Today I was searching for online activities for a certain student of mine and came across this wonderful resource: hubbardscupboard.org. Since I’m on the topic, I just wanted to list out a few very helpful and very free websites that I’ve used for elementary ESL.
Hubbard’s Cupboard has take home books (by topic and target sight word) for sight words and other stories. It’s definitely one of my all-time favorite sites. I’m thinking of printing the sight word books on cardstock and making center books for the classroom.
Kid Zone offers great coloring and writing activities for phonics. I use their worksheets quite often to supplement my curriculum for practice in writing, vocabulary with pictures, and practice finding the letters. The writing sheet can serve for writing practice, but I also have my students find the target letting in the labels underneath the pictures. On their own, my kindergarteners have expanded this extra activity to include searching every single word on the page and circling the target letter if it’s there. I have the cutest kids ever. (Kid Zone also has great ideas and printables for crafts projects and take-home books)
Flashcards from Kids Pages is a great resource. The pictures are well-done and they have a large range of topics — even parts of speech — that are great for simple classroom flashcards, word walls (in an up-coming post), games, and take-home vocabulary help. This website has many other resources including colorful alphabet posters, worksheets and coloring pages.
I use these tracer pages from Kids Learning Station. They are great practice for kids and can be given as a kindergarten homework option. These tracer pages would make great center books. Put each page in a page protector and let students practice with a dry erase marker and then wipe the pages off. There are lots of other great pages on this website, so be sure to look around.
Barry Fun English is a great site for online games for vocab. development, print-outs, and PowerPoints.
Bab Books is a fun online game that gives students practice in using the different parts of speech to make up silly stories. I use this as a reinforcement activity — sometimes in conjunction with the parts-of-speech-word-wall — once we’ve covered the different parts of speech. Students fill in the slots with the correct part of speech and the computer plugs it in to a short story. The results are hilarious.
Work Sheet Works is a good place to look for supplemental practice sheets for upper elementary and middle school students.
thoughts and songs 