PODCASTS TO PRACTICE YOUR ENGLISH

 BBC:
6 Minute English: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p02pc9tn/episodes/downloads
Lower-intermediate to upper-intermediate – British English
This is without doubt the best EFL podcast on the list and the one that I use time and time again.
Updated weekly, Six minute English provides fun and interesting ESL podcasts on topics such as
culture, technology, travel, business and more. They’ll always include at least three new phrases
to learn and after listening, students can check their understanding with the transcript.
The Why Factor: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p00xtky9/episodes/downloads

The English We Speak: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p02pc9zn/episodes/downloads

 British Coucil:
https://learnenglish.britishcouncil.org/en/

 Voice of America Learning English:

https://learningenglish.voanews.com/programs/radio

 Business English Pod

https://www.businessenglishpod.com/

 Podcasts in English
https://www.podcastsinenglish.com
Elementary to Intermediate - British English
The first homework is www.podcastsinenglish .com. This site provides free three to five minute
podcasts for English learners for beginner, intermediate and upper-intermediate level. To
practice comprehension and expand vocabulary, tell your students to listen to two podcasts a
week and write a summary of what they hear. To do this effectively, they’ll have to listen a few
times.
Negative: The podcasts are free but to read the transcript students must pay for the premium
version.
  CNN 10
https://edition.cnn.com/cnn10
Upper-intermediate-advanced – American English
CNN 10 is not an TEFL podcast, it is a real news show which condenses world news for that day
down to 10 minutes. Despite this, it provides a great way for higher-level students to practice
their listening skills while keeping abreast or world news. The video can be accessed in the CNN
app and students can read the full transcript afterwards to check their understanding.
Negative: Not made for ESL and so speech can be fast.

 ELLLO
http://www.elllo.org
Elementary to Intermediate - Variable
Elllo provides thousands of free English video lessons and ESL podcasts on everyday English
conversation. The podcasts consist of a dialogue between two people about an everyday topic.
They are short and sweet but there are thousands of them and so you could ask your students
to do one a day without much time commitment from them.
The best thing about ELLLO podcasts is that students can check their understanding with the
transcript AND a quiz.
Negative: Podcasts are under three minutes.

 TED
https://www.ted.com
Upper intermediate-advanced - Variable
TED provides thousands of videos about technology, education, politics, science and culture.
In my experience setting a TED talk for homework can be hit and miss. Sometimes I’d set a TED
video and everyone would love it and other times they’d complain that it was too long, too fast
or too confusing to understand.
TED is still a great resource but when choosing a talk for homework this is my advice:
Choose a video which is no more than 10 minutes long. You can separate talks by duration,
topic and language in the talk tab.
Check that the speaker isn’t speaking too fast and the accent isn’t too thick (native speakers are
best).
Another way to do this is to choose a theme such as ‘business’ ‘finance’ ‘or ‘crime’ and ask your
students to select and watch a TED video on the subject. Centre your following class around this
theme and give your students 10 to 15 minutes to recount their video to their partners. This is a
great way to reinforce the lesson vocabulary and engage your students with the topic.

 TED ED: A much better choice!

https://ed.ted.com/
A much better choice of listening is TED ED. TED Ed is full of short educational videos about
science, culture and history. Your students will be able to follow the listening much better
because along with the speaker’s voice there are animations to help tell the story.
Best of all the videos are only five minutes long and so it’s a homework activity that everyone
has time to do.

READING
ESL Lounge
http://www.esl-lounge.com/student/reading.php
ESL Lounge provides short readings and gap fill exercises divided into elementary, pre-
intermediate, intermediate, upper-intermediate and advanced. Students can check their
understanding with a quiz at the end.
Five Minute English
http://www.5minuteenglish.com/reading.htm
Five minute English also provides short reading exercises. All activities come with a glossary of
new words and a quiz at the end so your students can check their understanding. The only
drawback is that the readings are not defined by level.

GRAMMAR REVIEW
Viewing video lessons to either recap on the last grammar class or prepare for the next one is
another highly productive no-marking homework activity.
Here are the best grammar video resources.
Engvid
https://www.engvid.com
ENGVID Provides bite-sized video lessons on most aspects of English grammar and lots of
vocabulary points. Students can also read a transcript of the lesson and check their
understanding with a quiz on their website.
Let’s Talk: Youtube
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCicjynhfFw2LiIQFnoS1JTw
You need it, you’ll find it here. This Youtube channel has hundreds of videos on every aspect of
the English language.

GRAMMAR AND VOCABULARY QUIZZES

If you’ve just finished a grammar topic, setting your students a few grammar quizzes is a good
way to review the lesson. There are dozens of grammar quiz sites out there, but proceed with
caution: many of these sites are spammy with annoying adverts and pop ups all over the page.
They are difficult to navigate for a native speaker never mind a student.
The BBC also offers a comprehensive library of grammar resources and quizzes for English
learners. However, I haven’t included them in the list because you need a flash player to use
them.
The websites I have selected also have adverts but they are not invasive. They have also
established sites within the TEFL community.
Dave’s ESL Café (grammar)
http://www.eslcafe.com/quiz
This site provides a meeting point for TEFL teachers to ask and answer questions and share
resources. A little known fact is that Dave’s ESL Café also boasts hundreds of quizzes on various
grammar and vocabulary points, written by teachers.
ESL-lounge (grammar)
http://www.esl-lounge.com/student/
ESL-lounge is another well-known site for TEFL resources, it also has a library of grammar
quizzes for students.
British Council Teens (vocabulary)
http://learnenglishteens.britishcouncil.org/grammar-vocabulary/vocabulary-exercises
The best vocabulary quiz I have found comes from The British Council Teens site. Here users
must match pictures and words together to learn vocabulary. All words come with an audio so
students can check their pronunciation.

WRITING
Writing is an essential skill and, as a TEFL teacher, you must set and mark writing assignments.
But what if there were a way for students to practice writing independently as well?
Well, there is.
Do you remember when you were learning French or Spanish at school and your teachers
encouraged you to start a correspondence with a foreign pen pal to improve your language
skills?
Well, the concept still exists. If a few of the class take it up, it can also become an interesting
weekly speaking practice as you catch up on the news from their pen friends, and as a group,
correct the grammar and spelling on their next correspondence.
Popular Pen Pal sites
http://www.penpalworld.com
https://www.globalpenfriends.com
https://www.penpalsnow.com/index.html

PRONUNCIATION
Pronunciation is often the blight of an ESL class. Bad pronunciation should be corrected, but if
you have a large class it is often difficult to give that one-on-one attention to a student who is
really struggling to improve.
This is why asking your students to watch pronunciation videos and practice in their own time is
a worthwhile homework exercise. Here are some of the best sites to learn.
Rachel’s English: Accent American
http://rachelsenglish.com
Rachel’s English undoubtedly provides one of the most comprehensive pronunciation resources
on the web. Rachel will walk your students through all of the sounds in the English language. In
addition, she has videos on the rhythm of English, elision (when speakers drop vowel sounds as
they link words together in a sentence) and common idioms.
Youglish: Accent International
https://youglish.com
Youglish uses YouTube to teach the pronunciation of any English word. Simply write the word
into the search bar and Youglish will bring up a snippet of a video with someone using it. It is
truly brilliant.
BBC Learning English Pronunciation Guide: Accent British
Teacher Jamie teaches students all the common sounds in the English language.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/learningenglish/english/features/pronunciation
For more on pronunciation, check out our
pronunciation: https://www.bilinguanation.com/english-pronunciation-activities-for-your-esl-
class/guide.

EXAMS
Cambridge PET, FCE, CAE Exam
https://www.flo-joe.co.uk
If your students want to sit the Cambridge English exam then they can find everything they need
to prepare with Flo-Joe.com. Here students will find a rich archive of free listening, reading,
speaking and writing papers from each exam level. Listening and reading exams come with
their own answer keys for self-correction. The writing paper, however, will have to be corrected
by the teacher and speaking practice done in class.
IELTS
https://takeielts.britishcouncil.org/prepare-test/british-council-online-resources
https://www.ieltsbuddy.com
https://ieltsforfree.com/
If your students are taking the IELTS exam, here are three resource sites where students can
practice with past papers, complete with an answer key. Again any writing practice will have to
be corrected by the teacher and speaking practice done in class.
 Chris Pell tips:

 Reply All: https://gimletmedia.com/shows/reply-all (tech topics and

mysteries/discussions/interviews)
 The World: https://www.pri.org/programs/the-world (current
events/interviews)
 This American Life: https://www.thisamericanlife.org/ (interesting stories
about life in America/interviews/often amusing/some adult language)
 Criminal: https://thisiscriminal.com/ (short crime stories/interviews/often
amusing/interesting/some language)
 Serial: https://serialpodcast.org/ (investigative
journalism/mysteries/narratives/interviews)
 S-Town: https://stownpodcast.org/ (investigative
journalism/narrative/interviews)
 The Moth: https://themoth.org/podcast (curated stories/interviews/narratives)
 Revisionist History: http://revisionisthistory.com/ (historical
inaccuracies/sociology)
 Tim Ferris: https://tim.blog/podcast/ (personal development/stories on a wide
range of topics)
 Today in
Focus: https://www.theguardian.com/news/series/todayinfocus (current
events/interviews)
 Ted Talks: https://www.ted.com/talks (topical speeches/videos/transcripts)
 BBC Podcasts: https://www.bbc.co.uk/podcasts (a selection of various
podcasts)
 British Council Podcasts: https://learnenglish.britishcouncil.org/general-
english/podcasts (everyday conversational English)