In this section there are 2,124 articles that cover essential ESL topics such as how to teach grammar, use realia, and teach young learners. There are also a lot of lesson ideas and fun activities included in the articles. This ESL article, for example, is about teaching grammar and describes five great activities. It has been given five stars by other busy teachers so it obviously has useful content. Check it out for yourself or take a look at other articles that relate better to your questions or teaching situation.
There are a lot of dos and don’ts and tips and tricks that many teachers learn through teaching.
Our ESL Essentials section will help you master the basics of teaching English and will help you start teaching like a 'pro'. Every ESL Essentials article provides clear, to-the-point instructions that can be used with the students right away.
At the moment we have 2,124 ESL Essentials.
Sometimes that is the best way to learn but the experiences of others can also help you develop your teaching skills without having to make the same mistakes. If you have a great story or activity, feel free to submit your own article so that you can share your knowledge with others. We would love to hear from you!
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ESL Articles
View our latest knowledgebase articles that will help you become a better English teacher. Learn from
professional teachers and put a bit of your own creativity into it!
Short of hopping on a plane and going abroad, there is no better way to prepare your students for communicating in English while abroad than using role plays.
As a teacher, you should understand ...
It’s intimidating. It’s challenging. It’s difficult. Sometimes it seems impossible. What is it? Speaking in a second language.
Unless you are a gifted language learner, musterin ...
When you start teaching English in Japan, you’ll soon find that even students with perfect spelling and reading abilities struggle to make conversation.
There are a few reasons for this; on ...
You come into grammar class full of excitement and enthusiasm.
You present your students with the day’s lesson, and clearly explain how to form the future progressive tense. They seem to un ...
Thailand is a wonderful country in which to teach ESL.
Whilst some schools not be the most organized, and you may not be told of events until the very last minute, friendly students, beautiful la ...
A beginner lesson perfect for a class full of young, tactile-oriented learners who love to get up and move around.
This lesson aims at teaching and developing proper question phrasing as well as ...
As an English teacher in México, you often encounter students who have studied English for many years either in school or having had private lessons.
Many of them aspire to complete the Te ...
Standing in line recently in a convenience store in Houston, Texas, I overheard the following dialogue referring to the credit card apparatus so prevalent at cashier stations today:
-No, man. You ...
So you have ESL students who can read in English…great!
But can they really read? Not just pick up a book and read it, but apply reading strategies to a text to obtain the information they ...
Teaching ESP (English for Special Purposes not Extra Sensory Perception) does not necessarily have to be a chore.
It can be fun and easy as well. You always have to remember that it is not very d ...
You see a reading exercise approaching, and you roll your eyes.
Reading is an essential skill, and the coursebook certainly offers plenty of dialogues and texts to read – but the problem is ...
Twenty-seven sophomores were wilting away in my muggy classroom on that sweltering September afternoon in Houston, Texas.
They lethargically slumped down in their chairs and barely showed the sig ...
While perhaps not as popular as general or business English, English for tourism is a class that you may be required to teach during your career as an ESL teacher.
Whether your students are prepa ...
In my beginning years as an ESL instructor, the general wisdom in teaching ESL pronunciation was that it was not so much the individual speech sounds that mattered but rather the “supersegme ...
Class sizes in Thailand are typically larger than you are used to in your home country, or other countries where you have taught ESL.
This is particularly true for government schools, with privat ...
Often English for tourism lessons are high stress.
In my experience, students book a fabulous summer holiday abroad, panic that they don't speak English well enough, and sign up for my class, hop ...
Sometimes ESL teachers and students just need to stress about stress.
Well, maybe not stress about it but at least pay some attention to it. However, stress isn’t something most teachers kn ...
It’s a question I have struggled with throughout my teaching career: Should I allow my students to use their first language in the ESL classroom?
Keeping an English only classroom has its b ...
Why did the ESL teacher use riddles in the classroom?
Well, I suppose you could answer that question several ways. Riddles aren’t something that most English as a second language teachers i ...
There are many different strategies and teaching methods that can be used as a teacher.
Teaching English however, can sometimes limit the ways in which you can present information to your student ...
English for tourism classes are taught to prepare students for the difficult task of speaking English in the real world, either through work in the travel industry or travel abroad.
Speaking Engl ...
Once a number of years ago at the beginning of a pronunciation skills class, a young man came up to my desk and introduced himself as “Asher.”
I shook his hand, at the same time wonde ...
So you’ve been assigned to your first ESL listening class, and may be feeling a little at a loss.
Perhaps you’ve never taught ESL listening skills before and don’t quite know wh ...
Part of learning a language is making mistakes.
Every ESL teacher knows this and sees their students making mistakes in their classroom every day. We don’t like it, but we know it is realit ...
Before working in Russia, you have a number of things you must organise before you can do so legally, or even be let into the country at all.
None of them is exceptionally difficult but get them ...
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