Website Resource: National Council of Teachers of English

-       Website address:  http://www.ncte.org/

-       Copyright:  Copyright © 1998-2011 National Council of Teachers of English

-       Credentials:  This site is run by the National Counsil of Teachers of English.  Their mission statement is “The Council promotes the development of literacy, the use of language to construct personal and public worlds and to achieve full participation in society, through the learning and teaching of English and the related arts and sciences of language.”

-       Website Design and Ease of Navigation:

This site is fairly easy to navigate, but it contains a LOT of information!  It is designed for English teachers from elementary to college.  It has journal archives, news about conferences, ways to get involved, and additional resources.  I limited my discussion of the website to the Secondary education section.

As far as design, the website is pretty plain.  There are some pictures, but the same fonts and colors are used throughout.  My favorite part of the site, the Connected Community beta site, had much better visual appeal.

The Secondary section helps filter a lot of the information on the site.  For instance, it only shows the link to the journal that is for secondary teachers.  There is a list of links to use for navigating on the top left side of the page.

-       Response and Recommendations for Use:

This website has so much information for English teachers, such as searches for lesson plans, new text books, and the English Journal archives with articles on curriculum and latest practices.  I think this website would be a great tool in finding materials, such as textbooks and workbooks, for the classroom.  It is also a way to stay connected and learn about professional development webinars and conferences.

My favorite part of this site is the “Connected Community”, a beta site.  It’s basically a blog, but the discussions are organized into groups under different topics, such as new teachers or media literacy.  Just by going through some of the discussions, I can see that this would be a great resource for me.  There are tips about lesson plans, classroom management, and adjusting to different situations.