BBC Learning English

BBC Learning English - online lessons including video and audio. 8 out of 10. The Learning English website also gives access to the Open University's English courses. Click to go to website.

What's good:

There is new free material every week, and archives of hundreds of older lessons. These include the popular short features 6 Minute English audio podcasts, The English We Speak three-minute audio podcasts, and Lingohack videos. These are all short lessons, with text transcripts so you can read while you listen, and explanations of new vocabulary. A lot of the lessons have a "nature and environment" theme. I prefer that to the endless "going to the disco" and "what I did on my holidays" themes on most listening websites.

There's also a nice series of pronunciation lessons called Tim's Pronunciation Workshop; and audiobooks with simplified versions of books like Alice in Wonderland, and a lot of other things.

What's not so good:

I didn't find any lessons for students at lower or higher levels. It's mostly for students whose English is at Intermediate (B1) or perhaps Upper Intermediate (B2) level.

One purpose of the website is to give access to (OK, to sell!) Open University courses. The website navigation is not very clear; visitors often end up listening to marketing videos, in which people with strong foreign accents talk fast about how much they love the Open University.