Breaking News English (http://www.breakingnewsenglish.com/), operated by Sean Banville, is a gorgeous website providing current news and free, ready-to-print EFL/ESL lessons plans with new lessons every 2 days, including 26-page printable handout, more than 40 online activities and MP3 in American and British English.
How to Use Breaking News English in Teaching and Learning
- When preparing a lesson, teachers can tailor their lessons with the help of BreakingNewsEnglish.com. They can apply handouts, MP3, exercises and activities provided by the website to facilitate language teaching.
- With conditions permitted, teacher can ask students to finish some exercises in the classroom. Some exercises, e.g. Hangman, No Letters, Sentence Jumble can be completed in pairs or in group, which increase collaborative discussion, engagement and practice of using target language.
- Students can arrange their autonomous learning via BreakingNewsEnglish.com by listening the MP3 and finish exercises provided here. After finishing the exercises, correct answers are provided in the website and students can correct their answers by themselves. With questions on the exercises, students can ask their teacher or classmates for help.
Benefits of Breaking News English in Language Classroom
- Fabulous exercises: 20 online quizzes and activities are provided for language teachers and learners
- Exercises are interactive
- Different skills (listening, reading, speaking and writing) can be practiced via Breaking News English
- Frequent update on current English news and lesson plans
- Build confidence in dealting with news and reports
- MP3 of the news is provided in US & UK English
- Handouts are printable and MP3 are downloadable
Limitations
- Design of the website: the layout is a bit messy and complicated and the color is not attractive
- Finishing all the exercises might take quite a long time
- Too many advertisements in the website
- Not all the exercises are helpful
- Sean Banville's Blog
- Facebook of BreakingNewsEnglish
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