Lesson Planning

• ALTopedia – A database full of activities, lesson plans, and ideas sorted by textbook ranging from elementary school to high school. These uploads are sent in from other English teachers around Japan.
• ALTTO – An open-access professional development learning platform for ALTs teaching in Japan, run by English teachers in Japan as well as professors who teach at universities around Japan. This site has learning modules to level up your teaching skills and a blog about hot topics related to teaching.
• American English – The US Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs’ ESL resource page. It has ET resources and forums, as well as some reading on teaching ESL in general.
• Breaking News English – A resource for making lesson plans centered around current events.
• Colorin Colorado – A resource about reading 101 for ELL. Helpful tips on phonemic awareness, phonics, vocabulary, fluency, and comprehension, and how it can be taught across elementary, middle, and high school. This site also covers a wide variety of other important skills to cover for ELL in the articles written by Kristina Robertson.
• Eigo Ganbare – A resource covering three English levels with clean printouts explaining each topic. Also details how to set up an English club or pen pal system at your school if it’s something that interests you.
• English Activity – Ready-to-use materials that are primarily free to download, ranging from 3rd grade to 6th grade.
• ESL Authority – Pre-made worksheets ranging across a wide swath of topics, from simple topics like birthdays to phonics. Also has a job board to browse.
• ESL Kids – An older website with helpful worksheet generators, classroom game ideas, and fun songs!
• ESL Kid Stuff – Hundreds of lesson plans, games, activities, etc. for ages three to nineteen.
• Eva Easton’s American English Pronunciation – Not necessarily geared towards academia-type planning, but helpful commentary on specific details of the American accent. Has many different listening prompts and helpful explanation videos you could use to supplement some of your own material.
• Handwriting Workshop – Handwriting worksheet generator for writing practice.
• Kumamoto JET’s Lesson Anthology – An anthology of lessons from JETs around Japan! Surveyed and updated every year.
• MEXT online resource for ALTs – MEXT’s various resources covering teaching in the classroom topics.
• Naruto University of Education Activity Book for FLA – Classroom activities you can use with instructions in English and Japanese. Includes listening, speaking, reading, and writing activities.
• Reverse WaniKani – An ALT from Nagasai’s reverse WaniKani learning game, perfect for JHS English vocabulary.
• Tay’s Teaching Toolkit – A resource full of free PowerPoint and Google slide games for ESL, including game types focusing on single students, listening, speaking, reading, and more. Also has information about PowerPoint in general, so you can level up your own skill.