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Similarly to the Breaking News English website, the Famous People English website features simplified mini-biographies on famous people from all over the world. Each passage also comes with a variety of activities. I have used this site many times for finding level-appropriate reading passages.

This is a useful resource for teachers who want to use Skype in the classroom. The short annotations help seekers decide which lins are most relevant for them. There are resources for teachers looking for classrooms to connect with, for individual learners looking for conversation partners, and much more. I can see this as a go-to source for K-12 and higher ed teachers who need to communicate often (it's free) with people who live far away (it's internet-based).

Some of us discussed pecha kuchu last semester in Dr. Stoller's foundations course. It's a method of presentation that literally translates to "death by power point." The idea came about because people were getting so bored at large conferences when presenters were going on and on about there research. This style of presentation allows each slide to be up for 20 seconds and the total time is 6 minutes and 40 seconds. Presenters were not allowed to go over this allotted time. Students in Dr. Stoller's class last semester were given 5 minutes to present on the research we did all semester. Personally, I found it difficult to present all the information I wanted to, but I also was surprised by how much I could actually fit into five minutes. So how does this relate to language learning/teaching? Pecha Flickr is a program that allows you to type in a tag word, like fish or dog. Then, it will pull up different pictures on Flickr that are tagged with those words for 20 seconds at a time. Students could give a mock presentation or even be writing sentences for the 20 seconds each picture is shown. This is a creative and fun way to get students to think on the spot using random pictures. Although I feel this would be a fun and creative way to get students thinking, I would be cautious using this because some of the pictures are tagged inaccurately. For example, I typed in fish as the tag and the second picture was a couple kissing. However, this might be a unique way to bring in slang and informal language. Kissing with a fish face?

"Create your own jeopardy template online, without PowerPoint. Or browse the pre-made templates created by other people!" This is a handy site that allows you to build custom Jeopardy games, and it's all hosted online. I personally used this when teaching EFL young adult literature and it made for some really nice review games. Also, a lot of user generated content is publicly available, so if you happen to use a popular piece of literature, there might be something pre-made that you can use on short notice. It's also very easy to share content you create with coworkers or reuse it the next time you teach the course. Jeopardylabs is 100% free, and you can certainly do more than novel review themed games with it.

This is similar to Skype, but less expensive to use. You can video chat with up to 12 people at the same time for FREE. Nour

Soundcloud is a website where students and teachers can upload their audio files for others to listen to online. The best part is that people can leave comments at specific points in the recording that pop up as the recording is played. This way students are able to get precise feedback and encouragement at the exact moment something happens.

This website helps people to remember, or rather not forget language through a process of being reminded at different stages rather than through daily repetition.

I love this site. Like the Moth, it is a resource for stories from every day people all over the country. It's great for cultural topics, too. The stories are much shorter, usually 1-3 minutes, and are generally appropriate for students (though some aren't).

The Moth is a storytelling program that broadcasts weekly stories told by anyone - famous people or every day folks. It's a great listening resource, especially for getting a glimpse of American life, but would require you to pre-screen the stories (some are not appropriate for students at all). It is also probably best suited for adult advanced learners.

The Center for Digital Storytelling (CDS) is an organization that helps people create short, first-person narratives that educate and/or inspire positive change. The organization hosts a number of workshops on digital storytelling, and distributes stories in a number of traditional and media formats. The website provides information about the organization's mission, features selected digital stories, and connects to a textbook, blog, and newsletter. If you plan to include digital storytelling you your classroom, whether ESL or any other type of class, the CDC looks like a great resource. I was able to review portions of the textbook, and it looks great!

My blurb: This looks like an easy way to make a screencast. You can then upload the screencasts to twitter, facebook, youtube or your own site. Their blurb: Screenr | Instant screencasts: Just click record. Screenr's web-based screen recorder makes it a breeze to create and share your screencasts around the web. Just click the record button, capture your screen & voice, and share the link. Some people even call it fun!

Wordle isn't necessarily ESL focused, but it does do fun things with language. Teachers can use this application to create vocabulary word splashes that are visually appealing to students, or teachers can let students play with their own words. For example, students can input an essay and world will pick out the most frequent words and put them into a cool design. It's a simple and easy way to manipulate language.

Jena, I'm glad you posted this. I think that this has some great potential for introducing vocabulary in the pre- or -post phases of a lesson for different skills or content classes. I like that you can choose different fonts, # of words that can be displayed and the direction of displayed words. You can also embed this into blogs and wikis. For a good blog post on using word clouds in the classroom, you might want to check out Nic Peachey's post on this subject: http://nikpeachey.blogspot.com/2008/09/using-word-clouds-in-efl-esl.html As an aside, in my opinion this guy is perhaps one of the most active technology/CALL ESL people on the web. I get a lot of great ideas from reading his blog posts and other resources.

This is very interesting.. It can be used by teachers of vocabulary and writing.. I like the fact that it can be used ina number of ways. Thanks Jena

"Learn English with our free tools for ESL students, including English language references, activities including tests and polls, and articles on English usage. Our ESL forum is the perfect place get help learning English, where people are online to answer your questions 24 hours a day." This site can be very useful for students who need to practice English for Specific Purposes because it has like a Business English section and common idioms section. I don't feel that this site would replace a classroom very well but could easily be used as supplementary to a classroom and a place where students can ask questions if they don't want to bother their teachers.

At ESL Video, you can create your own quizzes and use other peoples quizzes. You can access beginning, intermediate, high Intermediate quizzes for videos. It was free to sign up, but it is a limited source for borrowing quizzes. These are the guidelines for making quizzes: - If you suspect the video or thumbnail-image violates copyright law, don't use it. ( - Read the "Top 10 Distractors" article by Sharon Yoneda. ( - Read the "Real (Teacher) World Application of ESLvideo.com" article by Sharon Yoneda. ( - Base your quizzes on shorter videos rather than longer videos. ( - Create your quiz first in a Word or text document, then copy / paste into the quiz builder. - Create quizzes with more than five questions. - Check your questions and answers for typos. ( - Music video quizzes - don't skip lines in the lyrics and be sure to add the transcript (often easily found with a Google search). ( - Design distractors that demonstrate mechanical, structural, phonological or othographic relevance. When you create your quiz, you add title, description, tags (past tense, WH questions, Directions), Question for Comments, Thumbnail Image, Video Embed code, level, language, and quiz type.

I opened the Pizza Restaurant "Community" topic. Part 1 is a Listening (using an optional audio segment), and read along section. I didn't see an option for speed and I found the reading to be fast for a language learner, but they can repeat it for multiple readings. Part II is a discussion with a couple of questions, "What kind of pizza do you like and what toppings do you like on it? And "Are there any unique toppings that people put on pizza in your country that reflect your local foods?" Part III is an online investigation with a link to a practice. From their Website: "One of the best ways to improve communication skills is to become familiar with the language by reading, building vocabulary, and discussing what you study in daily conversations. Too often, ESL/EFL students spend time reading about topics that they normally wouldn't use in daily conversation. This site presents short conversation starters or readings that you can study and then try to apply in everyday situations Before anything else, be sure to read the page, Using This Site, to understand the purpose of these materials and how to best use them. The table below outlines current and future topics. Those with links are now available. Write me if you have an idea for a new reading topic."