Literature Resources

Online Resources for English and Language Arts

A California State University Dominguez Hills PT3 Project

These links will open a new window in your web browser when you click them. To get back to this page, close the browser window.

Lesson Plans | Writing Resources | Interactive Learning Sites | English Language Development

California State Standards for English and Language Arts

You will need Adobe Acrobat reader to read this file. Click here to download the reader if you don't have it.

Resource

Lesson Plans

Lesson Plans Correlated to Standards

CyberEnglish

This site is the creation of Ted Nellen, a high school English teacher in New York City who is a pro at integrating the Internet into his classroom. Look here for lesson plans, "how to" articles, tips, and just anything you want to know about the relationship between the Web and English. If your time is limited, check here. http://www.tnellen.com/cybereng/

Yes
No, but the links to articles and information on English and education are worth the trip.

Folger Library

Lesson plans for teaching Shakespeare, some of which use web-based primary documents to explore life during Shakespeare's era. http://www.folger.edu/education/teaching.htm

--Yes
Lessons are aligned with NCTE standards

Learn to Read

Site uses music, words and animation to introduce phonics instruction for beginning readers. Short stories, easy games, movies and entertaining activities. http://www.starfall.com/

Interactive activities.

No, but very young children will love it.

Lesson Plans

Lesson plans on poetry, literature and writing. Site is maintained by a Canadian English teacher, and includes links to lessons he and other teachers have used and refined and as links to other useful sites. http://www.cgocable.net/~rayser/index.htm

--Yes
No, but links have been screened and have useful comments on content and usefulness.

Shakespeare Globe USA:

Lesson plans, scholarly materials, virtual tour of the Globe theater in England, links and more. http://www.shakespeare.uiuc.edu/

--Yes -
Lessons are from a wide variety of sources. Some are aligned to standards.-

Shakespeare Lesson Plans:

For lessons on the most commonly taught plays as well as general Shakespeare references and background resources on Elizabethan life and times, hie thyself to http://www.teachersfirst.com/shakespr-f.htm

-Yes - -
Lessons are from a wide variety of sources. Some are aligned to standards.-

Download books for your Palm or Microsoft Reader from the University of Virginia On-Line library

This e-library contains 51,000 humanities texts in 12 languages, as well as 350,000 related images. Some of the resources are off-line but many are online. About 600 titles are available for Palm and MS Reader. http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/

The Buley Library

American and British literature resources including authors from Jane Austin to W.B. Yeats, also categorized by genre, era, and location on the web. From Southern Connecticut State University. http://library.scsu.ctstateu.edu/litbib.html

Children's Literature Web Guide

Book awards, best sellers, journals, resources for parents, teachers, storytellers, writers, ideas, lesson plans. http://www.acs.ucalgary.ca/~dkbrown/index.html

Classics At the Online Literature Library

From Aesop to H.G. Wells, this is a fairly extensive collection, all free. http://www.literature.org/authors/

English Literature on the Web

This is an absolutely enormous list of links to English lit resources on the web, compiled by an associate professor of language and culture at Nagoya University in Japan. http://www.lang.nagoya-u.ac.jp/~matsuoka/EngLit.html

The Hero's Journey

An online environment for exploring the classic mythic story structure and creating your own stories. It explains the elements of a myth, shows examples from classic stories as well as pop culture, allows the user to see examples of student work, and provides an online writing environment for creating your own myth. An exciting site! http://www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/smc/journey/index.html

High School Literature Resources

Very useful links on writing and literature, from the Bellingham, WA school district. http://directory.webhideout.com/frame.php?url=http%3A//www.bham.wednet.edu/ENGLISH2.HTM&title=High+School+English+Resource+Page

Humanities Text Initiative

From the University of Michigan, the collection includes many full-text original documents as well as links to other collections. http://www.hti.umich.edu/

Internet Public Library: KidSpace

A visit to this site is like a visit to a spiffy new children's library. Turn the kids loose and let them explore. They'll find story time, arts and crafts, things for pre-schoolers, puzzles, comic strips, information on health and nutrition, homework help, science fair, html instructions, and much more. Or, they can search for information and books by their favorite authors. It's all presented in a visually appealing manner, with understandable language. http://ipl.si.umich.edu/div/kidspace/

Internet Public Library: TeenSpace

Homework help, books and writing, stuff especially for girls, clubs and organizations, dating, college and career. Teens should check this out.http://www.ipl.org/div/teen/

Language Arts Resources from California State University, Fullerton

Children's authors, book characters, creative writing, poetry, folk tales and fables, grammar, writing, storytelling, magazines and newsletters, and more. http://hdcs.fullerton.edu/ElEd/Faculty Own Pages/Recommended Sites/Web Sites Language.html

Links to American Literature Online

Links to major resources in prose and poetry. http://www.usinfo.state.gov/usa/infousa/arts/onlit.htm

Literary Resources On the Net

Resources divided by period: Classical, Medieval, Renaissance, Eighteenth century, Romantic, Victorian, 20th century, American, Women's lit, ethnic, and more. http://andromeda.rutgers.edu/~jlynch/Lit/

The Online Books Page

This site contains not only original full texts online, but links to other book-based exhibits as well, such as Banned Books Online, Women Writers, Prize Winners, and Foreign Language texts.From the University of Pennsylvania. http://onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/

The Perseus Digital Library

Primary and secondary sources for the study of Greek and Roman literature, as well as early Modern English Literature. (Plays, speeches and essays in Greek, Latin and English translation.) The library is a project of Tufts University. http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/

Resources for English and American Literature

Resources on Anglo-Saxon, Medieval, Renaissance, Victorian and Modern lit, poetry, journals, and much more, from the Indiana University library. Find your area of interest and get more background information than you'll ever need. http://www.indiana.edu/~libsalc/pwillett/english-www.html#Eng02

What'll I Read?

Thirty must-read books for the K-8 crowd, along with other reading links. http://encarta.msn.com/parents/features/mustreadbooksforkids.asp

Yahoo's Literary Links

Beats, Bloomsbury, Dada, Sci-Fi, Young Adults, and more. http://dir.yahoo.com/Arts/Humanities/Literature/Authors/

Spotlight on Voices and Visions

The Annenberg/CPB Project presents links to video, audio and written information on a dozen of American's leading poets including Langston Hughes, Sylvia Plath, Emily Dickinson and Walt Whitman. http://www.learner.org/catalog/literature/vvseries/vvspot/index.html

OnLine Literature (The Literature Network)

Lighten the book budget. Read the stories on-line. http://www.online-literature.com/author_index.php

(back to top)

Writing Resources

Bartlett's Quotations

Find a quote online. http://www.columbia.edu/acis/bartleby/bartlett/

Citing Sources

From Purdue's On-Writing Lab, links to information on both the MLA and APA rules for citing all sorts of sources, including electronic ones. http://owl.english.purdue.edu/handouts/research/r_docelectric.html

Online bibliography creation tools:

EasyBib: Free. User enters appropriate information in various fields. Program creates a correctly formatted bibliography. Adheres to the sixth edition of MLA and fifth edition of APA. Program will save info for future recall (user receives a number via email), or export a file suitable for printing or saving as Microsoft Word document. http://www.easybib.com

Citation Maker from the Oregon School Library Information System. User enters data, program formats it according to MLA style. User may print and/or save the finished file. http://oslis.k12.or.us/secondary/howto/cited/citeintro.html

Slate Citation Machine: Part of the Landmarks for Schools project. User inputs data; program produces properly formatted citation in APA and MLA style. Use must copy and paste data into a word processing document. http://www.landmark-project.com/citation_machine/cm.php

Common Errors in English

Learn the difference between "nauseated" and "nauseous," "continual" and "continuous," "compliment" and "complement," "dolly" and "handcart" and dozens of other stumbling blocks of the English language. http://www.wsu.edu/~brians/errors/errors.html

Elements of Style

If you only have time to look at one grammar and style book, this is it. It should be a staple of everyone's library, right next to the dictionary and the thesaurus. http://www.bartleby.com/141/

Essay Punch

Interactive, online essay-writing tutorial leads the student through the creation of a persuasive essay, step by step from brainstorming to revising and editing. The site provides a preview of the sponsor's software, so only one topic is available. Nonetheless, the site provides an excellent , nonjudgmental, self-paced introduction into the total writing process for students who may not understand just how to go about presenting their ideas in writing. http://www.essaypunch.com/

Learn How To Write

Interactive site for beginning writers offers exercises on writing short, simple sentences, using active verbs, using verbs instead of nouns, making lists, using only words that contribute something meaningful to the text and other useful tips. http://learnhowtowrite.com/learnhowtowrite.html

Grammar Now!

Tells the user how to check their spelling, grammar, or punctuation, and includes links to other relevant sites. Plus, students can copy/paste an essay or questions in a text box, and e-mail it in for a punctuation, usage and spell check. Note: user MUST have an e-mail address for this to work! http://www.grammarnow.com/

A Guide to Grammar and Style

Site maintained by Jack Lynch, assistant professor of English at Rutgers University. Good information, plus links to other related sites. http://andromeda.rutgers.edu/~jlynch/Writing/

Guide to Grammar and Writing

Site maintained by Prof. Charles Darling at Capital-Community Technical College in Hartford, CN. Helpful information, PLUS quizzes and a place to submit questions. http://webster.commnet.edu/grammar/index.htm

Inkspot

Writing resources for those who are REALLY serious about writing. How to sell your stories, poetry, children's stories. http://www.inkspot.com/

Midlink Magazine

A place for student writers to publish their work. (Site also includes some special teacher resources.) http://www.cs.ucf.edu/~MidLink/

NoodleTools

The tools include Noodle Quest, which helps students get started on a research project, and NoodleNoodle Bib, an interactive online tool to help students build a bibliography, once the research is complete. At one time, these resources were free. Sadly, that is no longer the case. Schools, and individuals, may now subscribe to this service. http://www.noodletools.com/

On-Line Writing Labs

Links to ALL the on-line college writing labs and writing resources. http://nwca.syr.edu/

Purdue University On-Line Writing Lab

Outstanding help with composition, grammar, spelling, paragraph constructions, and other roadblocks to writing. http://owl.english.purdue.edu/

Roget's Thesaurus

Find the right word here. http://www.thesaurus.com/

Society of Professional Journalists

Dozens of superb links for writing and young journalists. http://spj.org/

Teachers First (Writing Styles)

Writing and grammar help. http://www.teachersfirst.com/cnt-writ.htm

Tips-O-Matic

Writing tips for sentences, paragraphs and essays. Short, concise, reinforces classroom lessons. http://www.teachersfirst.com/cnt-writ.htm

Webster's dictionary

Type in your word, click search, it gives you a definition. http://www.m-w.com/

Wordsmyth's English Dictionary and Thesaurus

You type in the word; the program tells you what it means. http://www.wordsmyth.net/http://www.wordsmyth.net/

Writers Resource Center

Tips on writing styles: journalism, fiction, poetry; writing and editing assistance; marketing your work; software for writers.

http://www.shu.ac.uk/versewriter/

(back to top)

Interactive Learning Sites

HyperText Writing

Students at the University of North Carolina took a close look at three books and provided online annotation, comments, discussion and more. It's a different approach to teaching literature. Worth a look; maybe it will spark an idea, or a different approach to studying literature. http://sites.unc.edu/storyforms/index.html

Thesis Builder

An on-line writing helper. A interesting site for students who can't figure out how to get started on an assignment. http://www.ozline.com/electraguide/thesis.html

VerseWriter

An interactive, online tutorial on poetic forms. Requires ShockWave plug-in and excellent bandwidth. http://www.shu.ac.uk/versewriter/

Also, be sure to check our list of other interactive sites.

(back to top)

English Language Development

BBC World Service: Learning English

Listen to the audio; watch the video; take quizzes; read tips. http://www.wrn.org/listeners/stations/index.php?CurrentLetter=1

ELD Resources
Online exercises and lessons to print out; covers vocabulary, grammar, usage, listening, reading, writing. http://www.smic.be/smic5022/Nieuwmain.htm

English Web

Resources for learning and teaching English, including dictionaries, vocabulary, writing, full courses, listening and reading resources and chat. Three hundred and thirty three links in all.http://englishwebguide.com/

Randall's CyberListening Lab

General listening quizzes, online. Hear English spoken by native speakers.http://www.esl-lab.com/

Real English

Learn English via interactive online video. Sign up and get a password. It's free..http://www.real-english.com/

Tower of English

Hundreds of online resources for English language learners.http://www.towerofenglish.com/

Virtual Language Center

This site provides a little bit of everything for students who are learning English, including listen and learn activities, hints for writing research papers, pronunciation and grammar tips, cloze exercises, and games. Site includes handy teacher tools, too. http://vlc.polyu.edu.hk/

World Radio

Listen to radio broadcasts from around the world. http://www.wrn.org/listeners/stations/index.php?CurrentLetter=

back to top | back to main page

Online Resources for English and Language Arts
A California State University Dominguez Hills PT3 Project
These links will open a new window in your web browser when you click them. To get back to this page, close the browser window. Lesson Plans \| Writing Resources \| Interactive Learning Sites \| English Language Development
California State Standards for English and Language Arts You will need Adobe Acrobat reader to read this file. Click here to download the reader if you don't have it.
Resource	Lesson Plans	Lesson Plans Correlated to Standards
CyberEnglish This site is the creation of Ted Nellen, a high school English teacher in New York City who is a pro at integrating the Internet into his classroom. Look here for lesson plans, "how to" articles, tips, and just anything you want to know about the relationship between the Web and English. If your time is limited, check here. http://www.tnellen.com/cybereng/	Yes	No, but the links to articles and information on English and education are worth the trip.
Folger Library Lesson plans for teaching Shakespeare, some of which use web-based primary documents to explore life during Shakespeare's era. http://www.folger.edu/education/teaching.htm	--Yes	Lessons are aligned with NCTE standards
Learn to Read Site uses music, words and animation to introduce phonics instruction for beginning readers. Short stories, easy games, movies and entertaining activities. http://www.starfall.com/	Interactive activities.	No, but very young children will love it.
Lesson Plans Lesson plans on poetry, literature and writing. Site is maintained by a Canadian English teacher, and includes links to lessons he and other teachers have used and refined and as links to other useful sites. http://www.cgocable.net/~rayser/index.htm	--Yes	No, but links have been screened and have useful comments on content and usefulness.
Shakespeare Globe USA: Lesson plans, scholarly materials, virtual tour of the Globe theater in England, links and more. http://www.shakespeare.uiuc.edu/	--Yes -	Lessons are from a wide variety of sources. Some are aligned to standards.-
Shakespeare Lesson Plans: For lessons on the most commonly taught plays as well as general Shakespeare references and background resources on Elizabethan life and times, hie thyself to http://www.teachersfirst.com/shakespr-f.htm	-Yes - -	Lessons are from a wide variety of sources. Some are aligned to standards.-
Download books for your Palm or Microsoft Reader from the University of Virginia On-Line library This e-library contains 51,000 humanities texts in 12 languages, as well as 350,000 related images. Some of the resources are off-line but many are online. About 600 titles are available for Palm and MS Reader. http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/
The Buley Library American and British literature resources including authors from Jane Austin to W.B. Yeats, also categorized by genre, era, and location on the web. From Southern Connecticut State University. http://library.scsu.ctstateu.edu/litbib.html
Children's Literature Web Guide Book awards, best sellers, journals, resources for parents, teachers, storytellers, writers, ideas, lesson plans. http://www.acs.ucalgary.ca/~dkbrown/index.html
Classics At the Online Literature Library From Aesop to H.G. Wells, this is a fairly extensive collection, all free. http://www.literature.org/authors/
English Literature on the Web This is an absolutely enormous list of links to English lit resources on the web, compiled by an associate professor of language and culture at Nagoya University in Japan. http://www.lang.nagoya-u.ac.jp/~matsuoka/EngLit.html
The Hero's Journey An online environment for exploring the classic mythic story structure and creating your own stories. It explains the elements of a myth, shows examples from classic stories as well as pop culture, allows the user to see examples of student work, and provides an online writing environment for creating your own myth. An exciting site! http://www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/smc/journey/index.html
High School Literature Resources Very useful links on writing and literature, from the Bellingham, WA school district. http://directory.webhideout.com/frame.php?url=http%3A//www.bham.wednet.edu/ENGLISH2.HTM&title=High+School+English+Resource+Page
Humanities Text Initiative From the University of Michigan, the collection includes many full-text original documents as well as links to other collections. http://www.hti.umich.edu/
Internet Public Library: KidSpace A visit to this site is like a visit to a spiffy new children's library. Turn the kids loose and let them explore. They'll find story time, arts and crafts, things for pre-schoolers, puzzles, comic strips, information on health and nutrition, homework help, science fair, html instructions, and much more. Or, they can search for information and books by their favorite authors. It's all presented in a visually appealing manner, with understandable language. http://ipl.si.umich.edu/div/kidspace/
Internet Public Library: TeenSpace Homework help, books and writing, stuff especially for girls, clubs and organizations, dating, college and career. Teens should check this out.http://www.ipl.org/div/teen/
Language Arts Resources from California State University, Fullerton Children's authors, book characters, creative writing, poetry, folk tales and fables, grammar, writing, storytelling, magazines and newsletters, and more. http://hdcs.fullerton.edu/ElEd/Faculty Own Pages/Recommended Sites/Web Sites Language.html
Links to American Literature Online Links to major resources in prose and poetry. http://www.usinfo.state.gov/usa/infousa/arts/onlit.htm
Literary Resources On the Net Resources divided by period: Classical, Medieval, Renaissance, Eighteenth century, Romantic, Victorian, 20th century, American, Women's lit, ethnic, and more. http://andromeda.rutgers.edu/~jlynch/Lit/
The Online Books Page This site contains not only original full texts online, but links to other book-based exhibits as well, such as Banned Books Online, Women Writers, Prize Winners, and Foreign Language texts.From the University of Pennsylvania. http://onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/
The Perseus Digital Library Primary and secondary sources for the study of Greek and Roman literature, as well as early Modern English Literature. (Plays, speeches and essays in Greek, Latin and English translation.) The library is a project of Tufts University. http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/
Resources for English and American Literature Resources on Anglo-Saxon, Medieval, Renaissance, Victorian and Modern lit, poetry, journals, and much more, from the Indiana University library. Find your area of interest and get more background information than you'll ever need. http://www.indiana.edu/~libsalc/pwillett/english-www.html#Eng02
What'll I Read? Thirty must-read books for the K-8 crowd, along with other reading links. http://encarta.msn.com/parents/features/mustreadbooksforkids.asp
Yahoo's Literary Links Beats, Bloomsbury, Dada, Sci-Fi, Young Adults, and more. http://dir.yahoo.com/Arts/Humanities/Literature/Authors/
Spotlight on Voices and Visions The Annenberg/CPB Project presents links to video, audio and written information on a dozen of American's leading poets including Langston Hughes, Sylvia Plath, Emily Dickinson and Walt Whitman. http://www.learner.org/catalog/literature/vvseries/vvspot/index.html
OnLine Literature (The Literature Network) Lighten the book budget. Read the stories on-line. http://www.online-literature.com/author_index.php (back to top)
Writing Resources