Coronavirus: 148 free resources for home learning

In a bid to help teachers and parents with the school closures and the coronavirus, there are lots of free resources out there to assist with home learning. We have compiled a list for you
18th January 2021, 10:00am

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Coronavirus: 148 free resources for home learning

https://www.tes.com/magazine/archived/coronavirus-148-free-resources-home-learning
Coronavirus Schools

After schools closed owing to the coronavirus pandemic, a huge range of companies, celebrities and organisations offered their services for free. 

So what free resources can schools and parents now access?

We have tried to collate them all below for you.

Collections of resources

1. Tes resources - Everything from EYFS to key stage 5. All home learning packs have been made free on this link.

2. Oak National Academy has online lessons, quizzes and more. All created by teachers and in a sequenced curriculum.

3. Twig and TigTag Education - Free resources for students aged 4-16.

4. Khan Academy - Free resources for children aged 2-18.

5. BBC Bitesize - Lots of free resources here with videos and quizzes, too.

6. Teachit - Free resources for KS3, 4 and 5 all following the English national curriculum.

7. Classroom Secrets - A range of free resources for primary school-aged children.

8. TTS - A choice of free workbooks for primary-aged children.

9. Robin Hood MAT - Learning projects for EYFS and primary school pupils.

10. TalkingTales - free online rhymes, songs, stories & related storytelling activities by expert storyteller Kevin Graal.

11. Emile - All resources made free during school closures.

12. Pobble 365 - One free resource every day of the year.

13. Purple Mash - Resources aimed at primary school-aged children have been made free now schools have closed. 

14. The British Library has all their online learning resources for free. Plus their resources for secondary school teachers. And for primary schools, they have more resources on children’s books.

15. Teacher’s Pet - some free resources for primary pupils.

16. Phonics Play - Phonics Play have made made their resources free again for the duration of the school closures.

17. The Reading Realm has lots of free resources for teachers to use with their primary classes.

18. PebbleGo - You can find free packs for KS2 and 3 students on this resource website.

Language learning

19. Duolingo - A free app for your phone for students to work on their language skills, or try a new language.

Museums, art galleries, theatres and places of interest

20. Museum of London Docklands has a free virtual tour.

21. The Yale Centre for British Art has made courses free for students during lockdown.

22. The British Museum has made its online collections free to the public.

23. The Natural History Museum has free virtual tours.

24. The Tate Gallery has a 360-degree virtual tour online.

25. View the latest exhibitions at The National Gallery virtual tours.

26. Anne Frank House Museum has created virtual tours for free.

27. The Vatican has opened up its digital tours so the Sistine Chapel can be viewed.

28. NASA Kids is perfect for space fans. Learn all about the universe we live in by viewing these online videos.

Podcasts and radio

29. The ‘You’re Dead to Me’ podcast has a homeschool edition for kids.

30. BBC Teach podcasts for ages 3 and up.

31. GCSE podcasts collected for you on a range of subjects.

32. The Tes Podagogy series for all your CPD needs.

Online video

33. Google has launched Teach From Home in collaboration with the UNESCO Institute for Information Technologies in Education (UNESCO IITE). Teach From Home is a central hub of information, tips, training and tools from across Google for Education to help teachers keep teaching, even when they aren’t in the classroom. 

34. YouTube has Learn@Home, a website with learning resources and content for families - from popular learning channels such as Khan Academy, Sesame Street and code.org - for help with maths, science, history and arts. You can also visit the YouTube Learning destination for more videos and helpful resources.

35. BBC iPlayer has many educational and arts and culture videos available for free.

36. Carol Vorderman videos and worksheets for maths lessons now free for a 21 day trial.

37. Cartoon lessons on YouTube with Pete McKee.

38. Read Write Inc has its phonics videos on YouTube.

39. Joe Wicks - aka The Body Coach - is running PE Lessons for all ages.

40. Mr Bruff has shared daily English lessons for GCSE students.

41. Coding for kids daily lessons.

42. Outschool has made some of their online learning resources free.

43. English National Ballet with live ballet lessons on Saturdays.

Other resources

44. The Night Zoo-Keeper has a free trial to their online resources.

45. Minecraft: The Education Edition is popular with children already - these resources all have an educational purpose.

46. Schoolastic Book Club has free activities and games, mostly aimed at primary pupils.

47. Ideas for EYFS pupils or siblings from ABCdoes.

48. Look at nature all around the world with Explore.

49. Audible Stories has made all of its classic children’s stories free.

50. Watch science experiments with Colorado University.

51. Online physics demonstrations for students of all ages.

52. For teachers, there are free courses on online safety from National Online Safety.

53. Explore the world with videos capturing activity all over the planet with Project Explore.

54. Quaver Music has free school closure activities for students learning at home.

55. On Twitter, Patrick Stewart (@sirpatstew) you can find videos of him reading a sonnet a day during the first lockdown.

56. Julie Dawn Cole, who played the original Veruca Salt in Willy Wonka And The Chocolate Factory (and Tes mental health columnist), has read the book it was based on - Roald Dahl’s Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - aloud one chapter a night at 6pm on her Facebook page.

57. Harper Collins have made resources free to schools and families.

58. The FitNut has free PE resources for nursery and primary children.

59. The National Association of RE teachers have provided free RE resources.

60. News Mag Media have made their content free. Great for supporting children with their non-fiction reading.

61. ReadingWise has made their literacy materials free during the school closures.

62. For fans of The Mantle of the Expert, some of the Troll Hunter resources are free for parents and teachers to use.

63. Sum Dog has personalised maths and spelling you can try for free.

64. For help for your physics GCSE and A-level students, try Physics Online for free videos.

65. The National Literacy Trust have free resources for parents and schools to use during lockdown.

66. The government have produced ‘Hungry Little Minds’ for parents to use with EYFS children.

67. Hosted by Barclays, Digital Eagles have live lessons on coding available on YouTube.

68. Teacher well-being is important too, and Ditchling Yoga have made their content free for all teachers and NHS staff.

69. Primary Stars Education is normally a subscription service, but has made packs for year one and two free during school closures.

70. White Rose Maths has videos and resources for home learning, as well as a daily hour of maths help for parents.

71. Team Teacherly has resources for teachers to assist with the planning of lessons.

72. Teaching Ideas has free resources for teachers and parents.

73. Researchify have classic children’s literature in audiobook and PDF.

74. Primary school children might enjoy these free resources and videos from Carly Hart. They have been designed to encourage a love of reading and created by the author herself.

75. Bedrock Learning, an online vocabulary building site, has made all of its resources free.

76. Free Science Lessons Online to help with GCSE science.

77. Students who want to learn French can use these Learn French with Alexa YouTube videos to help support their learning.

78. The British Council have their free resources on Connecting Classrooms.

79. National Geographic have lots of content free for students to explore the world from their bedrooms.

80. The National Theatre have released new digital resource with recordings of world-class theatre productions and learning materials, is now available to teachers and pupils to access at home for free during the school closure period. The 24 productions include Macbeth, FrankensteinJane Eyre, Treasure Island and many more! 

81. Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone is available for free on Audible Stories- and in several languages. Helpful for MFL students.

82. The Globe have made their Playing Shakespeare: Macbeth resources all free access for teachers and parents. It includes fun activities like ‘Staging It!’ for younger children too.

83. The Royal Society have free resources for budding scientists.

84. The Poetry Society have learning from home resources for parents to use with their children, or for teachers to set as tasks.

85. The Reading School has lots of resources made free for teachers to use for literacy teaching.

86. The EverLearner is offering a free subscription to schools until June 30. They cover a range of exam boards, qualifications and subjects.

87. For EYFS students, you can look here for many free resources.

88. Science teachers stuck for resources can look at Science Doctor for free lessons.

89. Disney Theatrical Productions is offering free downloadable creative activities for teachers and parents from their West End shows of The Lion King, Mary Poppins, Frozen and Aladdin. This collection of fun and educational resources for home learning is available to download here.

90. Anomoly create educational videos for primary school aged children, including fun and active games. Due to the school closures they have released their content free on YouTube, and you can find it here

91. CBBC and BBC2 have given over their channels to daily education shows.

Videos, quizzes, podcasts and articles will appear on BBC Bitesize Daily via the BBC iPlayer, red button, BBC Four and BBC Sounds.

92. Pearson are making resources free for home-learning. As well as offering free teacher training, Pearson are also giving free access to primary, secondary and revision online curriculum resources.

This includes access to hundreds of e-books for primary children’s reading and online student books and revision guides to help students learn and revise.

93. Unicef have a range of resources for schools and home-learning.

94. Kahoot are offering free distance-learning tools during the coronavirus outbreak.

95. The Met Opera is streaming its content for free.

96. There are also broadway shows available here- perfect for drama and theatre students.

97. For aspiring playwrights, there is this course for writing your first play run by Renowned playwright Lauren Gunderson.

98. For those looking to try their students on something more challenging, there are over 400 Ivy League courses made free here.

99. FutureLearn have a range of free classes here for students who have online access.

100. Jisc have a range of resources made available to support during the coronavirus crisis.

101. Educare (part of tes) has free resources to help schools during the crisis.

102. Mirco:bit have compiled many home learning projects for students to use and keep active. There is a video here explaining how the Micro:bit works. Good for a technology and PE cross curricula project!

103. For quality teacher CPD you can access ResearchEd Home for videos of lectures created by teachers and academics.

104. The UN have created Mission 1.5 an online game for students. The game can be found here, and students from all over the world are taking part.

105. Earth Challenge 2020 is a downloadable app for students. Students can help scientists capture research quality environmental data, and lets students engage in citizen science. 

106. WWF Together is another app that has proven really popular with children kept at home during school closures. Using the app children are able to explore the lives of endangered species. Challenge your students to try out “tiger vision,”. They can also take a selfie with an animal!

107. Travel isn’t possible at the moment, but the power of Our Planet means the globe is there to explore through videos and photos.

108. Harry Potter: A History of Magic exhibition at the British Library is available through Google Arts and Culture.

109. The British Library have their extensive collections available online, and a great resource for students trying to research at home.

110. Daily reading is essential for students of every age, and The Day Home provide daily newsletters for families to read. Subscriptions are free, so every student can have one.

111. Learning Through Landscapes have resources to help parents connect their children to nature through home learning. 

112. Primary school aged children can have a free subscription to China Box.

113. Fording Bridge have worked with zoos to create resources for home learning.

114. Computing and business studies students might find these courses interesting- all made available for free by AWS (an amazon company).

115. Scholastic have free home learning packs- useful if you need to provide children with tech-free options.

116. CODE are offering free coding classes to students.

117. There are free STEM resources available from the British Science Association.

118. Seneca has resources for students of all ages- from KS2-5.

119. Study Tube have online videos to help in STEM subjects, all free and can be found here.

120. The Council for Subject Associations have collated home-learning resources in response to the coronavirus outbreak, and they can be found here.

121. GCSE Pod have free resources for a range of subjects, all available here.

122. Smallpeice Trust are a charity who have put together ‘engineering at home’ activities for children to do during the coronavirus outbreak. They use everyday items and all details are on their website here.

123. DFRobot is offering free access to STEM-based lesson plans and step-by-step project tutorials which cover a range of topics and platforms including the Internet of Things (IoT), robotics and Artificial Intelligence (AI) on its website.

124. Canva is an online tool now free for parents and teachers to use.

125. Matific is an online maths resource with activities, worksheets and word problems, make it an ideal resource for distance learning.

126. Education City has given free access to students and teachers during the school closures.

127. LaunchPacks are the brainchild of the people behind Encyclopaedia Britannica. They are an education resource that provide curriculum-aligned multi-media content sets on a large variety of classroom subjects.

128. Discovery Education have made resources free for students in primary schools.

129. Doctors Without Borders have made these resources free for students who wish to learn about a range of subjects from English to missing maps. There are also assemblies for schools to use for either when schools reopen, or as virtual assemblies.

130. CREST Awards have created Star and SuperStar activities to support primary school students who struggle more with being at home, and for secondary students there is an independent project that is both low on resource requirements, and with non-specialist assessment.

131. MeeTwo is a mental help app for young people aged 11-25 years

132. For financial resources, the London Institute of Banking and Finance have produced these resources for secondary school students on financial literacy. 

133. The Poetry Society have lots of resources available for parents and teachers here.

134. Experian have produced financial resources called Money and Me.

135. Oxford University Press has made many of its flagship educational and home learning resources available for free to teachers and parents affected by the Covid-19 pandemic.

136. For music lovers there is a #VFVirtualSing recorded daily 10-15 minute sing alongs for children, parents and teachers. You can watch the videos and join in here.

137. RIBA have created resources for students interested in architecture. All free and online here.

138. You can find resources on PlanBee’s website.

139. LCP have resources on their website and tes shop.

140. For teachers who need help with the teaching of English, ‘Searching for Excellence’ has shared free blogs and podcasts.

141. Swimming in pools might be off the table at the moment, but at the National Aquarium they’ve created virtual swimming lessons...with the fish!

142. Geography resources can be found on the Royal Geographical Society.

143. Carousel Learn has free accounts for early adopters to make use of their roulette style quizzing platform.

144. You can get 3 months free on Fiction Express and make use of their reading resources.

145. If you’re looking for home learning packs, Third Space Learning has KS1 and 2 maths packs for you to use.

146. For teacher CPD, you can sign up for free to Teacher Empowerment.

147. Oak National has launched a free online library with the National Literacy Trust.

148. Premiership Rugby Champions have launched free online lessons for teachers to use. You can download these twice-weekly maths and PHSE lessons aimed at KS2 primary students.

This list should not be taken as a recommendation for any products or services by Tes (and those featured should not claim any recommendation by Tes), and all data and GDPR rules - and terms and conditions - should be closely scrutinised by schools and parents.

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