Ms. Tomalin’s English Language Center
Independent Study for English Learners
FREE online English language courses
- USA Learns American English language course for adults provided by the U.S. Department of Education, includes both beginner and intermediate-level modules
- BBC Learning English British English learning modules for both adults and children (BBC = British Broadcasting Company)
- FLOW Speak Downloadable app for English speaking practice.
YouTube channels for learning American English
- Rachel’s English: American English pronunciation, vocabulary, and situational speaking
- Boost Up English: American English pronunciation, vocabulary and grammar
- English with Jennifer: Grammar, vocabulary, speaking & reading fluency
- VOA Learning English: Voice of America radio news, spoken at 33% slower than normal broadcast speed
Vocabulary
- The Britannica Dictionary: My favorite dictionary for English Learners! Its definitions are easy to understand, and it has audio to hear pronunciation
- Vocabulary.com: Sign up for free account that makes individualized vocabulary study for you
- Quizlet Root words flash cards
- Vocabulary-Building Games: A collection of free vocabulary learning games
- Dave's ESL Café: Dictionary of slang
- a4ESL: Vocabulary quizzes English-only and bilingual
Grammar
- Grammar Girl: A YouTube channel that focuses on English grammar and punctuation. If you prefer text instead of video, see this webpage
- Linguanaut English Written Course: Grammar lessons
- Dave's ESL Café: Grammar lessons and quizzes
- a4ESL: Grammar quizzes with 3 levels of difficulty
- ESL Lounge: Self-guided lessons
Practice irregular verbs
- Match present verbs with their past form
- Practice with a jeopardy-style game
- Irregular verbs 2-player game
- Irregular verbs flashcards
- Series of irregular verb exercises
- Irregular verb drills
- Complete the chart
- Using irregular verbs in sentences
Idioms
- Definition and examples of idioms
- Pocket English Idioms: Illustrated examples of idioms
- The Idiom Connection: What is an idiom? and dictionary of idioms
- Dave's ESL Café: Lists, examples and definitions of idioms
Listening comprehension
- Voice of America: Practice English by listening to radio news. Includes transcripts if you want to read while listening
- Podcasts in English (British English): Multiple levels, with transcripts available
- TED Podcasts: TED Talks audio
- Breaking News English (British English): Listening and reading comprehension practice using recent news articles
- Randall's ESL Cyber Listening Lab: Listening quizzes
- IELTS Listening Test: Practice, Lessons and Tips to improve your score
- Down to Business English: British English for business
- Excellent ESL 4U: Listening activities
Reading comprehension
- Breaking News English: Reading and listening comprehension practice using recent news articles
- Excellent ESL 4U: Reading practice
Writing and editing
- Grammar Girl: Tips for correct writing.; especially don't miss Grammar Girl's Editing Checklist
- Purdue OWL: ESL Online Writing Lab of Purdue University
- Excellent ESL 4U: Scroll down for practice writing topics
- ESL Writing: A collection of links for practicing English writing
- The Elements of Style by William Strunk Jr. is an old-school writing guide
Games for practicing English
- List of ESL games
- Games to Learn English website
- Free Rice: Each correct answer donates 10 grains of rice to the UN World Food Programme
- Ruzzle: Word puzzle game
- ESL Games +: Some games are downloadable
- Brain Pop ELL free trial
Spanish → English
- Learn English from Spanish - Con instrucciones y explicaciones en español
- Spanish/English cognates listed alphabetically, English to Spanish
- Lista alfabética de cognados, español al inglés
- Cognates grouped by part of speech
- Here is a printable list of Spanish/English cognates
- FALSE cognates with definitions in English
- Cognados FALSOS con definiciones en español
Pronunciation Practice for American English
Video tutorials for pronunciation of American English
Producing vowel sounds
- Rachel's English American English vowel sounds videos
- Short vs. long vowel sounds intro video
- Some tips about vowels
- Compare vowel sounds (American)
- American English vs. British English vowel sounds
- Minimal pairs practice
- Ship or Sheep: Practice vowel sounds with minimal pairs (text only)
- Vowel length is affected by ending consonant
Short vowels
- Short vowel sounds overview - practice with a mirror
- How to produce the short /a/ sound as in bat
- How to produce the short /e/ sound as in bed
- Compare Short /e/ vs. short /a/ --> bed vs. bat
- How to produce the short /i/ sound as in sit
- How to produce the short /u/ sound as in push
Long vowels
- Long vowel sounds overview - practice with a mirror
- Compare long /e/ vs. short /i/ --> seat vs. sit
- Compare short /i/ vs. long /e/ --> live vs. leave
- Compare short /o/ vs. short /u/ --> shot vs. shut
Producing consonant sounds
- Rachel's English How-To videos list
- Unvoiced vs. Voiced consonant sounds
- How to produce Stop consonants (your mouth stops the flow of air)
- Vowel length is affected by ending consonant
B and V
- How to produce /f/ and /v/ (use same mouth position)
- How to make the V sound
- Minimal Pairs Practice for /b/ and /v/
CH and J
- How to produce /ch/ and /jj/ (use same mouth position)
D and T
- How to produce /t/ and /d/ (use same mouth position)
- I Sleep in a BET (D vs T)
- The Flap T
- T Combined with other sounds
F and V
- How to pronounce /f/ and /v/ (use same mouth position)
- How to make the /v/ sound
- Practice the difference between /f/ and /v/
G and K
- How to produce /g/ and /k/ (use the same mouth position)
L and R
- How to produce L /l/
- How to produce R /r/
- Compare /r/ and /l/
- How to produce /l/ in the middle of a word
- Compare Work vs. Walk
- Compare Word vs. World
- Practice /l/ and /r/
- Practice /l/ and /r/ with diagrams of mouth
S and Z
- How to produce /s/ and /z/ (use same mouth position)
- Letter S pronounced as /z/
- Final -s plural nouns
- How to pronounce BECAUSE (final /z/)
V and W
Y and J
CH and SH
- American pronunciation CH vs SH
- Practice Difference between /ch/ and /sh/
- Compare S and SH /s/ vs. /sh/
TH: /θ/ (unvoiced/soft) and /ð/ (voiced/hard)
- The 2 sounds of TH
- Pronunciation tips for TH
- Link TH to other sounds
- Final -TH + S
- NTH Cluster Practice Tip
- How to pronounce TH after /n/ or /z/
- How to pronounce The word SOMETHING
- Practice /θ/ Unvoiced (soft) TH
- Practice /ð/ Voiced (hard) TH
- TH sounds video list
Suffix -ed
- Video 3 ways to pronounce -ed
- Video Final –ed Sounds part 1
- Video Final –ed Sounds part 2
- Video Eva Easton's -ED course
- Video flash cards Final –ed
Consonant clusters and blends
Consonant cluster = consonant sounds that are not separated by a vowel sound
- How to produce consonant cluster TR as in train
- How to produce consonant cluster THR as in three
- How to produce consonant cluster BR as in bring
- How to produce consonant cluster SHR as in shrimp
- How to produce consonant cluster -TL at end of words such as bottle
- How to produce consonant cluster -NTH at end of words such as tenth
- How to produce consonant clusters -SKS -STS and -SPS at end of words such as desks, tests, wasps
- How to pronounce QU /kw/ as in quiet
- How to produce /sk/ and /dj/ as in schedule
- How to produce /gr/ and /dj/ as in graduate
- Especially for Spanish-speakers: Consonant clusters that start with S (not ES!)
Minimal pairs – Practice for all letter sounds
Minimal pair = 2 words that are different by only 1 sound, for example: lot/not, sad/sat, or bad/bed
- Audio ManyThings.org
- Video 60 Minimal Pairs
- Audio ShiporSheep.com
Pitch and intonation
The pitch of a sound = how high or low it is
Intonation = the rise and fall of the sound of your voice when you speak
- What is intonation?
- Questions and intonation: Up or down?
- Questions vs. statements
- Intonation Practice: How to greet Americans
- Imitation exercise: What did you do today?
- Imitation exercise: Talk about Thanksgiving
Stress on syllables
Stress = a greater loudness or force you put on a syllable of a word when you say it. Some English words are spelled the same but are stressed differently, for example:
- CONtent is a noun (= the things that are contained within something)
- conTENT is an adjective (= pleased and satisfied)
- English: A stress-timed language
- How to stress a syllable: The "shape" of stressed syllable
- Stressed syllables within words
- Change the stress, change the meaning: 35 words that change meaning
- Stressing content words
- Un-stressing and reducing function words
- Changing word stress for clarification
- Unstressed vs. reduced syllables
- Stress patterns in phrases and sentences - part 1
- Stress patterns in phrases and sentences - part 2
- Stress patterns in phrases and sentences - part 3
- Stress and rhythm in American English pronunciation
Rhythm
Rhythm = a repeated pattern of sounds that happen at times that are equally separated
- The rhythm of English
- Stress and rhythm in American English pronunciation
- Imitation exercise: What did you do today?
- Imitation exercise: Talk about Thanksgiving
Tongue-twisters!
- Rachel’s English 3 Tongue Twisters to Improve Your American English
- Hank Green Tongue Twisters
- Storyteller Donna Washington Peter Piper Tongue-Twister
- Storyteller Donna Washington Betty Boughta Tongue-Twister
- Storyteller Donna Washington Tongue Twister Challenge
- Thistle-Sifter tongue-twister from the movie The King's Speech
- Try more yourself! Here is a list of tongue-twisters
References and Research Tools for English Learners
- The Britannica Dictionary for English Learners: Includes definitions that are easy to understand and audio to hear pronunciations
- Thesaurus: Find synonyms and antonyms of words
- Sweet Search: Like Google Search, but all sources have been verified by educators
- Carrot2: Search engine that organizes search results into topics
- Wikipedia in Simple English: Includes the same information as regular Wikipedia, but written for English Learners
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Updated March 2024
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