The internet is awash with free resources to help you become a better teacher.
You may find that some old-fashioned educators think looking for ready-made material online is lazy, preferring to use nothing but a textbook and their own imagination to plan lessons.
Certainly there are plenty of websites out there offering free worksheets, and there is no denying these offer you a bit of a shortcut.
But there is nothing wrong with using them, after all it will save you time, provided they are suitable for your students.
You can also adapt them accordingly or use them to supplement material you have already designed yourself.
As well as worksheets, looking online can also bring a whole new level of interactivity to your lessons thanks to all the games, songs and videos available.
In today's blog post we're going to take a quick look at some of the best the internet has to offer TEFL teachers.
The British Council works in over 100 countries developing international relations using the English language. A well-respected organisation with more than 75 years experience, they have teamed up with the BBC to offer a
website dedicated to TEFL teaching.
If you are looking for printable worksheets, then you can't go far wrong with
English Banana.
Kindergarten Worksheets is great for young learners, whereas older learners, with good conversational English, will benefit from
Bogglesworld ESL. You can also make your own wordsearches using
Discovery Education and crosswords on
Puzzle Maker.
ESL Library has hundreds upon hundreds of images you can use in your presentations and on flashcards.
Barry Fun English is probably the best site around for online games and will be of great benefit to those with an interactive smartboard. Videos are also an invaluable resource to those blessed with such technology. A great example of this is
Go Animate. This is great fun as it allows students to create their own cartoons with real spoken dialogue. There are loads of great TEFL songs and videos available on
Youtube. All you have to do is search for the topic at hand. If your resources are a little more primitive then you can find plenty of low-tech games
here and role plays
here.
You can bounce your ideas off other teachers, and steal theirs, on
Dave's ESL Cafe, the biggest TEFL forum around. Most countries also have expat boards specifically designed for English teachers who are living and working there. The
Guardian is the best source for TEFL news and
TEFL.com the best for jobs.
Hopefully there should be more than enough links there to keep you busy! Feel free to comment below and submit your own suggestions for the best TEFL sites.
