Websites

Here's a great  collection of tutorials for learning Picasa.

Here are some resources for using Smartboards:

CATESOL 2008 Smartboard workshop

Smart Technologies Smart Notebook Lessons page

Smart Notebook Activity creation guide (PDF)

Speller Software download- A free spelling activity addition to the Smart Notebook (This looks VERY COOL and makes me wish I had a Smartboard....)

Smartboard Teacher Exchange download site

Mr. Shurley ESL

Here are some technology tutorials to help you master some of the fundamentals:

Word Tutorial: Online Technology Practice

PowerPoint Online Tutorial

Excel Tutorial

Web Resources

                The Internet has many great resources to aid and supplement your teaching. If you find a good site that you’d like to share with other teachers, please e-mail Bruce Moon, eslbruce@gmail.com for inclusion in www.capitalesl.org , the school’s  ESL website,

                Here’s a listing and descriptions of some of the best web resources for adult ESL. You can find lots more at www.capitalesl.org . You will find this list, with additions, at www.capitalesl.org/resources .

A4esl.org (a4esl.org ) is a collection of activities created by ESL and EFL (English as a foreign language) teachers from around the world. You will find puzzles, exercises, and links for all levels of students

OTAN (www.otan.us ) links adult educators to resources to support and enhance their teaching. A lesson plan library is one especially valuable feature, but there is a wealth of information on links, research, and other information specific to adult education

California Distance Learning Project ( www.cdlponline.org ) provides articles on topics of interest to adults in the instructional areas of health, housing, working, school, money, and more. The articles have audio files so students can read along with the audio. Many of the articles have a beginner and an intermediate activity. There is vocabulary to support the reading.

Randall’s Cyberlistening Lab (www.esl-lab.com ) offers audio dialogues, text, and quizzes of real life situations. There are three levels of difficulty.

Discovery Educatiion (www.discoaveryeducation.com ) is a service that the school subscribes to which offers thousands of video clips, as well as audio files, essay prompts, and still ;pictures, to support your teaching. Contact Bruce (eslbruce@gmail.com ) to receive training in Discovery Education and your pass code to access Discovery Education.

www.thebeehive.org has articles on adult ed topics. Not specifically designed for ESL, Beehive has solid information and sometimes has links to local resources and articles.

Voice of America Special English (www.voanews.com/specialenglish/) has articles with attached audio files in many areas that students enjoy listening to to develop their reading and listening skills.

Most of us use Google all of the time. There are other search engines. Here are some that may be worth a try:

• SortFix
• AskVox
• KartooVisu
• Sputtr
• SearchCrystal
• Kosmix
• Twerq

The California Distance Learning Project has stories with activities, sound, and some video on critical areas of adult life, including work.

A4ESL.ORG is a website developed by ESL/EFL teachers and has lots of quizzes, puzzles, and activities. Here's a link to their easy grammar quizzes.

The University of Iowa's Sounds of English lets you pick sounds that you want to hear and see diagrams of how they are pronounced.

Minimal Pairs Practice gives you the opportunity to choose between two similar sounding words.

Marshall Adult Education Center's Reading Skills for Today's Adults has graded reading lessons on life skills topics. There are two levels covering grades 1-8, Level 1 (grades 1-4.5) and Level 2 (grades 5-8). There are printed versions of the readings for teacher use.