Learning English Useful Links
Monolingual Dictionaries
businessdictionary.com (business focus)
learnersdictionary.com (American English)
dictionary.com (Ads can be too much sometimes)
urbandictionary.com (good for slang terms)
wiktionary (Being added to every day huge wordbank)
Netlingo ( Acronyms for Internet or technology terms)
Translation Guides
Deepl.com (our recommendation for students)
Linguee.com (good translations and a good back-up)
Google Translate (works just like Google – very good)
Synonyms, Antonyms and Word Formations
Wordhippo.com (The pink hippo graphic is one feel good reason to use wordhippo. It provides one-word translations from many languages into English)
Thesaurus.com (sister site to dictionary.com)
A person has just shared this page – will you?
It takes 20 seconds and you really help us to help others
Apps
Grammarly.com corrects your writing while online, using Firefox as your browser
Quizlet.com : create your own wordlists and learn on the go
Podcasts: Learn vocabulary and practice your listening skills
BBC English – We Speak ( Conversation through short videos)
BBC English – 6 minutes a day ( learning resource in small bites)
Free Online Self-Study Websites
British English
BBC Learning – English See what we have
British Council (a lot of free resources for all levels)
American English
Harvard – edX (Harvard University English learning resources with some interesting topics for learners)
Learn American English Online (Free resources available for self-study)
Learn English Through Songs
A great way to learn English for those who like to sing is through song. Students have recorded themselves with their smartphone to help them improve.
Blended Learning Solution
The Boston School offers you the chance for teacher support on key learning points you may be struggling with during your self-study of English.
Alternatively you can sign-up for the school newsletter for how to exercises, grammar points and more.
Other links worth sharing
Translation stories – Reddit
Reddit has some great topics and stories about English use. This one shows you your essay is not the only thing people should worry about.
The Guardian Newspaper
Free resource for those self-studying, taking an IELTS test, Cambridge Advanced, Cambridge Proficiency or BEC Higher, there are relevant articles for free for you.
For those who like more visual learning tools
WARNING – The Visuwords™ online graphical dictionary can be great fun.
What is it?
- It’s a dictionary! It’s a thesaurus!
- Look up words to find their meanings and associations with other words and concepts.
- Produce diagrams reminiscent of a neural net.
- Play with the results by using the search box to look up a word, double-click a node to expand the tree. Click and drag the background to pan around and use the mouse wheel to zoom.
Click to visit the website and type in lucky in the search box
Visuwords™ uses Princeton University’s WordNet, an opensource database built by University students and language researchers. Combined with a visualization tool and user interface built from a combination of modern web technologies, Visuwords™ is available as a free resource to all.
Wikimedia Commons – free media files
Please remember creative commons material is free to use but you must make reference to the author or source.
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Say goodbye to BEC Exams
The Boston School adapts to the June 2024 phase out of BEC Examinations. Learn what appropriate alternatives exist that match your needs.