Show HN: ESL Voices – Helping teachers with daily lesson plans | Hacker News Reader

Show HN: ESL Voices – Helping teachers with daily lesson plans

esl-voices.com

12 pointsCawbv6 comments

I’m an ESL (English as a Second Language) teacher with experience in the classroom. I developed this website to deal with the problem that many teachers find it difficult to regularly provide material for ESL students. Since one of the main goals is to have ESL learners become proficient in English as quickly as possible, ESL-Voices provides free weekly lesson plans with answer keys for teachers. The lesson plans are based on current articles from a variety of major newspapers and magazines. I am also hoping to attract guest teachers in the future. I’m looking for any and all feedback. In particular, does the organization of the posts content about news stories, together with lesson plans, work? Thanks in advance.

Hi Cawbv,

I'm glad to see another motivated teacher. I currently work in ed tech and would like to learn more about t he challenges you face in the classroom. I was recently at ISTE and was able to get a good amount of feedback. But none from someone who was motivated to develop theheir own solution. I'm the lead engineer of a company and am not interested in selling you anything. Just want to gain insight into your challenges. Please email me at pablo@moondropapps.com

Hi I’ll contact you.

I'm an ESL teacher with just a few months experience in class and no TEFL certificate. I have had exactly the problem with coming up with lesson plans. The issue is I'm teaching students who have never learned a language and are absolute beginners, and it looks like most of the lesson plans you have are for higher level students. In general, I think it's important to break down the level in lesson plans first. The challenge with absolute beginners is that you can't get into any interesting material and I'm not very good at coming up with creative and fun lesson plans all the time.

Hi, Yes, these are plans for the more advanced ESL students. I am working towards including guest teachers, some of whom may contribute lesson plans for the lower levels. I agree that It is very challenging for teachers working with true beginners to create interesting activites. The New York Times has an ESL teaching section that might be of interest to you. Another useful site is Betty Azar http://www.azargrammar.com.

Thanks!

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