Vol. 1. No. 3 INT March 1995
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On the Internet

Traveling the Internet: Top 10 Stops for ESL/EFL Teachers and Students

M.E. Sokolik
University of California, Berkeley
<msokolik@uclink.berkeley.edu>

Watching the development of the Internet can be likened to watching a burgeoning young town that has no city planners: it is chaotic, crowded, and ultimately, interesting. Finding your way around, however, is made difficult by the fact that maps don't exist: in fact, they would be obsolete the microsecond they were created. The scores of books that are being published to help people navigate the 'net are a step in the right direction, but they, too, become obsolete while they undergo the slow, painful, print process.

Each issue of TESL-EJ features information relevant to ESL/EFL teachers. This issue, we are presenting ten spots you or your students might want to check out. Some of these are gopher sites-- you can typically access these just by typing "gopher" on your on- line system (each system varies, be sure to ask if you aren't sure about yours). Others are WWW (World Wide Web) sites, which require a graphical browser such as Mosaic or Netscape.

Web sites can be frustrating! Since they often include sound and graphics files, they can be slow even on the most sophisticated machines. In addition, connections sometimes don't go through, or you find that the browser you are using doesn't match the standards used to create the file.

This is not meant to be discouraging. Rather, browse with this information in mind, but then have fun. And, as you look around, if you see things you think would be useful for your colleagues around the world, let me know. We'll feature your suggestion in an upcoming issue of the journal.

The Sites

  1. WWW Sites

    1. Galaxy

      2. http://einet/galaxy/Arts-and-Humanities/Language-and-Literature

      You will find a wealth of language-related material here. Poetry (including a link to the Shiki Internet Haiku Salon), fiction and nonfiction, a Roget's Thesaurus, a hyptertext version of Webster's dictionary, and much, much more. [-1-]

    2. The Scholastic Internet Center

      3. http://scholastic.com:2005/public

      The Scholastic Internet Center is a commercial venue for Scholastic products. However, they also have student writing samples, text excerpts, sample syllabi, and other information available, without charge. For content-based work, there are also files for teaching science and math.

    3. The Whitehouse

      4. http://whitehouse.gov

      Tour the Whitehouse, spend a day with the Clinton family, or explore the various branches of the U.S. government (even here Socks, the Clintons' cat, meow).

    4. The Library of Congress

      5. http://lcweb.loc.gov/homepage

      Learn about special collections, search for titles, and explore a number of other functions of one of the largest libraries in the world. The U.S. Library of Congress is beginning a project to digitize its collection, so this site will probably be one to continue to watch for interesting developments. This site includes access to Thomas, which has complete texts of bills and information about legislation before the U.S. Congress.

    5. Weather Information Superhighway

      6. http://thunder.met.fsu.edu/~nws/wxhwy.html

      This site has connections to meteorological stations worldwide. You can get a weather map of Europe, track hurricanes in the Caribbean, find out the weather in Japan in either Japanese or English, and much more. There are some interactive maps available, which can be used to specify an area of interest. Beware: downloading these maps is a slow process.

    6. Virtual Frog Dissection

      7. http://george.lbl.gov/ITG.hm.pg.docs/dissect.html

      This spot lets you interact with Lawrence Berkeley Laboratories in dissecting a "virtual" frog. You can view various parts of the frog by clicking on names of anatomical parts. If you've mastered it in English, you can try it in French, Spanish, German, or Dutch. If you speak another language and would like to add your translation, you can.[-2-]

    7. Applied Linguistics Virtual Library

      8. http://www.bbk.ac.uk/Departments/Applied Linguistics/VirtualLibrary.html

      This site is maintained by Prof. Larry Selinker, and contains information on Applied Linguistics programs throughout the world. It also links to ESL and AL-related archives, including TESL-EJ and TESL-L. You can also click on Prof. Selinker's home page and see his picture.

    8. TESL-EJ

      http://www.kyoto-su.ac.jp/information/tesl-ej

      http://www-writing.berkeley.edu/TESL-EJ

      [The above URL updated Dec. 1997 -- ed.]

      TESL-EJ can now be found in its entirety (or nearly) on our new Web site in Japan. The most recent issue can be found at the "Well" site.

  2. Gopher Sites:

    1. Ask ERIC

    3. gopher://ericir.syr.edu/11/Lesson

    Link up to ERIC, a large database of abstracts, articles, and other information on education.

  3. CUNY Gopher: Teaching English as a Second or Foreign Language

    4. gopher://CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU:70/11/Subject%20Specific%20Gophers/

    (choose teaching English as a Second or Foreign Language)

    This gopher site also contains a link to TESL-EJ, as well as TESL-L archives. It houses a large number of files of great use to ESL/EFL professionals.

Surf's up! Enjoy the ride.

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