Resources for languages self-improvement

 For self-study and HW practice

by Maria Soledad Bancoff

Translator & Lecturer

Dear learners and teachers! 💓

As much as teachers want to cover ALL in class, time flies and it's hard to cope with evrything! Mostly, when we teach conversation classes the main focus of the class is on helping our students to acquire fluency and the main tools to speak about different topics: vocabulary and useful language (phrases).

Nevertheless, learners can do MUCH on their own to self-improve faster! Here are some resources I LOVE and strongly recommend students to visit and practise on their own. 

Check the website, its short description and an extention with some more details below. ALL these resources are FREE, and there's no need to sign in.

If you like this entry, feel free to like it, share it and comment here. Your comments make a differente and help me to reach more learners and educators. Explore and comment here: which is your favourite?

Happy learning!!

Website	Link	Useful to improve	Language(s)
1. One Note	https://www.onenote.com/learningtools	Fluency and pronunciation	Any
2. Lyrics Training	https://es.lyricstraining.com/	Listening	Any
3. English Central	https://es.englishcentral.com/browse/videos	Listening, fluency and pronunciation	English
4. Google Slides Caption	https://blog.google/outreach-initiatives/accessibility/whats-you-say-present-captions-google-slides/	Speaking and pronunciation	Any
5. BITS	https://esl-bits.net/	Listening and pronunciation	Any
6. ESL Fast	https://www.eslfast.com/	Basically... all!	English
7. ESL Lab	https://www.esl-lab.com/	Listening	English
8. New York Public Library	https://www.nypl.org/help/community-outreach/immigrant-services/learn-esol-online-resources	It's a list of resources for all learners!	English
9. Perfect English Grammar	https://www.perfect-english-grammar.com/	Grammar practice and explanations	English
10. Write and improve	https://writeandimprove.com/	Writing	English
11. Speak and improve	https://speakandimprove.com/	Speaking	English
12. ELSA	https://elsaspeak.com/	Speaking	Any
13. Vocabkitchen	https://www.vocabkitchen.com/profile	Writing	English
14. Englishmatic	https://englishmatic.com/english-reading-comprehension-tests-exercises-online/	Reading, vocabulary, grammar and IELTS.	English
15. English Club.	https://www.englishclub.com/	All!!	English
16. Games to learn English	https://www.gamestolearnenglish.com/	Grammar and vocabulary.	English
17. Playphrase	https://playphrase.me/#/search	Listening.	English
18. Language Reactor	https://www.languagereactor.com/	All connected to listening.	All
19. Interview Warm-up	https://grow.google/certificates/interview-warmup/	Listening and speaking.	English
20. English Grammar	https://www.english-grammar.at/	Vocabulary and grammar.	English

1. One Note: scroll to the bottom of the website and copy and paste any text. Click Try It Out to access the text in the Immersive Reader. You can listen and read aloud, click on the word(s) you want to hear again, when clicking some words, they show a picture to help the student undersatand their meaning.By enabling the tags, you can see words categories. (HOW COOL IS THAT!) You can also set the speed you feel comfortable with when reading.

2. Lyrics Training: listen to your favorite songs and type the words you hear! (it's a game, so watch your score). You can choose the difficulty level!

3. English Central: students can choose their level, repeat phrases from videos they select and get immediate feedback (although the feedback is not accurate, the contents of the videos are interesting and engaging to practice!)

4. Google Slides Captioning: you can enable this wonderful tool to speak and check if the transcriptions of what you say match your speech.

5. BITS: it's a large collection of novels, short stories, speeches and many other recordings. You can listen and read at the same time, also try to copy the pronunciation and intonation! (this is a great practice, as you "teach" your speech organ how to articulate sounds!) Also, little by little, you'll incorporate new words and structures.

6. ESL Fast: it's a brilliant collection of many different tools for self-improvement splitted into levels. You can find excercises to boost your speaking, reading, writing and listening. There's grammar too!

7. ESL Lab: you can listen to lots of audios (interesting dialogues from real life), and do quizzes to check your comprehension.

8. New York Public Library: you'll find LOTS of websites and a brief descriptions of their content.

9. Perfect English Grammar: choose the grammar content you need to practice and do some drilling! You'll get immediate feedback on your work, and you can practice as much as you want.

10. Write and improve: submit you own writing and get a feedback of some of the most common mistakes and suggestions to re-write your work.

11. Speak and improve: you can practice speaking and check your skills to answer questions quickly. It’s a good tool to practice on your own and get some feedback. Give it a try!

12. ELSA: Speak English in short, fun dialogues. Get instant feedback powered by artificial intelligence technology. This is suitable for many languages!

13. Vocabkitchen: This is a great tool to learn about your writing level. Copy and paste a text written on your own without help and get an estimate on your level according to global standards.

15. English Club: This website contains very useful and easy-to-use resources to practice different skills, access explanations and forums to exchange with other students.

16. Games to learn English: One of my favs!! You can play these simple yet engaging games to practice some grammar and learn new vocabulary. The layout is clean and brain-friendly. Enjoy it!

17. Playphrase: It is an AI tool that allows users to search and play movie and TV show dialogue clips using keywords. You can login, but it’s not necessary. Just type the phrase you’d like to listen to and hit enter.

18. Language Reactor: Language Reactor is a language learning app on the web that uses video streaming platforms to help you learn languages. You can download its Chrome extension and install it. After you install the extension and you visit Youtube or Netflix, it will ask you to choose your native language. Once you click on a video, it will show you the subtitles in the original language, and the subtitles in your native language. It will also add a side panel with the entire text of the video. You can click on each word, and a dictionary will pop up. It will also pronounce this word for you.

19. AI interview: This AI tool is a great way to warm up for a job interview. Before starting, make sure your microphone works well. Just choose the kind of interview you’ll attend and practice answering some questions. You can also practice just for fun.

20. English grammar: This is a highly recommended resource to check your knowledge and continue learning. Choose from the many options classified into levels and test yourself. You’ll get immediate feedback on your work.

Have a wonderful week!! See you soon!!