Free Sites for Teaching and

Development.
Contents
Your Own Personal Development.............2
News and Information................................3
Project Work.................................................4
Improving Your Vocabulary........................5
Material for the classroom.........................5
Pronunciation and Listening Activities.. . .6
Recommendations for Self Study.............7
Games...........................................................8
Video..............................................................8

Your Own Personal

Development.
www.teachertrainingvideos.com
Created so that the most technology phobic teacher can
incorporate modern methods into their teaching.
Russell Stannard gives simple instructions via video on
how to use different sites. I have learnt
how to use itunes to get podcasts.
how to make wikis.
how to make really fast language worksheets.
how to use fun internet sites
Some of the information has been incorporated into this
worksheet.
www.teachers.tv
Teachers TV is the digital channel for everyone who works
in schools. Programmes cover every subject in the
curriculum, all key stages and every professional role
from teaching assistant to headteacher. You can watch on
digital cable and satellite and programmes are also
available anytime, on-demand and for free on this
website.
There are 15-minute continuing professional development
lessons packed with useful information, exciting pupil
programmes for use in class, and a daily education news
summary. There are ongoing series such as Teaching with
Bayley and Inspirations and award-winning
documentaries on everything from global citizenship to
education practice in other countries.
Regular specialist hours cater to new teachers, governors
and other specialist audiences, and core curriculum hours
cover primary and secondary maths, English, science and
ICT. Themed seasons such as Behaviour Matters and
Lessons from America showcase a range of programmes

focusing on a central issue or topic. And all that's just for

starters!
http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/
This site brings together everything busy English language
teachers need for the classroom and the staff room lesson plans and worksheets, teaching tips, web links,
teaching articles and lots of information about professional
development - training, conferences and qualifications.

http://www.britishcouncil.org/eltecs
ELTECS stands for English Language Teaching
Contacts Scheme. It is free to join and you receive a
weekly email full of ideas, internet links and information
from other English teachers all over the world. At the
moment there are over 15,000 ELT practitioners signed up
to this site.
http://www.guardianweekly.co.uk/
You can sign up to become a worldwide member of this
international newspaper. There is a whole forum (question
and answer section) on teaching and learning English
around the world.
www.pbwiki.com
Wikis are sites where the whole group of invited people
can write articles, post pictures, videos and links. This is
great for creating a no-hassle way to showcase and
correct students work online. Wikis increase student
engagement and are all about collaboration. This site is
especially easy to use and is focused on educational
needs.

News and Information.

3

www.bbc.co.uk
This has everything and is the most visited site in the UK.
Do you want to check out the weather in Oxford?
Do you want to check out local news?
Do you want to catch the latest headlines?
Do you want to look at recipes for meals, which will be
ready in less than 5 minutes?
Well now you can!

www.guardian.co.uk
One of the most resourceful newspaper sites on the web.
You can read film and book reviews and after you have
registered you can even post your own comments.

Project Work.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/country_profiles/
Full profiles provide an instant guide to history, politics
and economic background of countries and territories, and
background on key institutions. They also include audio or
video clips from BBC archives.
The information is easy to gather, wonderful for sharing
and good for projects; plus it is easy and quick to use.
www.biography.com
Browse and search for information on famous people
around the world. There is a born on this day link as well
as videos and interviews.
http://www.learnenglish.org.uk/
Here you can find all the resources from the British
Council. There are links to many sites with a focus on
projects and group work.
http://www.woodlands-junior.kent.sch.uk/

"The most visited school website in the country"

TES February 2007 (The Times Educational Supplement.)
This site has award-winning material on life in Britain.
Although it is written by British children between the ages
of 7 and 11 it is perfect for all second language learners as
it is informative, clear and interesting. Much of the content
is aimed at overseas visitors, and there are some 1,500
pages on British life and culture glimpsed "through the
eyes of their students"

Improving Your Vocabulary

http://www.macmillandictionaries.com/home.htm
This site keeps you up to date with new words entering
the language with a daily word of the week. There are
vocabulary activities with key words as well as dictation
exercises and other listening activities.
http://www.wordspy.com/
This Web site is devoted to lexpionage, investigating new
words and phrases. These are new terms that have
appeared multiple times in newspapers, magazines,
books, Web sites, and other recorded sources. They even
give you the top 100 words of the month.

Material for the classroom.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/learning/subjects/english.shtml
This site has a plethora of wonderful resources for
teaching.
There are links to the British council sites, advice on
teaching and even 60-second summaries of Shakespeares
plays.

www.onestopenglish.com
Some of the content on onestopenglish is available for
free. This includes lesson plans, worksheets, news articles
and professional support .

www.english-4U.com
Ready-to-use ESL lesson plans for teaching adult learners

designed for one-to-one and group classes

focused on developing speaking skills
based on current news stories and hit songs
easily integrated with coursebook material
available 24 hours a day, wherever you are

developed by teachers for teachers

www.breakingnewsenglish.com
A massive amount of teaching materials based around up
to date news articles. There are thousands of articles with
listening, pre-reading, reading and post-reading tasks. In
fact there is so much material you will have to select what
you want and paste it into a worddocument!
http://school.discoveryeducation.com
No login is necessary for this teaching tools site. You can
create a variety of activities for your students including
matching activities, gap fills and spelling games.

Pronunciation and Listening

Activities.
6

http://cambridgeenglishonline.com/Phonetics_Focus/
This has been voted by ELTECS members as the best free
pronunciation site. There are many fun activities for
students to recognise phonemes, as well as listening and
recording difficult sounds. You can even design your own
personal flashcards.
www.eslpod.com
This is a listening haven. Free listening materials can be
downloaded and the site is easily accessible. Learning
guides with transcripts and worksheets have to be paid
for. There are a variety of lessons all from the USA.
www.esl-lab.com
This is an ESL cyber lab organised into levels and different
accents from the English speaking world. It is well
organised with pre-listening, listening and post-listening
exercises and scripts are free too. Unfortunately the
listening exercises are not that authentic.
http://www.tuneintoenglish.com/
This site connects to a youtube video of songs with a lot of
free downloadable worksheets for classroom use.

Recommendations for Self

Study.
www.eflnet.com
A very well-organised site which students can work on
alone. There are error correction quizzes, phrasal verb
activities and a wide variety of grammar and vocabulary
games.
www.uefap.com

This is dedicated to students in higher education who are

using English for academic purposes. It is a guide for
students on all the skills areas. It has clear, well
presented examples and advice, hence a useful tool for
self study; especially in the reading and writing sections.

Games
www.free-english-games.com
These are entertaining games for younger children. Sign
up using your email address and everything is free.
www.learn-english-today.com/wordgames
Here you can improve, develop, learn and check your
English all through games. Everything is organised and
easy to access. There are different activities with a level
of difficulty. Quick and good to use but unfortunately not
all of the activities are that interesting.

Video
www.videojug.com

A superb, easy to access site based around a series of

videos. You search for the topic you are interested in,
such as travel or cooking, and you will find short, simple to
follow videos with clear information and advice.
For example today I found out
How to prepare shrimps
How to sharpen your knives
How to manage student debt
www.teflclips.com
This site is dedicated to the possibilities for YouTube and
other video sharing sites in the classroom. Every week a
new lesson plan will be uploaded.