Get inspired and creative with these amazing resources!
Are you an English teacher looking for new ideas and resources? Do you wish to enhance your teaching knowledge and improve your style?
For you I have put together a list of amazing online ESL resources for teachers. Links to articles and materials that are free, inspiring and useful. Feel free to contribute and share! Happy teaching!
Teacher Training and Further Development
Links to blogs, articles, videos and webinars
Free Cambridge Course on becoming an ESL Teacher: Free 6 week course from FutureLearn, starting at different times throughout the year. Learn what it means to be a TEFL or English Language Teacher, and start preparing for your first teaching job.
https://www.iatefl.org/: 26 inspiring talks from IATEFL
Cambridge Webinars: here’s the schedule for Cambridge’s free webinars for teachers
Giving Feedback: Great Article with 5 tips on giving productive feedback to students by motivating them at the same time!
Reflections on Teaching and Learning – Blog: Great Blog by Lizzie Pinard on Teaching, research, Delta, material development, etc.
Copyright: What exceptions are there for teaching materials? What do you need to know about licenses and copyright?
Resources for English Educators from University of Maryville: Advice on where to teach ESL, requirements, Resources for ESL Teachers, etc.
Free Webinars from Cambridge English: webinars on youtube on all topics relevant to English teachers
BBC Teaching Skills: Plenty of hands on advice for different “how to teach…?” topics
ESL Lesson Plans: Lesson Plans, developing skills, activities, etc. Very comprehensive collection from yourdictionary
Resources for the Digital Teacher
Resources for Teaching Online
https://thedigitalteacher.com: lots of links and infos on the digital classroom
Planning online lessons: 19 successful online teachers share their tips and resources for planning online lessons
Tools for the Digital Teacher
Platforms, software and apps for Teaching Online
Skype: my preferred platform for video and web conferencing, especially for 1-1 lessons. Skype is the only platform where the chat history gets saved and you can edit chat messages. Extremely useful if you’ve made a spelling mistake or want to add some extra information to a message at a later point in time. And it’s free!
Zoom: platform for video and web conferencing, the basic plan is free
Miro: simple whiteboarding platform for cross-functional team collaboration, free basic plan
General Teaching Materials
Materials that can be used in the classroom or for online teaching
cambridgeenglish.org/teaching-
Cambridge Free Lesson Plans: celebrating 5 years of official exam preparation materials
Applied Linguistics: 10 Guidelines for Pronunciation Teaching
Perfect English Grammar: a website that clearly explains all tenses and their use including some exercises and additional “premium” material
ESL Games: a website dedicated to ESL online games for all ages and levels
All things Grammar: 1000+ quality worksheets from A-Z, printable
Tefltastic Blog: Everything on Tefl by Alex Case: worksheets, teaching tips, specialised vocabulary, articles, etc
We are Teachers: 30 free resources not only for ESL teachers. Materials for young learners in a school environment, guided reading, science, creative arts,….
Tools: English tools range from simple tools that can alphabetize your sentences or generate word searches to worksheet creators. Most of the tools have lots of options for customization, as well as different fonts and colors. Moreover, all tools are designed to be user-friendly and offer major text input range (i.e. high character limit). Try them out!
Breaking News English: Current news including readings, listenings, activities, games, vocab. There are 2 new lessons every week.