Hopefully these bits and pieces will be just as useful to other newbie teachers as they were to me. Feel free to add your own suggestions!
Free resources – BusyTeacher.org
This site contains some really fantastic downloads – one of the first things I found, for example, was a Powerpoint presentation about the definite, indefinite and null articles in the form of a ‘Who Wants To Be A Millionaire’ game – brilliant!
Error correction sheets – BusyTeacher.org
Rather than leaving you to find this within the huge wealth of resources that is the BusyTeacher website, I thought I’d call this post out as a particularly useful one. I found it very helpful as I started teaching my student online, as I didn’t initially know how best to correct him.
After I had done the first, short, free introductory lesson with my Blabmate students, I wanted to learn a bit more about them. Therefore, I started creating brief lesson plans to spark conversation, and to bulk up those conversation plans, I used this wonderful website, which has lists of questions relating to almost 700 different topics!
(Almost infinite) ELT ideas – another blog from the unstoppable Sandy Millin
I had been a fan of Sandy’s ‘main’ blog since I decided to try and create a teaching/living in Berlin/annoying witterings kind of blog myself (her main one is listed on my ‘General ELT Info’ page…I know, the boundaries between these pages are a bit blurry and I do need to give some further thought to my organisation.)
But anyway, concerns about my own blog aside, Sandy’s ELT ideas blog is essentially an ongoing compilation of a whole host of random links, photos, ideas for teachers to use however they please. Sandy refers to them as ‘prompts’ and I for one look forward to learning how to know which type of exercise is the best for which kind of language learning skill, and then using some of these excellent bits of realia. I definitely recommend a quick scroll down the feed for lots of great ideas for little activities in lessons.
A great post about using crossword puzzles in lessons
I just thought this was a great, and very easily adaptable idea worth saving for the future.
All at C blog: video activities for advanced learners
I was just trawling through my list of bookmarked websites for some inspiration for a lesson with my Korean student, when I re-found this blog of lesson ideas. It struck me initially because the most recent post when I accessed the site was a lesson plan about Monty the Penguin, so naturally I was hooked! It’s so named because it’s aimed principally at C1 and C2 level learners (according to the CEFR) and is full of excellent video suggestions for practising listening and stimulating speaking.
BerLingo 