Teachers First - Thinking Teachers Teaching Thinkers

This site allows students to practice pronunciation in 10 languages, including English, European languages, and Mandarin Chinese. After a free registration, you can put in a search term for lessons. It's a bit difficult to guess search items, so looking at the entire list in any given language is a good way to start. Currently, English has 298 items. You are also able to contribute lessons.

One helpful document is the Chuala inventory which allows instructors to quiz ESL students on their pronunciation by having them pronounce 144 distinct items. They can then search the lessons for practice, recording, and making comparisons on these phonemes.

Some of the lessons take the whole language approach and appear as dialogs, discussions, or Q and A. Most, however, have students practice distinct sounds only, with no context. One advantage of the program is that you can select lessons by distinct language area. For example, American English students can hear examples of American English rather than British English. You can also request that other lessons be created. This site requires Flash and enabled Javascript. Get Flash and directions on enabling Javascript from the TeachersFirst Toolbox page..

tag(s): chinese (48), pronunciation (39)

This well planned site makes language learning easy. See a complete demo from a link on the "Features" page. Select the language you wish to study after free registration. Gifted students seeking independent study of a language will enjoy the extensive offerings.Lessons begin with a conversational preview. Each portion of the conversation appears on a separate screen, with multiple practices and translation. Hear native speakers pronounce the conversation sand explore many other rich features. If you mouse over the words, you can see the phonetic pronunciation. follow the color coding to see exactly which section of the language corresponds to the English. Although the site is in BETA as of this review, more language offerings appear frequently. Unfortunately the site does not offer English as a second language except to Spanish and Polish speakers. Presumably more English is coming.

This site requires FLASH. Get it from the TeachersFirst Toolbox page..

tag(s): chinese (48), french (82), german (59), greek (38), japan (58), japanese (42), russia (35), russian (24), spanish (109)

This animated site is sure to excite your students about learning the basics of French. Your students will love the cartoon characters on skateboards who teach the language skills. This website is educational, age-appropriate, and motivational. The topics include colors, numbers up to 60, pets, time, holidays and more. This website requires Flash, get it from the TeachersFirst Toolbox page..

tag(s): french (82)

This animated site is sure to excite your students about learning the basics of French. The language introduced includes numbers 0 - 21 and common phrases (such as "Hello, how are you?" or "What is your name?". Your students will love the cartoon characters on skateboards who teach the language skills. This website is educational, age-appropriate, and motivational. This website requires Flash, get it from the TeachersFirst Toolbox page..

tag(s): french (82)

This illustrated word list, grouped by category, offers users the chance to test their vocabulary knowledge of basics in English, French, Danish, and Dutch. Simply select a language and category, and the graphics in the category ask for a word choice. Immediate feedback in the chosen language indicates a percentage of correct choices and allows users to guess again.One unfortunate note: since the site creators are French, they did not capitalize the months of the year--even in English. You probably will not want to use that section of the site.

tag(s): french (82), vocabulary (255)

This website provides numerous teacher-created PowerPoints. Some of the presentations are excellent, while others are just mediocre. The range of topics goes from astronomy, to history, to French and much, much more! There is something good here for every classroom. You MUST have PowerPoint software (not free) to be able to download and edit the shows.

This site doesn't have a lot of depth, but there are examples of French Christmas traditions and how they have evolved over the last few hundred years. The presentation is extremely easy to navigate. C'est aussi en Francais!

tag(s): christmas (46)

As part of their extensive site for vocabulary, roots, and more, MyVocabulary.com has added a themed area for French vocab. Find interactive vocabulary activities using French vocabulary words. You will also find printable crosswords, fill in the blanks and more, all using the same theme words. This and other "themes" available on the site will make vocabulary development fun.

tag(s): french (82), vocabulary (255)