Life beyond Google...

Here are some links to sites that offer an interesting twist on web searching: the sites are less well-known, but can save a lot of time if you are searching for specific resources:

Software search
This engine allows you to search for useful software, mostly freeware and shareware.

Categorized search
Yoozila filters the results into social, video, blog, news and other categories.

PDF Search
A specialist seach engine that looks for downloadable pdf files

Sound Search
A site that specialises in finding sound effects freely available on the web

Image globe
This is an innovative and interesting image search engine

Multiple Search Engine
Sputtr promises to search multiple search engines simultaneously

MultiSearch
Ms Freckles is another multi search utility with an attractive interface.

Encyclopaedia Style Search
Factbites offers what it claims is a more "human" approach to searching.

Music Links

Here are a set of links to children's music pages. Most of these sites offer lyrics and music in midi format. Midi uses the computer's music synthesizer to play the songs. In midi format, songs are always "karaoke" - the synthesizer cannot emulate the human voice.

This can work as an advantage rather than a drawback, as the children can sing the song without interference from the original singer.

Unfortunately, Midi files will not play on a CD player if you copy them directly to CD without changing the file format. (You will still need a computer in your classroom to play the music.)

You can, however, change the format. To transfer Midi to CD, you have various options. One is to connect the audio out of your computer to the audio in of your CD player, and record the track in real time. Another option is to convert the midi file to a CD format (wma/wav etc) and then burn the new file to CD.

Many computers nowadays have a recording device, so you can play and record the file simultaneously over the internet.

LINKS

• KIDDIDLES
• CAN TEACH
• CHILDRENS SONG LYRICS
• MORE LYRICS & MUSIC
• YET MORE SONGS
• ACTION SONGS
  

There is some useful methodological advice on using songs at the British Council.

You can use MIDI SEARCH to help you locate song files.

LINK SITES

Many internet sites dedicate a lot of space to links to other sites. These links are often organised and classified in directory style. As we discussed in the session on searching, using this type of site with pre-evaluated links can be useful for busy teachers who do not want to spend time getting Google to work for them.













A few examples are given below.

ABOUT DOT COM
THE HOLIDAY ZONE
INTERNET TESL JOURNAL
ESL HQ
TESOL MAX
ESL CAFE LINKS
RONG CHANG
ESL DESK
USING ENGLISH

Again, tracking down these link compendium sites is a matter of refining and focusing your search skills. For the results above, I used the following search:

"ESL Links" children

You could try a lot of variations:

"EFL links" children
"EFL links" "young learners"
"ESOL links" kids

When you find a good links site, remember to bookmark it, and then bookmark the individual sites you find when navigating from the links site. Very quickly, you will find that you have a good number of high quality, reliable sites available to help you with preparing and supplementing classroom activity.