, ELL, and ESOL.
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Journals and Magazines
- TESL-EJ. Teaching English as a Second Language Electronic Journal
- The Internet TESL Journal.
- Connect. National Newsletter for Technology and Adult Literacy.
- Language Learning and Technology Journal. An academic refereed journal sponsored by scholars from around the world.
- The Language Teacher On-Line. Contains excerpts from The Language Teacher, the monthly publication of the Japan Association for Language Teaching (Zenkoku Gogaku Kyoiku Gakkai).
- ESL Magazine. A bi-monthly print magazine, but has many practical articles online also.
Language References
- The Virtual Language Centre. A favourite stopping place for resource-assisted language learning, with many language tools (including a web concordancer), exercises, and study guides for students and teachers.
- A Web of On-line Dictionaries. This meta-site offers pointers to over 130 different on-line dictionaries, many of them bilingual (English and another language).
- The International Phonetic Alphabet. At the home site of the International Phonetic Association, you can find a full chart of the latest IPA symbols and sources for fonts.
- IPA Fonts for your computer (Windows and Mac) . Free download from SIL.
- Collins COBUILD Student Dictionary Online.
- VoyCabulary. Look up or translate words as you read web pages.
- American Sign Language Dictionary. Combines text and graphics to provide word definitions. Includes numbers 1-10 and full alphabet.
- alt.usage.english. Home page for a newsgroup dedicated to questions about the English language. Interesting archives on questions students frequently ask, word histories, etc.
- Project Gutenberg. A massive endeavor to make 10, 000 public domain works of literature and significant writings available for the world. Browse by author, title, subject.
- The Complete Works of Shakespeare. Searchable.
- The Linguist List. Home page for an Internet network for professional linguists. Many language resources here.
- "Welcome" in Many Languages. How to say "Welcome" and other courtesy phrases in over 325 languages.
- Sounds of English. Pictures, sounds, and videos to help learners and teachers of English with pronunciation.
- Dolch Word Lists. The 220 most frequently used words in the English language; a basis for early reading.
- General Service List. First published in 1953, this list of of 2,000 words was created to be the ideal beginning ESL vocabulary. Although it's somewhat out-of-date, many materials are still based on it and it's worth a look.
- Academic Word List. Developed by Averil Coxhead of Victoria University of Wellington, in New Zealand. It contains 570 words that occur frequently in academic texts.
- Academic Vocabulary. University of Nottingham. Tools and activities for both teacher and student to expand academic vocabulary using the Academic Word List.
- Web Vocabulary Profiler. Paste in a portion of text to analyse the word frequencies and lists that the words are found in. One of the useful tools from the Compleat Lexical Tutor website at University of Quebec.
- WordNet. Princeton University Cognitive Science Laboratory. An online lexical database that "organizes verbs, adverbs and adjectives into synonym sets, each representing one underlying lexical concept." Useful for advanced vocabulary study.
- Expanding Academic Vocabulary. Presentation at TESL Manitoba SAG Conference, 2005.
- Pragmatics: Speech Acts. Improving language learning through the teaching of speech acts. For teachers and advanced language learners, the site is designed to increase awareness of the sociocultural aspects of language, e.g., complaints, compliments, apologies, refusals and thanking.
- Citation Style Guides. How do you cite bibiliographic references in MLA, APA, or Taurabian style? How do you write gender-free language? This page from the University of Syracuse Library has links to all the answers.
Articles
- EAL Learners in ELA Classes. Powerpoint presentation.
- MA Dissertations in TESL, from the English Language Institute, University of Surrey.
- School Calendars Around the World. When do school terms start and finish? Information from over 50 countries, compiled for TESL-L by Thomas Robb.
- Myths and Misconceptions about Second Language Learning: What Every Teacher Needs to Unlearn. Research on second language learning has shown that there are many mistakes about how children learn second languages. Each of the five misconceptions is accompanied by a discussion of second language learning and its implications for classroom teachers.
- Mental Health and the Adult ESL Refugee: The Role of the ESL Teacher. ERIC Digest by Myrna Adkins and Barbara Sample.
- In the Classroom: A Toolkit for Effective Instruction of English Learners. (Pilot version) U.S. publication from the National Clearinghouse for English Language Instruction Educational Programs. An ongoing collection of tools and strategies, with examples, for working with diverse elementary and secondary learners. Also includes communicating with students in a diverse classroom and working with home and school.
- Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder:The Lived Experience of Immigrant, Refugee, and Visible Minority Women. A recent report of research for the Prairie Women's Health Centre of Excellence. PDF format.
- Practical Ideas on Alternative Assessment for ESL Students. ERIC Digest by Jo-Ellen Tannenbaum.
- Learners with Special Needs in British Columbia: Identification, Assessment, and Programming. Although specifically for the B.C. situation, this PDF document contains much useful information for educators wanting to advocate for their special needs ESL students.
- English Language Learners with Special Needs: Effective Instructional Strategies." ERIC Digest, A. Ortiz. A framework for meeting the needs of English language learners with learning disabilities.
- Language Learning Strategies: An Update. ERIC Digest by Rebecca Oxford.
- ESL Versus Mainstream Classes: Contrasting L2 Learning Environments. By Linda Harklau TESOL QUARTERLY Vol. 28, No. 2, Summer 1994
- Grammar and Its Teaching: Challenging the Myths. ERIC Digest by Diane Larsen-Freeman.
- Dialogue Journals: Interactive Writing to Develop Language and Literacy. ERIC Digest by Joy Peyton.
- Cultural Thinking and Discourse Organizational Patterns Influencing Writing Skills in a Chinese English-as-a-Foreign-Language (EFL) Learner. V. Gonzales, Chia-Yin Chen & C. Sanchez, 2001 (via Bilingual Research Journal).
- Content-Centered Language Learning. ERIC Digest by Joann Crandall.
- ESL: Science. Approaches suggested in the Victoria, Australia curriculum ESL support materials.
- ESOL/ELL Differentiation in Science. Based on the Maryland, U.S.A. curriculum, but many helpful ideas about accomodations, reading strategies, vocabulary strategies, and questioning techniques.
- Access and Engagement in Science. Support document from the U.K., with guidance for science teachers with EAL students in their classes.
- Support for inclusion in science classes. Practical strategies for students who need help with English, including EAL learners.
- Class Struggles: Public Education and the New Canadian."
A powerful series of articles from the Toronto Star, by Andrew Duffy, the result of year-long Atkinson Foundation Fellowship. Duffy examines the relationship between immigrants and the public school system.
- Establishing an Effective Newcomer Program.. ERIC Digest by D. Short and B. Boyson. Guidance on developing a newcomer program.
- What is TPR Storytelling? Total Physical Response Storytelling: A Communicative Approach to Language Learning, by V. Marsh. An innovative way to extend the strengths of TPR.
- Language Arts Through ESOL: A Guide for ESOL Teachers and Administrators. This document provides an overview of topics such as principles of language acquisition, instructional strategies, integrated language and content, teacher training, and assessment. From the Florida Department of Education.
- Transitions Into or Out of Poverty: Impact on immigrant and non-immigrant children's developmental behaviours. A Toronto study funded by Human Resources Canada.
- Working with ESL Parents. From the Tasmania, Australia school system, this page discusses the interactions of home and school.
- Home and School Communication. From the British Columbia Teachers' Federation, the page contains a sample brochure for ESL parents, translated into fourteen languages.
Testing and Study Skills
- TOEFL. Information about the Test of English as a Foreign Language, from the Educational Testing Service. Important news about the change to computer-based testing. Tutorials, sample questions, and study materials are also available.
- TOEIC Preparation. Okanagan University College offers a set of on-line exercises for students preparing for the Test of English for International Communication. Requires the Shockwave plug-in (available through the site).
- CanTEST. Information from the University of Manitoba's English Language Institute. Further information from the University of Ottawa on test format and marking.
- Handbook of English Language Proficiency Tests. Detailed descriptions of five standardized tests commonly used with K-12 students. Does not include CELT or SLEP.
- "Language Testing" on the WWW. References, articles, descriptions, discussions of many aspects of testing. Includes many related links.
- Puzzlemaker. A site that allows you to create puzzles and games that can be printed out.
- Self-Study Quizzes Online. Over 1,000 learning activities from Internet TESL Journal, created by teachers.
- Activities for ESL Students. Also over 1, 000 quizzes and activities for English language learning, including some bilingual ones.
- Study Guides and Strategies. For testing, reading, writing and classroom participation. Translated into several languages.
Ideas and Plans
- ESL Ideas Page. A place where students and teachers can share ideas about how to learn/teach English.
- TESL Lesson Plans. A collection of practical and interesting ideas for Grade 7 through adult classes. Maintained by the Internet TESL Journal.
- Lifelong Learning Online. Interactive curriculum lessons focused on functional literacy skills, geared towards the adult learner. Themes include family, community, and work.
- ESL Lesson Plans. Extensive collection of sample lesson plans for adult ESL (from OTAN).
- EFL4U.com. Weekly free lesson worksheets and teacher's instructions.
- One World, One People. John Korber's collection of lesson plans that blend the basics with creative language production.
- Randall's Cyber Listening Lab. Short listening exercises, long conversations, videos, with comprehension exercises. Uses Real Audio and Real Video. Great.
- Snapshot Archive. From the New York Times, this excellent collection of photos is accompanied by lessons designed for younger students, but very adaptable for ESL of all ages.
- English-to-Go. A commercial site, but as a guest or with the free limited membership, you can still access a new free warm-up, lesson plan, or grammar tip each week. Lessons are based on Reuters news items.
- EFL/ESL Games. Need something to liven up that class? This site offers a variety of sample "edutainment" games from the author's book.
- English Zone. A fun place for teachers and students. Study aids, games, references, humour, and more.
- ESL Partyland. Another source for students and teachers with quizzes, lesson plans, conversation starters, discussion forums (unmoderated).
- Business English. Edited by Linda Thalman.
- The WWW as a Project for Collaboration. By Douglas Mills, for a TESOL presentation.
- ESL Plans. Excellent resource.
Specifically CALL (Computer Assisted Language Learning)
- Books for Teaching Languages Using the Internet. An up-to-date bibliography by Linda Thalman.
- TESOL CALL-IS Software List. New! A review of software, publishers for ESL. Before you buy anything, check this list.
- WWW Activities That Work (And Why!). New! Notes from a presentation at the 1996 TESOL Conference. Ideal for teachers who are wondering how to use the WWW effectively with ESL students. Background, implementation and activities.
- Teaching with the Web. This is a compilation of ideas for using WWW resources as a teaching tool as well as other links to sites that have pedogogical information. By Lauren Rosen.
- Computers and More: Creative Uses of Technology for Learning a Second or Foreign Language. Scholarly article by Rebecca Oxford and others. Interesting section on technology and learning styles.
- Data-Driven Learning. A thought-provoking article by Gregory Hadley about new approaches to language pedagogy made possible by computer resources.
- Internet Options in the Classroom. What can you do with one computer?
- OWLs and ESL Students. A review of on-line writing labs which have resources for ESL students. By Suzan Moody.
- Linguistics Funland TESL. A wonderful collection of resources for in-class use, journals, papers, MUDS, MOOs and more.
- CAELL Journal: A Place to Start in Selecting Software. An article by Deborah Healey and Norman Johnson. From TESOL '98, CALL on a Shoestring.
- ESL software. Shareware and freeware, from Martin Holmes, University of Victoria. Includes cloze programs and The Evil Landlady Action Maze.
- Agora Language Marketplace. Information and resources for language professionals. An index of on-line companies offering language-related publications, products and services. Also, read the monthly Agora Newsletter , featuring a calendar of language events, articles, and product and publications reviews.
- The Virtual CALL Library. A central point of access to language software across the Internet. Many English shareware programs and other language programs that could be used with English are available for downloading. Most files come in ZIP format.
- Athelstan Publications. A source for software and books related to CALL.
- Concordancing with Language Learners: Why? Where? What?. By Vance Stevens.
- Articles on technology and language learning. Over 1300 references from Michael Barlow and Athelstan.
- CALL in the Year 2000: Still in Search of Research Paradigms. By C. Chapelle.
Literacy
- National Adult Literacy Database (NALD). An excellent Canadian resource. Covers what's happening across the country--initiatives, materials, funding, organizations.
- Canadian Language Benchmarks 2000: ESL for Literacy Learners. This PDF document "lays out the progression of reading, writing and numeracy skills for ESL adults who have little or no literacy skills in their first language. The ESL Literacy Benchmarks are designed to be used with the Listening and Speaking ESL for Adults Benchmarks."
- National Institute for Literacy (NIFL). (U.S.) Information about adult literacy and adult basic education, incuding ESL literacy.
- Reader's Digest Canada. Online highlights of this popular magazine.
- The BVC Learning Web. Designed for people with developmental disabilities, this site hopes to provide "interesting, stimulating, and practical lessons in basic literacy."
- Reading in a Second Language: What Every Teacher Needs to Know. An online module by Dr. Jill Mora, San Diego State University. This slide show summarizes research on the development of second language literacy, with an emphasis on yong bilingual learners . Accompanied by links to other ESL literacy resources.
- English is Soup. A phonics resource for ESL literacy adults.
- Speach Teach. Designed to support children with speech and learning difficulties, this site also supports literacy learners with its downloadable clipart, worksheets, flashcards, and other learning resources
- Readability Test for Written Materials. A quick summary of two of the widely-used readability tests (not ESL).
- The Children's Literature WWW Page. Excellent collection from University of Calgary.
- AAA Math. Hundreds of pages of basic math skills. Excellent for ESL numeracy.
- Basic Math for ESL Students. A step beyond AAA Math.
- Math Glossary. For students learning Basic Math.
- Glossary of Mathematical Terms and Concepts for ESL Students. Available in English, French, and Spanish.
News
- CBC News.
- CBC Latest News for Kids. Indepth stories, interviews, links, quiz--suitable for older learners too.
- National Post Online and The Globe and Mail. Canada's two national daily papers.
- CNN Interactive News. A good source for current text. Updated frequently, of course.
- Newspapers in Education for EFL and ESL Learners and Teachers, from the Bangkok Post. Excellent teaching ideas.
- The New York Times Learning Network. Although designed for American students in grades 3-12, many of the activities are very adaptable for intermediate-level and up ESL students.
- Western/Pacific Literacy Network/CNN SF Learning Resources. Again, despite some U.S. emphasis, this site contains good hman interest articles at two reading levels, accompanied by audio and video clips, and interactive comprehension activities.
- Time Inc. News Portal. Links to a number of magazines published by Time Inc.
Government
- A Newcomer's Introduction to Canada. A government guide to settlement in Canada--environment, employment, rights and responsibilities, society.
- A Look at Canada. Citizenship and Immigration Canada's book for newcomers. Includes sample questions for the Citizenship test.
- Attractions Canada. Discover Canada through its seasonal activities, festivals, and recreational tourism.
- Integration Net. News, information, and research on settlement in Canada.
- Foreign Embassies in Canada. Contact information.
- The World Factbook 2001. Information from the CIA.
Organizations
- TESL Canada
- TESL Manitoba
- TESL Ontario
- TESOL. The web site of Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages, Inc., an international association dedicated to the effective teaching of English worldwide.
- TEAL (B.C.)
- SCENES (Saskatchewan)
- ATESL (Alberta)
- CALICO. An international clearinghouse and leader in computer-assisted learning and instruction, oriented toward, although not exclusively, language learning.
- ERIC: Education Resources Education CenterSearch the database for bibliographic citations and full-text articles in education.
Penpals
- SL-Lists: International Student E-Mail Discussion Lists, for college, university and adult students. There are currently ten interest areas included.
- ESL CAFE's E-Mail Connections for Students. Part of Dave Sperling's remarkable ESL CAFE on the Web, but the entries are not moderated, so join at your own risk.
- ePALS. Established in 1996, this site brings together teachers, students, and classrooms throughout the world for intercultural exchange. Several communication tools, including "student-safe" web-based email and discussion forums, are available here.
- Intercultural E-Mail Classroom Connections. The IECC (Intercultural E-Mail Classroom Connections) mailing lists are provided by St. Olaf College as a free service to help teachers and classes link with partners in other countries and cultures for e-mail classroom pen-pal and project exchanges.
- Email Projects Homepage. Links adult learners in community and non-credit programs around the world. A fascinating showcase for their work.
- E-Mail for ESL/LINC Students. A presentation by Claire Bradin at the 1998 TESL Ontario Conference. Very clear and useful.
Resources: Odds and ends and a few quirks
- Canadiana. The Canadian resource page. News, travel, weather, government, history, culture, sports, etc.
- The Olympics. An excellent collection of resources from CASLT for the 2002 Olympic Games.
- The Kiersey Temperament Sorter. What is your personality type?
- Learn2.com. The source for useful information about important procedures and just-for-fun. Good lesson resource.
- How Stuff Works. Another site full of how everything works.
- Common Proverbs. Over 230 of them, from Charles Kelly and Lawrence Kelly.
- Currency Converter. Check the conversion rates for over 180 currencies from 250 geographical locations.
- Cultural Profiles Project. An overview of life and customs in over 100 countries.
- Multi-cultural resources for people working with Early Years children.
- Kids Domain Holidays. Updated 1-2 months before each holiday, this site has many ideas that can be adapted for ESL.
- Internet Movie Database. Movie synopses, star biographies, behind-the-scenes, and more.
- Aurora Borealis. Ever try to explain the Northern Lights to someone who hasn't seen them? The beautiful pictures on this site will help.
- ESL/EFL Job Search. A non-commercial site with tips and suggested resources for finding English language teaching jobs. By Tom Riedmiller.
- Web Construction Tools. You've decided you or your students need to make a web page. This will get you started. Lots of sources for images.
- Making Text Legible. Lighthouse International gives guidelines on designing for people with partial sight.
Great Link Collections (Much more comprehensive than this one!)
- Dave Sperling's ESL Links for Teachers. The best! Links to over 150 places! Add your own links!
- English as a Second Language An excellent starting point for ESL learners who want to learn English through the Web. Many useful links.
- Online Materials for Language Teachers. A must. By E.L. Easton, who probably never sleeps.
- ESL Lesson Plans and Resources. By Prof. Marty Levine of California State University, this collection includes some valuable, but less commonly cited resources, including Reader's Theater and folktales.
- ESLoop. Follow the loop for choice ESL sites.