ESL etc.

I just listened to an interview with Larry Sabato on The Diane Rehm Show. They discuss his new book, A More Perfect Constitution. In the book (and interview) he outlines 23 suggestions to improve the Constitution to make it fairer. If I were teaching ESL students in the US, I think this could be the [...]

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The K12 Online Conference is a free online conference inviting participation from educators around the world interested in using Web 2.0 tools and technologies in their teaching. The 2007 conference began with a pre-conference keynote on October 8. Over the following two weeks (October 15-26) forty presentations will be posted online to the conference blog [...]

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Kira just told me about LibriVox, a website offering free audio recordings of public domain books. Needless to say, this could be useful for language learners, and also for English teachers living abroad looking to immerse themselves in some native culture. In addition to the mp3 files, each LibriVox entry also includes a link to [...]

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mp3 First, I answer a listener’s request for ideas on getting larger classes to speak. Specifically, I talk about a pronunciation activity, pair/groupwork and roleplays. Next, I talk about week two of my sophomore English for Tourism conversation classes. I’m trying to improve students acquisition of vocabulary and sentence patterns by covering the same content [...]

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Each episode of Grammar Girl: Quick and Dirty Tips for Better Writing addresses one problematic grammatical issue. As an English teacher, grammar instruction is a weak area for me, and Grammar Girl explains things very clearly and concisely. There are extensive archives, and each show is short (5 minutes or so) and easily digestible. Past [...]

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Here are two sites full of free Buddhism resources. BuddhaNet – Tons of free eBooks and audio files. The eBooks cover general Buddhism, meditation, Theravada Buddhism, Mahayana Buddhism and even children’s books. The audio files include chanting, meditation instruction, Dharma talks and even songs. Dharma Seed – Tons and tons of wonderful Dharma talks, organized [...]

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I was recently listening to an old episode (#10) of This American Life and I heard a short (1 min 30 sec) play by the Neo-Futurists. It’s called “21 Lies I Will Tell My Children,” and seems like it could be used for discussion activities with adult (or at least relatively mature) ESL / EFL [...]

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Sometimes you hear something that makes you glad to be alive. Radio Lab is just such a radio program. Each episode addresses a big idea (time, morality, etc.) using a combination of interviews, sound effects, music and discussion. There is no way to describe it that would really do it justice. Just listen to it. [...]

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Here are some of the podcasts I listen to on a regular basis. I’ve linked to their websites, but you can also just search for them in iTunes. Radio Lab – Each episode addresses a big idea (time, morality, etc.) using a combination of interviews, sound effects, music and discussion. Absolutely wonderful, and every show [...]

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