Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day Review: Best ESL Blog for Curated Resources

Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day is one of the longest-running teacher blogs on the open web. Sacramento high school ELL teacher Larry Ferlazzo has posted a daily roundup of curated teaching resources almost every weekday since 2007.

Each post is short and link-dense: a few paragraphs of context, then a numbered list of websites, videos, articles, or lesson ideas. Topics range across subjects, but the throughline is ESL/ELL instruction and student motivation — the two areas Larry writes and trains on.

Three things define the blog:

• Daily cadence: ~18 years of consistent posting means the archive is enormous. Search inside the blog for "ELL" or "ESL" and you'll surface hundreds of relevant roundups.
• "Best of" mega-lists: Larry maintains long-form posts like "The Best Websites for Teaching & Learning About X" — these are bookmarks, not news. Updated periodically and very deep.
• Current-events tie-ins: a recurring format is "Here are resources for teaching about Y" (e.g., International Days, news events, holidays). Easy to drop into a Monday morning lesson plan.

Larry also writes weekly on AI tools for the classroom and SEL updates, and curates links for his BAM Radio show. He's authored multiple books on ELL instruction and student motivation, and contributes to Education Week and the New York Times Learning Network.

For ESL/ELL teachers, the blog fits into a weekly routine like this:

• Monday scan: open the blog with morning coffee. Skim the day's post. Save 2-3 links that match this week's unit. Time cost: 5-10 minutes.
• Current-events lessons: when a UN International Day or a major news event lands, search the blog for the keyword. Larry almost always has a curated list ready.
• "Best of" lists as planning fuel: bookmark the relevant mega-lists (Best Websites for ELL, Best Sites for Reading Comprehension, etc.) and use them as your planning library when the curriculum goes blank.
• AI tool weekly drop: Larry runs a recurring "Free & Useful AI Tools for the Classroom" series. Useful for staying current without doomscrolling Twitter.
• Substitute teacher plans: the resource roundups translate well to "use this list if I am out" — most links are free and self-paced.

What it doesn't do: provide ready-made lesson plans with answer keys. Larry curates links; he doesn't write classroom materials. For that, layer in ESL Brains or Teach-This on top of the blog.

Yes — with very few caveats. The blog has survived 18+ years because it solves a real problem for teachers: filtering the firehose of the open web. Larry does that filtering daily, with consistent voice and consistent quality.

The honest tradeoffs:

1. It's a link blog, not a lesson library. Don't expect turnkey materials. Expect curated starting points.
2. Volume is high. Daily posts since 2007 means the archive is dense. Search is your friend; the daily front page can feel overwhelming if you try to read everything.
3. Some links go stale. ~18 years of links means dead URLs are inevitable. Larry updates the major "best of" lists regularly, but the long tail of older posts has rot.

Honest recommendation: subscribe via RSS or email and treat the blog as a 5-minute daily scan. Use the "Best of" lists as your planning library. Pair it with a structured lesson-plan resource (ESL Brains, Teach-This) when you need materials ready to print.