Deborah Healey, University of Oregon (dhealey AT uoregon DOT edu)
See Resource List for more details and suggestions
Unless otherwise noted, all of the items listed are free. Some may require a free subscription.
Planning & teaching
Saving and organizing
- Saving your links: Diigo - www.diigo.com
Social bookmarking - search other people's links by topic as well as your own. Add links easily with the Diigolet browser button or the Delicious browser button. This also has an app.
- Displaying linked information - digital curation
This is a quick and visually-rich way to create a compilation of web sources on a given topic. It's easy to add, but not very easy to organize the links on your page.
- Pinterest - www.pinterest.com (this is also available as an app). Create an account to browse or create your own lists.
- Scoop-It - www.scoop.it
You need to log in to view content. If you use a free login, you have to log in at least every 30 days or your account is deactivated. You can reactivate it for free, but it's another way to get you to buy a premium account.
Controlled material
- Breaking News English: www.breakingnewsenglish.com
Readings and related (downloadable) audio based on news articles, at a range of skill levels, with extensive lesson plans and teacher ideas as well as online activities; searchable. This is a great teacher resource, especially if you download the Lesson Plan guide
- VOA Learning English: learningenglish.voanews.com
The news, read more slowly than normal
Authentic material
- Sources of academic texts
These are on a variety of subjects. Some of the journals are more praise-worthy than others, but they are full-text and free.
- Literature:
Project Gutenberg (over 60,000 free books): www.gutenberg.org
These are works that are no longer restricted by copyright, generally because the author has been dead for at least 75 years. You might find something more recent donated by a generous author, but not likely. Gutenberg also has a growing collection of audio books.
Online teacher tools
Quizzing and polling (mobile device or computer use)
- Kahoot! - kahoot.com
Designed for social learning; create surveys or multiple-choice or reordering quizzes that are taken by groups (or individuals). Results can be shown in real time. There is a time limit
- Socrative - socrative.com
Create T/F, multiple-choice, or short answer quizzes that students can take individually, or competitively with Space Race. Space Race will display group answers in real time. See a tutorial at www.youtube.com/watch?v=upY8uG3NFfY
- Quizlet - quizlet.com
Create
flashcard-style quizzes. Quizzes can be taken on a computer or mobile
device. Individuals can use Quizlet decks to study or groups can compete
with Quizlet Live. See a tutorial at www.youtube.com/watch?v=TYdV96Za7_c - PollEverywhere - www.polleverywhere.com
Create quick polls (thumbs up/thumbs down, multiple choice, rank ordering, word cloud, click on an image). Respondents can be anonymous or sign in; results for the group are displayed in real time. Good choice for workshops or formative assessment. A variety of video tutorials are at www.polleverywhere.com/videos/tutorials
Authoring and materials creation
- PowerPoint template for Jeopardy and other games: https://www.lifewire.com/free-powerpoint-games-for-teachers-1358169
They seem to keep this site updated, which is much appreciated. Nice choices of Jeopardy, Wheel of Fortune, Family Feud, Price is Right, Deal or No Deal, Who Wants to be a Millionaire, and Cash Cab templates from different authors.
- LessonWriter: www.lessonwriter.com
Vocabulary, grammar, pre-reading, post-reading from a text (1500 words maximum). The free version lets you create standalone lessons. Subscriptions allow for class access to files and other kinds of sharing. This site has been giving me problems, but see if it works for you.
- Hot Potatoes authoring program: free download at www.hotpot.uvic.ca
Create exercises to accompany readings; can be timed; use the exercises you create either online or offline
See more information: Getting Started with Hot Potatoes PDF
- Textivate- text reconstruction activity -add your own text. Nice tool,
but now editing is available only by subscription: GBP 25/year for a basic subscription. http://www.textivate.com
Materials creation by teachers or students
- Record and share audio easily - record and share on your phone, if that's available, or with Vocaroo on a computer. Amazingly easy: www.vocaroo.com/
Create a recording and email a link. Recordings are kept on the server only a short time, so it's good to save the recording as well.
- Create screencasts: Show, don't tell by recording what's happening on the screen and your narration.
Screencasting tools
- Create mind maps to display information graphically
- Graphical vocabulary with VisuWords: www.visuwords.com/
A graphical - and beautiful - look at words and their relationships. This gets more powerful with practice.
- Word clouds
Copy and paste in text to create a thought-provoking collage of words from the text, with the most common words largest. - Free images to use without worrying about copyright
- Pixabay - buy the author a cup of coffee if you use an image a lot - www.pixabay.com
Suggestions for using mobile apps
Assessment: Rubrics
Teacher feedback and file sharing
Motivation to learn: Authentic audience
- Projects to join
- iEARN: https://iearn.org/
This is a global organization that has projects to join (work with students from many different countries) or helps teachers find partner classes. There are country-specific iEARN groups all over the world, as well.
- TakingITGlobal: www.tigweb.org
Topics of interest to young adults in particular; projects and cultural forums
- Project-based learning - WebQuests
- Social media
- Student Forums at Dave’s ESL Café https://forums.eslcafe.com/student
Wide range of topics, with monitors that try to keep discussions appropriate
Class discussion
Created by D. Healey; last updated 24 December 2020
 This work by Deborah Healey is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
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 Updating... Ċ Deborah Healey, Apr 17, 2015, 11:20 PM Ċ Deborah Healey, Apr 17, 2015, 11:22 PM Ċ Deborah Healey, Apr 24, 2018, 10:14 PM Ċ Deborah Healey, Apr 17, 2015, 11:21 PM
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