The 50 Best ESL Resources for Kids

Proficiency in English is essential for academic success. Kids who learn English as a second language (ESL) can benefit from lessons and activities in a variety of formats, helping them stay engaged and have fun while learning.

Interactive games and activities, vocabulary instruction, listening and reading comprehension, videos and other types of lessons can help kids learn ESL successfully. The following ESL websites for kids are categorized to help you choose the best websites for your child.

Games & Activities - Vocab - Listening & Reading - Videos - Other - ESL News

Games & Activities 

• 4 Kids ESL: 4 Kids ESL presents a variety of resources for ESL students in grades K-6, including flashcards, PowerPoint lessons, games and vocabulary worksheets.
• Dave’s ESL Café: Dave’s ESL Café offers ideas for children’s ESL activities. This content is primarily directed toward parents and teachers.
• English Avenue: English Avenue offers phonics and grammar worksheets, flashcards and board games for teachers and parents. This site charges an annual fee for access.
• English Ladder: English ladders offers English quizzes for ESL learners at all levels. The site remembers previous scores to allow learners to see their progress. The site requires free registration.      
• ESL Kids Stuff: This site has a wealth of resources for ESL children, but it has a particularly great section of games and activities. The games are broken into 4 sections: classroom games, flashcard games, song games, and teaching the alphabet. The site also has a fantastic online games section for kids to use with 12 different interactive games.
• ESL Kids World: ESL Kids World is a collection of resources for children learning ESL, including flashcards, games, songs, worksheets and interactive exercises online.
• ESL Kids: ESL Kids offers a variety of activities, including games, flashcards, worksheets, songs and more. The games section includes 8 full pages of spelling, speaking and vocabulary games.
• ESL Pages: ESL Pages offers a variety of ESL resources for students and teachers, including dictionaries, reading, grammar, speaking and spelling exercises, lesson plans, songs and games, and more.
• Hello World: Hello World is a comprehensive ESL resource, offering a variety of games, exercises, interactive activities, and more, with a special section for young children.
• Learn English Kids: This site, by British Council, offers resources for children learning English. Activities include games, songs, listen & watch, read & write, and more.
• Study English Today: This site helps children learn ESL through games, including Hangman and Memory Squares.
• Syvum: This site offers English reading activities, spelling and grammar activities, and online word games and puzzles for children of all ages.
• Teach Children ESL: This site offers free worksheets, flashcards, games, lesson plans and online activities to help children learn English.
• Young Learners' ESL: This site presents ESL resources for ESL students  ages 5-18.  Lessons include games, stories, songs and chants, and writing exercises.

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Vocabulary Instruction 

•  BBC Children’s Learning: The KS1 and KS2 Bitesize sections offer English vocabulary lessons for children ages 5-11. This site is presented by the BBC and concentrates on British English.
• ESL Kids Lab: This site offers 3 sets of flashcards that each have about 10 categories each, such as Action Verbs, Colors, Zoo Animals, Weather, and Time. You can download both small and large versions of all of the flashcards.
• ESL Kids--Worksheets: This site offers a worksheet generator that allows teachers to print custom-generated worksheets and quizzes in a variety of formats.
• Illustrated Vocabulary: This site helps children learn English vocabulary by viewing illustrations and choosing the appropriate word from drop-down menu. Topics range from colors and shapes to seasons.
• Lantern Fish: Lantern Fish presents language and math worksheets for grades K-7. Activities include grammar, math, nouns and other elements of vocabulary.
•  Lesson Planet: This site offers ESL vocabulary lesson plans and worksheets categorized by grade level.
• Picture Dictionary: Picture Dictionary helps children learn English by viewing vocabulary words and corresponding pictures.
• Starfall: Starfall offers free children’s phonics resources. There is a special section of kindergarten reading and phonics curriculum.

Listening & Reading Comprehension 

• 123 Listening: This site presents spoken dialogue on a variety of topics, and accompanying worksheets that help students match the written words with the words they hear.
• Agenda Web: Agenda Web helps students learn English by listening and reading a story accompanied by animation. Stories are categorized by elementary, lower intermediate, intermediate, upper intermediate and advanced levels.
• Cartoon English: Cartoon English offers a series of videos with accompanying text and comprehension quizzes. Videos are categorized by beginning, lower intermediate and upper intermediate levels, and have optional Spanish, Portuguese, Chinese, Korean and Turkish subtitles. Voices are computer-generated and free from any accent.
• Ed Help: Ed Help offers stories and reading comprehension exercises for English students from 1st grade through high school.
• ESL Bears: ESL Bears presents a series of listening comprehension exercises, in which students listen to questions and choose the best answer from several choices. This site is designed for first-year and beginning ESL students.
• ESL Storybooks: This site sells ESL storybooks, textbooks and vocabulary games for teachers to purchase and print for use with their students.
• Learn English Kids: This site helps kids practice their reading comprehension skills with interactive listening and reading games. This site is presented by British Council and emphasizes British pronunciation.
• Read Along with LA Time: This L.A. Times site presents children’s stories with accompanying text to help children learn English vocabulary.  
• Stories for Kids: This site is a collection of links to English reading exercises, some animated, with accompanying text, or with interactive content.
• Takako’s Great Adventure: This site presents a serial narrative story about a Japanese character named Takako. Students can follow the text while listening.  Each story is accompanied by vocabulary exercises and comprehension quizzes.
• What Do You Hear: What Do You Hear presents a series of listening comprehension exercise in which students listen to spoken sounds and parts of speech, then answer comprehension questions.

Videos

•  Clothes Words: This video is part 1 in a series of 6 videos teaching English clothing vocabulary. There is an accompanying book available for download.
• English 4 Kids: English 4 Kids is a comprehensive ESL site for kids. The site offers free activities, including videos, PowerPoint lessons and games, and printed lesson plans for sale.
• English Beginners Lesson—Numbers: This video is a simple, clear lesson teaching kids English numbers from 1 to 10.           
• Food Words: This video is part 1 in a series of 6 videos teaching English food vocabulary. There is an accompanying book available for download.
• Kindersay: Kindersay offers online English vocabulary videos for preschool aged children. Videos are categorized and can be viewed individually or as a slide show.
• MES TV: MES TV offers free ESL videos for children. Students learn dialogue by listening to spoken questions and answers with accompanying pictures. Videos cover a variety of subjects.
• More Easy Rhymes for Learning English: This video helps children learn English by listening to rhyming stories with accompanying pictures.
• This, That, These and Those: This video teaches the demonstrative pronouns this, that, these and those, and how to use them.
• Where’s Shompy?: This video teaches children prepositions of location, complete with a song and hand motions.

Other 

• Chinese Children Learn English: This site is geared toward Chinese-speaking ESL students, and sells children’s picture books teaching English vocabulary.
• Colorín Colorado: This site is a comprehensive resource specifically for Spanish-speaking ESL students and their teachers. The site includes a variety of activities, advice and teaching strategies.
• Education Place: This Houghton Mifflin site offers grammar and vocabulary exercises for more advanced ESL students in grades K-8.
• English-Zone: English-Zone offers a wealth of ESL language, vocabulary and grammar resources for older children. The lessons include worksheets and exercises, dictionaries, study skills and more.  
• ESL Galaxy: ESL Galaxy is a collection of lesson plans and teaching resources for ESL students and teachers of young ESL students.
• Handwriting For Kids: Handwriting for Kids offers math and vocabulary worksheets to help kids learn English handwriting.
• Super-Nature: Super-Nature is a curriculum that teaches children English using nature and ecology vocabulary.
• Teach ESL to Kids: This site, written by an American ESL teacher in Japan, is a comprehensive site for ESL teachers. Resources include games, crafts, lesson plans, advice for teaching babies, and more.
• The EFL Playhouse: The Playhouse offers a variety of activities for younger children learning ESL, including chants, songs, fingerplays, rhymes, tongue twisters, and more.

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