Language Sites

Activities for ESL Students
http://a4esl.org/
This is a great site with quizzes, tests, exercises, and puzzles to help you learn English as a Second Language (ESL). The activities have different levels, and there is a bilingual list of activities in various languages.

Ages of English Timeline
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/british/launch_tl_ages_english.shtml
This interactive timeline breaks the history of the English language into ten periods. For each period, you can learn some history, hear a segment of the language spoken as it would have sounded at the time, learn how the language was changing at the time, see some words which entered the language during the period and more. Check out the background graphics, too, to see how the landscape of England changed over time.

AncientScripts.com
http://www.ancientscripts.com/  
According to the site creator, Lawrence K. Lo, "The aim of Ancient Scripts is not to replace texts books or instructional web sites. Instead, it is designed to give an introduction to writing systems, which hopefully will tantalize the reader into searching for more information on the web or in books and publications." Major divisions within the site are: 1) Writing Systems; 2) Phonetics; 3) Historical Linguistics; 4) Extra (ramblings, games, etc); 5) Bibliography; and 6) Web links. Quite extensive and written in a style that is accessible to young learners.

Bob the Builder, Multilingual
http://www.hitentertainment.com/bobthebuilder/
Choose your language and join Bob the Builder as he explores his town, meets his friends, and does his daily chores! Fun and interactive Web design, lots of activities for kids! Game-like activities include a simple spelling game — fun for ESL students — and a simple counting game.

Braillebug
http://www.afb.org/braillebug/
The American Foundation for the Blind created an age appropriate site for students to learn out braille. Under games, students can see what their name looks like in braille, or figure out words with a braille alphabet close by. Students can also change the colors on this website to make it easier to read.

Casa Notes
http://casanotes.4teachers.org/
This site will let you assemble a variety of take-home notes in English and Spanish. Make your choices and then click the button to go to the next step. When finished, print and send home.

Dave's ESL Cafe
http://www.eslcafe.com/
At the English as a Second Language Cafe, you'll find helpful areas such as the Idea Page and Discussion Center. Other people on the net write in with their ideas and problems and get responses. It's a good place for teachers especially. Helpful for students is the quiz page where one can choose from multiple quizzes on a single topic.

Do You Speak American?
http://www.pbs.org/speak/
The home on the web for a television program about the nature of American English, which originally aired on PBS in January 2005. "Do You Speak American?" examines the differences in the ways American speak across age groups, ethnic groups, and regions. This is an interesting way to launch a study of language, especially of the American habit for creating new words and expressions. Lots of audio accompaniment makes this an excellent site for strengthening the listening skills of intermediate-to-advanced English language learners.

ESL Go: Free ESL Classes and Activities
http://eslgo.com/
ESLgo.com describes itself as "a free English web site for learning English as a second language". The site's designer, a former New Yorker now teaching in Korea, offers online lessons in grammar, vocabulary, reading, and writing as a resource for both students and teachers of English as a Second or "Foreign" Language.

ESL Gold
http://www.eslgold.com/ 
This site's primary materials are thematically organized into categories such as "Speaking," "Reading," "Listening," and "Writing." Within each of these sections, visitors can take a look through topical resources that compartmentalize different more digestible themes, such as "Topics for Writing" or "Organizing and Composing." Visitors can also find materials for beginning, intermediate, or advanced level students.

ESL Lounge
http://www.esl-lounge.com/
Free ESL lesson materials and ESL lesson plans. Printable worksheets for ESL classroom teaching. Grammar, pronunciation, board games, flashcards, games, song lyrics and more.

¡Españolé!
http://www.espanole.org/
A bottomless source of Spanish treasures that ensnare the imagination and appetites of nearly anyone with an interest in the Spanish language. From the basic learner to the AP student, from the teacher to the native speaker, "¡Españolé!"appeals to every need. It is a major warehouse of Spanish resources that one can choose to enhance Spanish language proficiency. It covers everything—grammar, vocabulary, literature, art, music, periodicals, radio, cooking and travel. It is a labor of love from one educator, who just happens to be Florida's 2001-02 Spanish Teacher of the Year.

Especially Español
http://www.kn.pacbell.com/wired/espanol/index.html
This site for Spanish language resources includes a brief description of hotlists, activities and resources appropriate for elementary students, activities and resources appropriate for middle/high school students, links to professional bilingual educator sites, internet tutorials, and other resources.

Fonetiks
http://www.fonetiks.org/
Are you learning a new language and hope to someday sound like a native speaker? Use Fonetiks.org to help with pronunciation. Spanish, French (and French Canadian), German (and Swiss German), Italian, Brazilian Portuguese, Japanese (Romanji), Indonesian, and Thai language pronunciations are listed. For English learners, American, British, Australian, Canadian, Irish, Scottish, and Welsh accents are available.

German for Travelers
http://www.germanfortravellers.com/
Educators will want to zero in on the Learn section. Explanations, vocabulary lists and exercises are available for those who wish to learn conversational German. There is even a quiz (in German) on Harry Potter; look under Exercises with Video. You can find travel information here, as well as links to “all things German.”

Interactive French
http://laits.utexas.edu/fi/index.html
This is a comprehensive French language tutorial site. It includes thirteen chapters featuring vocabulary, grammar, video clips with interviews and dialogues, and written exercises linking to French magazines and periodicals. Students can also find pertinent cultural information presented via video using the target language. The site provides in-depth language skill building and opportunities for interaction. It is an outstanding resource!

Interesting Things for ESL Students
http://www.manythings.org
This web site is for an excellent resource for people studying English as a Second Language (ESL) or English as a Foreign Language (EFL). It contains many activities including quizzes, word games, word puzzles, proverbs, slang expressions, and anagrams. Even though the primary focus is for ESL, native English speakers may also find some interesting things on this site. This site is very easy to navigate and easy to read.

Internet Picture Dictionary
http://www.pdictionary.com/
The Internet Picture Dictionary is a free, online multilingual picture dictionary designed especially for ESL students and beginning English, French, German, Spanish and Italian language learners of all ages. Activities include Flashcards, Fill-in-the-Blanks, Word Scramble, Stinky Spelling and Straight Recall.

Language Dictionaries
http://www.yourdictionary.com/languages.html
There are 6,800 known languages spoken in the 200 countries of the world. 2,261 have writing systems (the others are only spoken) and about 300 are represented by on-line dictionaries. The dictionaries are in alphabetical order and they go across the page to the right, making it easy to find the language you are looking for. Navigation is simple. Just click the name of the language of which dictionary you'd like to browse through. It will take you to a page full of links to dictionaries of that dialect, as well as, some you can open in your word processing programs.

Lanternfish
http://bogglesworldesl.com/
Tons of printable teacher worksheets and flashcards including fall worksheets, Halloween, Thanksgiving, animal habitats, frog life cycle, water cycle, language arts, ESL, French, and Spanish. Great activities for ESL students.

Learn Chinese
http://www.wku.edu/~yuanh/AudioChinese/
This site shows how to say simple Chinese expressions. Choose a topic, pick the English phrase you wish to say in Chinese, click the audio icon, listen and repeat. Save the phrases to your computer so you can repeat the lesson over and over. The Chinese phrases at the site are written, too, but most students will spend the most time with the audio portions.

Learn Spanish
http://www.studyspanish.com/

Learn Spanish with Pictures
http://www.my-spanish-dictionary.com/
Students can click on pictures to see the word in both Spanish and English. Contains 300 pictures with an alphabetical index.

LiteracyCenter.Net: Play and Learn
http://www.literacycenter.net/play_learn/
Young students will enjoy practicing their French, German, and Spanish at this site. For each language, children can explore upper- and lower-case letters, letter pronunciation, simple words, shapes, colors, numbers, and more. Suitable for K-5.

Nellie's English Projects
http://www.nelliemuller.com/Nellies_English_Projects.htm
An ESL teacher developed this site to provide a wide range of resources for both ESL and mainstream students. The site map includes extensive links under the topics with the most useful ones under Students and Tasks, while the Process category focuses on skills (primarily writing). Under Students one has a range of ESL activities available to improve English skills, including games and quiz links. For projects, long and short range, the Tasks category offers links to various web quests with tips on ESL integration. .

Paint It!
http://www.britishcouncil.org/kids-games-paint-it.htm
A clever site for English Language Learners attempting to deal with the spoken word. Users must paint various objects according to the spoken instructions. Correct responses evoke a response of "Good!" while incorrect responses get a "Try Again."

Phonetics: The Sounds of Spanish
http://www.uiowa.edu/~acadtech/phonetics/
This site contains animated libraries of the sounds of Spanish and English. For each sound there is an animated articulatory diagram, a step-by-step description, and video-voice audio of the sound in context.

Reading Matrix
http://www.readingmatrix.com/ 
The Reading Matrix, was designed to create a place where both teachers and other interested persons could come together to find resources about reading and writing. Most of the resources are geared towards the language needs of ESL and international students, but there is really something for everyone. The Archives are a good place to start, as users will have the opportunity to look through subject-oriented resources for English-language learners that range from dictionaries, grammar quizzes, and speaking and listening practice.

Repeat After Us
http://repeatafterus.com/
This site is a collection of copyright-free texts ranging from nursery rhymes to philosophy to literature from many time periods and cultures. Some 1,100 of the more than 6,000 texts offer audio readings. The site was originally designed to help English language learners, as users can hear as well as see the texts. It is also useful for those who are hearing-impaired, as well as anyone who is looking for simple access to these texts.

Sight Words with Samson
http://www.sightwordswithsamson.com/sw/sight_words.asp
Here are 28 word lists, ranging from very easy to challenging, presented as games. Each game takes players through four vocabulary-building drills, all with excellent audio reinforcement. This is an excellent site for EFL/ELL classes, although the graphics might be a bit too "young" for older students. However, it is a worthwhile individual activity for students needing extra practice.

Spanish Grammar Exercises
http://www.colby.edu/~bknelson/exercises/index.html
This site offers a lot of interactive exercises to practice different structures. Barbara Kuczun Nelson is the author of the site.

Test Your French
http://www.bbc.co.uk/languages/french/gauge/
This site provides a test to measure a student's level of competence in French. The test is in written, auditory and video formats. The site scores the test and then directs the user to level-matched practice lessons.

Travlang's Translating Dictionaries
http://dictionaries.travlang.com

Where Do Languages Come From?
http://www.exploratorium.edu/exploring/language/

Words & Tools
http://www.wordsandtools.com/index.htm
Words & Tools offers Interactive tests and exercises for language learners of English and Spanish. The English section includes diagnostic vocabulary tests and exercises, English grammar, and interactive crosswords. The Spanish section offers Interactive grammar exercises at the elementary and intermediate levels. Each product has a demo full of interactive exercises, too.