Sussex Centre for Language Studies

English language links

Learning resources

  • UEfAP (Using English for Academic Purposes) is a guide for international students developed by Andy Gillett of the University of Hertfordshire.
  • English e-pack from London Metropolitan University: 36 activities (in 4 units) especially designed to help with the business aspect of Academic English.
  • University Challenge - a short orientation and listening course for international students.
  • LearnEnglish online with the British Council - lots of good learning activities
  • Internet TESL Journal student links - more than 12,000 of them, and over 1,000 activities for ESL students - a vast collection of quizzes, tests, exercises and puzzles.
  • Antimoon.com - how to learn English effectively. Includes advice from people who learned English successfully. Site written in simple English.
  • EnglishSpace is a free English language course for beginners, pre-intermediate or intermediate students, themed around a spaceship voyage. There's messaging, homepages and collaborative storylines as well as puzzles, games, exercises and projects to help you practise your English skills.
  • Interesting Things for ESL Students - a fun study site with word games, puzzles, quizzes, slang, proverbs etc.
  • Dave's ESL Cafe offers lots of discussion forums, quizzes, idioms and the ESL Help Center, a message board where your English questions are answered by a team of teachers from around the world.
  • Free English Games - animated online games to help you improve your English. Requires Flash.
  • La Mansión del Inglés - English for Spanish speakers: courses, grammar, vocabulary, exercises, books, downloadable software etc.

Reference

News and media

  • Most British newspapers have online editions: The Guardian, The Telegraph and The Mirror for example have almost the whole newspaper freely available. The Times requires payment for some content though.
  • BBC News and CNN Interactive are also well-presented, in-depth news sites.
  • Google News UK allows you to search and browse over 25,000 continuously updated news sources.

  • Virtual Brighton is intended as a reflection of the cultural and commercial life of Brighton, Hove and the South Coast, and includes a section for tourists.

Listening

  • BBC Learning English - audio, exercises, glossaries and other material based on the World Service broadcasts.
  • Listen and Write helps to improve your listening skills using dictation from audio and video on the web. It repeats sections until you enter the correct transcription, and is particulary useful for detailed listening that involves bottom-up processing skills.
  • elllo - English Listening Lesson Library Online is an impressive library of hundreds of audio clips of English speakers from around the world, many as audio slideshows (with pictures) complete with subtitles/audio transcripts and audio notes about the clips (and even transcripts of those!). There are also comprehension questions, some of which are also audio.
  • Real English - learn (mostly American) English through videos of people speaking "real English": spontaneous, authentic speech instead of "classroom English".
  • English Accents and Dialects - a virtual exhibition from the British Library (log in with your university username for full access). The BBC Voices website covers more contemporary regional vocabulary.
  • Fonetiks - pronunciation guides to seven world varieties of English, with native speaker sounds and accents.
  • Literacy Network run a useful site based on CNN and CBS stories: full/abridged/outline text of the story, listen to the text, video clip, with a variety of exercises.
  • Randall's ESL Cyber Listening Lab - well-written and structured listening quizzes for autonomous learners, including some Divace-specific material and some video.
  • ComAudio provides audio fragments - regularly updated from a variety of sources - which you can listen to while reading the spoken text on-screen. You can look up the meaning of words by clicking on them and check your understanding by answering questions.

  • Splendid Speaking is an advanced-level self-study course and community, from the makers of Flo-Joe.

Exams and Tests

Reading and Writing

  • The Purdue University Online Writing Lab offers on-line writing support (tutors reply to your e-mail), plus a virtual sheaf of handouts on writing skills, grammar, punctuation etc. They also maintain a comprehensive list of other on-line writing centres and resources, such as The Online Writery at Missouri University.
  • Online Books Page at the University of Pennsylvania is a good starting point for browsing the treasure trove of online literature.
  • Turning the Pages is a British Library project to allow realistic access to unique old books such as the original Alice.
  • The Many Roads to Japan is a free online ESL reader for low intermediate level and above. The novel tells the story of a Vietnam War conscientious objector's adventures in about 20,000 words, and includes comprehension and discussion/essay questions, with the author's reading of the answers. It can also be heard online read by the author.

Variants