Resources
On this page we have collected some of our favourite
websites. While this isn't a big collection of links, we believe that
what lacks in quantity, we compensate for in quality. Busy teachers and
teacher trainers on our staff use each of these sites regularly. With
such a huge amount of stuff on the internet for English teachers, we
have also included a brief description of each site and why we like it.
Our tutors and graduates have also published articles
and lessons in various magazines and on the web. In fact, some of them
are so active that it's hard to keep up.
OxfordTEFL Tutors and Graduates
on the web
Great sites for General English
teachers
Job sites for English teachers
For Business English teachers
Language Teaching Methodology
Reference (good for making your
own materials)
Organisations
Teachers travelling around
For teachers and students
Spanish Schools
Sites of General interest
www.onestopenglish.com
While there are lots of websites with downloadable lesson plans out
there, you'd be hard-pressed to find one with more than Onestopenglish.
It is one of the most popular sites on the web for teachers and with
good reason. It's got articles and a fun section called Diary of an
English teacher. But the main draw is the sheer amount of free, quality
lesson material with teaching notes.
Iona Lunan, Course Director Trinity TESOL Certificate
www.english-to-go.com
I really like this one, which is a site that uses Reuters' news stories
as a basis for lesson plans. Most parts of it are paying, but there are
some (good) free samples. It's categorised by level and is really easy
to use.
Sarah Yandell, Director of Studies and General English
teacher
www.puzzlemaker.com
This is a really good crossword and wordsearch creator site. Just type
in the words (and definitions) of words you want to work on and the
site creates a puzzle for you. It's so fast and great for vocabulary
consolidation amongst other things. Sarah Yandell, Director
of Studies and General English teacher
www.bcnteacher.com
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www.tefl.com
I consult this everyday as it gives worldwide jobs listings, and lots
of them. You can subscribe free of charge to receive this as
well as other newsletters full of TESOL info. It's
really one of the biggest out there. You can also list your CV with
them, get weekly job alerts and find out about courses to get certified.
Anna Stubbs, Careers Officer and CERT TESOL Teacher
Trainer
www.englishjobmaze.com
As well as comprehensive worldwide jobs listings, it offers tips on how
to put together a CV/ résumé and answers those tricky grammar
questions. However my favourite section is countries @ a
glance. You click on to the country of your choice and will
be presented with fantastically useful information on that
country such as contracts, salaries, tax, average number of hours you'd
be teaching, busiest periods to find work, Visa information and links
to other websites. It's a great (on-line) alternative to
Susan Griffith's 'Teaching English Abroad'
Anna Stubbs, Careers Officer and CERT TESOL Teacher
Trainer
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www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/business/index
This is a great link for up to date, real life business situations.
Students can work on vocabulary, useful expressions, do listenings, add
their comments to topical discussions and read the work of famous
business gurus. It's good for homework as it is regularly up-dated and
practical.
Jennifer Goodman, Director of Studies In-company
& Business English Teacher
www.spainmedia.com
Remember Barcelona Business magazine? Well, it's no longer printed, but
can be found here. I use it often as a source of information and
scandal (he's one of the few really investigative journalists left),
and also for ideas for lessons; it's particularly useful to prompt
discussions in telephone classes.
Nick Rawlinson, Director In-company training
www.entrepreneur.com
Another well-thumbed source of material for my students; articles
covering every aspect of business, throws up a whole load of useful
expressions and collocations, real-life case studies also make it a
more authentic source of information than The Course Book.
Nick Rawlinson, Director In-company training
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www.hltmag.co.uk
This site published one of our articles so it must be good! Seriously
though, Humanising Language Teaching has lots of articles,
lesson ideas, jokes etc., all with a humanistic slant, which sets it
apart from other sites. Edited by humanistic guru Mario Rinvolucri.
Duncan Foord, Director of Teacher Training Department
Learning
Novish
An excellent simulation that teaches you an invented language: Novish.
The aim of this activity is to make language teachers think about how
new languages are learned and the role of mistakes. It is taken from a
classic book by Julian Dakin called The Language Laboratory and
Language Learning (1973). If you are doing a Diploma paper on
cognitivism, this is a good experiment to undergo!
Lindsay Clandfield, Diploma Tutor and General English
Teacher
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Reference (good for making your
own materials)
www.wikipedia.org
Wikipedia is a free Internet encyclopaedia; the difference here is that
people from all over the place contribute articles and information to
help build the site. Plus all the content is free. They have entries on
almost anything, from the general to the truly bizarre. I like to use
it to create reading activities.
Lindsay Clandfield, Diploma Tutor and General English
Teacher
www.statistics.gov.uk
Ok, Ok, statistics aren't necessarily the most exciting things in the
world, but this has so much information on life in the UK, from eating
habits, to drinking habits (!), to gender pay gap, to how the UK has
changed over the past few years. It's proved to be a very useful source
of hard data for my business students to practise talking about
statistics, which is something that most of them have to do at work,
and is much more authentic than those dull graphs we find in course
books.
Nick Rawlinson, Director In-company training
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www.education.guardian.co.uk
For anyone who thinks that a bit of grammar and a Tefl course makes you
an expert, or anyone thinking they know all there is to know about the
job, think again and read some of the interesting articles by respected
TEFL pros in addition to plenty of comment from people in the field on
the highs and lows of the industry.
David Young, Course Director OxfordTEFL Prague
www.iatefl.org
IATEFL is the International Association of English teachers. The
website contains general information about the organisation, but if you
check out the SIG (special interest group) websites you are sure to
find something that will interest you, or be helpful in class.
Lindsay Clandfield, Diploma Tutor and General English
Teacher
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www.easyjet.com
For those of you who haven't experienced the joy of an easyjet flight,
this is the granddaddy of cheap airlines. Sometimes it's cheaper to fly
to London from Barcelona than it is to take the train from London to
Brighton! Book early.
Jennifer Goodman, Director of Studies In-company
& Business English Teacher
Travel in
Spain
Tourist information about Andalucía. I used it to plan a trip to
Seville and Cordoba, found hotels, opening hours and loads of useful
stuff. There's an English version too.
Nick Rawlinson, Director In-company training
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www.its-online.com
Most sites have printable and downloadable material for class, but
little or no interactive stuff. The its-online network is a big
exception. Loads of stuff for both teachers and students. I don't have
room to do it justice here – just go and take a look! Some parts of the
site are free, others are paying. It's not expensive though, especially
if your school gets on board.
Lindsay Clandfield, Diploma Tutor and General English
Teacher
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Spanish in Spain
Learn Spanish with Barcelona Spanish....Experts in Spanish Tuition,
Small Groups and 1-to-1, General and
Business Spanish....You will learn !
www.barcelonaspanish.com
www.humanmetrics.com
You can do a free Myers Briggs personality test on this site by
answering 50 questions. A lot of the staff at Oxford Tefl did it and
most thought it very accurate! The test gives you a print out
describing your personality type and consequent strengths and
weaknesses. Very useful in helping you to understand yourself as a
teacher and team member. You could also get your intermediate or
advanced learners to do it and discuss the results.
Duncan Foord, Director of Teacher Training Department
The
Hunger Site
Just one click and we can do some good; for every click, sponsors
"donate" food, medical help etc to the more needy.
Nick Rawlinson, Director In-company training
BCN
Teacher
Useful information about Barcelona....
The Hot Topic – Monthly lesson plan on using hot,
topical subjects in the classroom.
By Lindsay Clandfield and Scott Thornbury
http://www.onestopenglish.com/tefl_skills/speaking.htm
Essential UK – Material on aspects of life in UK, at the
British Council Language Assistant website
By Jo Budden
http://www.britishcouncil.org/languageassistant-arc-essuk.htm
Task Based Learning – Methodology article and activities
By Mark McKinnon and Nicky Rigby
http://www.onestopenglish.com/News/Magazine/Archive/elt_taskbased.htm
Using L1 in the classroom – Methodology article and
activities
By Lindsay Clandfield and Duncan Foord
http://www.hltmag.co.uk/jan03/mart2.htm
Motivating Teenagers – Article and activities
By Jo Budden
http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/think/methodology/motivate_teens.shtml
sing the phonetic chart with young learners – Article
and activities
By Nicola Meldrum
http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/think/pron/young_phonemic.shtml
Teaching One to One – Article and activities
By Nicola Meldrum, with activities by Lindsay Clandfield
http://www.onestopenglish.com/News/Magazine/Archive/onetoone.htm
Teaching without a coursebook - Article and ideas
By Jennifer Goodman
http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/think/resources/no_book.shtml
Using Pictures in the Classroom - Article and ideas
By Jennifer Goodman
http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/think/resources/picture_story.shtml
The Teachers Survival Kit – Article
By Lindsay Clandfield and Duncan Foord
http://www.its-teachers.com/voices/survival/default.asp
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