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                                                 Internet Resources

Please check out the latest addition-Word Practice: ESL Grammar Games-suggested by Katheryne Hylton. You can find this in the "Skills: Grammar and Vocabulary" section below.

General EFL/ESL Resources


Lesson Plan Repositories
         https://word.tips/word-practice-esl-grammar-games/

Skills: Grammar and Vocabulary


Skills: Listening and Speaking


Skills: Reading

  • CNN News FYI for Teachers
    http://fyi.cnn.com/fyi/teachers/
    Activities of all kinds based on news articles.
    If you'd like articles on culture topics, also see:
    Wired
    http://www.wired.com/news/culture
  • Comenius
    http://www.comenius.com/
    Fables and idioms activities for English learners.
  • English Club: Reading
    http://www.englishclub.net/reading/index.htm
    Reading activities for ESL and EFL learners, including: Classics, Short Stories, Jokes and Proverbs.
  • International Reading Association
    http://www.reading.org/positions/
    As an advocate of excellence in the teaching of reading, the International Reading Association participates actively in the process of shaping sound public policy in education. Research-based positions on critical issues are disseminated through a series of policy statements, resolutions, and other publications.
    For more information on reading in an ESOL context, see:
    I-TESL-J, Reading
    http://www.aitech.ac.jp/~iteslj/links/ESL/Reading/
    Articles and lesson plans for teaching Reading from educators worldwide.
  • Learning Network
    http://www.literacynet.org/cnnsf/
    The Western-Pacific Literacy Network offers web-delivered instruction using current and past CNN San Francisco bureau news stories. Though the intended audience is adults, instructors and learners (of all ages) are encouraged to use this material to promote better literacy. Each module includes the full text of each story and interactive activities to test comprehension. The learner can choose to read the text, listen to the text, and view a short video clip of the story. Each module is designed for ease of use so the learner can use it independently. The instructor can also incorporate any story into class activities and lesson plans.
  • The Maze
    http://archives.obs-us.com/obs/english/books/holt/books/maze/index.html
    A "branching" story that lets you choose your direction as you read.
    For more on action mazes, see Martin Holmes'
    Quandary Materials
    http://www.halfbakedsoftware.com/
    Action mazes can be used for many purposes, including problem-solving, diagnosis, procedural training, and surveys/questionnaires.
  • Project Gutenberg
    http://promo.net/pg/index.cgi
    A large repository of texts in the public domain.
    If you like this sort of resource, also see:
    Online Books
    http://digital.library.upenn.edu/books/
  • This Day in History
    http://www.historychannel.com/thisday/
    A daily look at events from history. Often euro-centric, this can make a nice springboard for researching alternative points of view and parallel events.
  • Travelers' Tales
    http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/traveltales.html
    A collection of folktales.
    For more on folktales, also see:
    iEARN Folktale Project
    http://www.nsc.ru/folk/

Skills: Reading, Genre, Mystery Stories

  • Candlelight Stories
    http://www.candlelightstories.com/
    Check out "Online Storybooks" in the free section of this web site.
  • Directory: Google's Mystery Stories
    http://directory.google.com/Top/Arts/Online_Writing/Fiction/Genres/Mystery/Short_Stories/
    An online directory of mystery stories from Google. For another directory, see:
    Directory: Yahoo's Online Stories
    http://www.yahooligans.com/school_bell/language_arts/Online_Stories/
    This is a directory with links to collections of Folk and Fairy Tales, Ghost Stories, Holiday Stories and Interactive Stories, with younger audiences in mind. Some sound files also available.
  • Holiday to Murder, An Online Novella
    http://www.hopcott.freeserve.co.uk/holiday-murder/chapter01/
    One of Rob Hopcott's murder mystery stories is published at this web site as a free short online novel (novella) featuring the popular character Alice.
    Also see this site for ghost stories:
    The Moonlit Road
    Listening files also available.
  • MysteryNet.com
    http://www.MysteryNet.com/
    Online mysteries, information about famous authors such as Agatha Christie, Clue-A-Day game for solving a crime, and much more. It's great fun! Also see MysteryNet for Kids at     http://kids.mysterynet.com/.
  • Mystery Short Fiction
    http://users.ev1.net/~homeville/msf/0start.htm
    Mystery Short Fiction is a work in progress. The goal is to list all mystery short fiction published in English since 1990. There are books and magazine issues that haven't been tracked down yet, and new ones appear every month.
  • Ongoing Tales Mystery E-Magazine
    http://www.ongoing-tales.com/SERIALS/mystery/
    Mystery stories in serial format. A detailed Table of Contents is available at     http://www.ongoing-tales.com/contents.html.
  • UptownCity's Online Mysteries
    http://uptowncity.com/mystry/storys/Myst1.htm
    Short mysteries in simple English. You can email them to guess or get the ending!
  • Web Companion to Agatha Christie
    http://www.nd.edu/~rwoodbur/christie/christie.htm
    A complete listing of novels and publication dates in which it gives the information for each novel:
    *A complete list of major and minor characters.
    * A brief synopsis of the plot.
    * Spoiler (for those who want to know "whodunit" and how).

Skills: Writing

  • State of Writing A wonderful list of many links for English as well as other languages
  • 28 Boring Words and What to Use Instead A vocab/writing thought provoker
  • IECC
    http://www.iecc.org/
    IECC is a free teaching.com service to help teachers link with partners in other cultures and countries for email classroom pen-pal and other project exchanges.
    For another keypal service, see:
    Mighty Media Keypals
    http://www.teaching.com/keypals/
    This site is easy to use as the student, when registering, chooses a number of qualities s/he would like to find in their key pals. Students can also choose the country from which they would like to have their key pals if they want to get information about specific countries. They can also specify a fixed range to age to deal with as well as if they would prefer males, females or both.
  • I-TESL-J, Writing
    http://www.aitech.ac.jp/~iteslj/links/ESL/Writing/
    Articles and lesson plans from English language educators around the world on the topic of writing.
  • National Council for Teachers of English (NCTE) Research Reports
    http://www.ncte.org/
    Many reports on the integration of various computer-based tools and resources in writing and reading-related activities. Adobe Acrobat Reader is required to open these PDF reports.
  • http://bid4papers.com/blog/spelling-grammar-punctuation-mistakes/  A useful cheatsheet for some of the most important spelling, grammar and punctuation rules. (Thanks, Keira!)
  • For some OWL resources, see:
    Writing Help, HUT
    http://www.ruthvilmi.net/hut/LangHelp/Writing/
    Help resources for teaching academic writing from Ruth Vilmi.
    Writing Help, Wooster
    http://www.wooster.edu/writingctr/help.html
    Composition and grammar advice, for example: MLA and APA documentation, punctuation, plagiarism, thesis statement, etc.)
  • PIZZAZ, Creative Writing Activities
    http://www.uoregon.edu/~leslieob/pizzaz.html
    A web site for educators with ideas and step-by-step instructions for incorporating creative writing ideas in the English classroom.
  • Punctuation Made Simple
    http://www.cas.usf.edu/JAC/pms/index.html
    A small, simple site with some rules and examples for problematic forms of English punctuation.
  • Researchpaper.com
    http://www.researchpaper.com/
    A collection of topics, ideas, and assistance for school related research and writing projects.
  • Student Lists
    http://www.latrobe.edu.au/education/sl/sl.html
    The Student Lists were established in February 1994 to provide an email forum for cross-cultural discussion and writing practice for college, university and adult students in English language programs around the world. There are currently ten student lists.
  • Writing Techniques Handbook, UIUC
    http://www.english.uiuc.edu/cws/wworkshop/
    Practical writing advice plus genre-specific information on:
    Tips on Taking an Essay Exam Writing About Film
    Writing Abstracts
    Writing About Poetry
    Writing Cover Letters
    Writing a Literature Paper
    Writing a Thesis for a Literature Paper
    Writing a Philosophy Paper
    Writing Personal Statements
    Writing Resumes
    Writing Proposals
    Writing Standardized Essay Exams
    For another resource specifically on essay writing, see:
    English Channel
    http://www.hio.ft.hanze.nl/thar/essay.htm
    A guide for academic writing, giving clearly cut definitions of what essay, thesis, report is, dealing with pre-planning, gathering material, structuring, , making paragraphs, writing introduction and conclusions and other essential things, which are followed by exercises aimed at consolidating the material.

Web Quests

  • Web Projects, Quests and More
    https://www.tomsnyder.com/profdev/web_projects.asp
    A great collection of web sites with accompanying projects and tasks.
  • Multiverse: Web Quests, Science and the World
    http://www.ardecol.ac-grenoble.fr/english/multiverse-science.htm
    From Dafne Gonzalez. She especially likes the science quests.
  • WebQuest Page at San Diego State University
    http://webquest.sdsu.edu/webquest.html
    Start with the Overview and FAQ link. Then, visit training materials and Examples.
    Also see:
    Why WebQuests?
    http://www.ozline.com/webquests/intro.html
  • WebQuests from Discovery
    http://school.discovery.com/schrockguide/webquest/webquest.html
    More examples of webquests. See, in particular, the template link for webquests.
    You can find another very simple template for offline or online use at
    Tech-Niques
    http://darkwing.uoregon.edu/~leslieob/templatetogotodo.html
WebQuests from Spartanburg
http://www.spa3.k12.sc.us/WebQuests.html
Examples of webquests for elementary and secondary aged students.
Additional examples for ESL/EFL are available:
International AIDS Awareness Day
http://darkwing.uoregon.edu/~leslieob/CALL9.html
U.S. Thanksgiving, Sites to be Thankful For
http://darkwing.uoregon.edu/~leslieob/RW5Thanksgiving.html