Internet Resources For Teachers & Students

These educational Web sites were featured in our workshop: Keys to Success in ESL.

Silly Books Kids can read other kids' stories and submit their own

Mighty Book Interactive books, games, puzzles, and songs

Star Fall Leveled literacy site from ABC's and emergent readers to multicultural books

Storyline Online Children's books read aloud by members of the Screen Actors' Guild accompanied by activities and lesson ideas

Sites for Middle and High School Students

History Matters This site contains a huge database of free primary source documents from US and world history reflecting the lives of ordinary people. It also has resources for teachers including lesson ideas, syllabi for history units, and guides to analyzing historical evidence.

National Geographic Stunning multimedia research tool

Randall's ESL Cyber Listening Lab Hundreds of leveled listening activities and quizzes allow students to practice their listening comprehension skills independently with a wide range of topics that appeal to teens and young adults

Many Things for ESL Students Practice vocabulary, grammar, and sentence structure through interactive games

PBS History Detectives A site with lessons supported by multimedia presentations all about researching family history and artifacts designed for secondary students

Hippo Campus Instructional videos related to high school content areas arranged by subject

Foreign Language News and Newspapers A database of news sources in eight languages. Nice for students who can't yet read an English newspaper but who want to keep up with current events.

Jefferson Lab A comprehensible site that brings high school science content to life, including a student zone, teacher resources, and science puzzles and games

Phonetics Flash Animation Project Students can see and hear how sounds in English are formed

Professional Sites for Teachers

Colorin Colorado A bilingual site for families and educators ELLs with free printable resources

Center on Instruction: English Language Learners This site provides free research-based materials and resources to improve instruction and intervention for Ells.

AdLit The sister site to Colorin Colorado especially for teachers and parents of adolescents who struggle with literacy. This link takes you directly to the section about ELLs.

NABE A national professional organization for educational research and programs for ELLs

NCELA US Department of Education site dedicated to English Language Learners

Everything ESL Stay up-to-date on what's happening in our field through professional articles and more

Internet TESOL Journal A variety of professional resources for ESL teachers

Classroom Resource Sites for Teachers

Dave's ESL Cafe An extensive site with online teacher forums, ideas for using the Internet to teach ESL, links and job postings.

Jan Brett Run by the famous children's author who wrote "The Mitten," this site has free charmingly illustrated and printable classroom materials for elementary grades, including masks for reader's theater.

ESL Partyland A site packed with ideas and resources for teaching ESL through music.

ESL Gold An extensive site with useful ESL resources for secondary teachers and students.

Sounds of English Find a range of creative ideas and printable resources for practicing pronunciation with your students.

Englishpage A useful site for secondary teachers that focuses mostly on grammar but has a nice listening lab for advanced learners.

Edhelper A popular site for teachers. There are still no ESOL-specific materials offered here but many of their offerings can be modified to meet Ells' needs.

Discovery Education Tools for making your own word puzzles, free classroom clip art and links to other educational sites.

Enchanted Learning A site of bilingual visual resources and printable’s arranged by subject.

Epals online classroom exchange Set up safe online correspondence between your students and students from around the US and the world.

Ethemes A large database of content-rich, age appropriate resources organized by themes.

Tools for Reading, Writing, and Thinking Printable graphic organizers and valuable resources put out by Greece CSD.

Circle of Stories Lesson plans around the theme of storytelling and sharing of cultural heritage with real Native American stories.

PBS Teachers Quality standards-based materials and interactive student activities arranged by content area with sections devoted to ELLs.

One World Mural Activities for all grade levels around the theme of world peace and unity. Check out the section about how multicultural heritages have shaped American English.

Wake Up World Students learn about a day in the life of four children from around the world. A great lead-in to making their own projects!

Global Art Project People of all ages are invited to trance their hand, write their name, country of origin, and a wish for world peace in their native language, and send it in to become part of an international art exhibition! A great project for any ESL class or as part of a peace curriculum.

Cultural and Refugee Information Sites

BRYCS This site offers cultural information on refugee groups in the US, bilingual resources for refugee families, and resources for teachers working with refugee children.

Center for Applied Linguistics Find extensive cultural information for many linguistic and cultural backgrounds. A list of free full-length printable publications is on the right hand side of the screen and is worth browsing!

Culturally Responsive Resources This site gives a glimpse of the kinds of issues faced by refugee families in the US. It also has Bilingual information to share with families. While aimed at social workers, the site is informative for teachers who want to deepen their understanding of  thier refugee population.

The Spring Institute for Intercultural Learning This Colorado-based organization offers an impressive list of free online publications for English Language Teachers focusing on refugee ELLs.

BGCenter This website offers valuable resources and contacts for parents and teachers of internationally adopted children.

Bilingual Typing Tools Use a standard keyboard to transcribe the phonetic spelling of foreign words into another writing system, which can then be cut and pasted into a word document or email. Great for kids who are fluent in their L1 and want to word process in their own language! Please note: These are NOT language translation programs! Knowledge of the target language is required to use them.

Arabic * Use this site also for: Urdu, Hebrew, Greek (links for these languages are on the upper left when you open the page) 

Cyrillic (Russian, Ukrainian)

Hindi  *Use this site also for: Bengali, Gujarati, Kannada, Malay, Punjabi, Telugu, Tamil (links for these languages are on the right when you open the page)

Vietnamese (Requires a download)

Thai