The Book Next Door
Australian EAL/ESL materials for adults and young adults
2016 May 17

The ESL Small Publishers Independent Network: ESL-SPIN

ESL Small Publishers Independent Network

If you’re interested in books written by other Australian EAL/ESOL teachers, look out for the ESL-SPIN table at your next event, and come and say hello to some members of the ESL Small Publishers Independent Network. We’re all long-term teachers and writers,  creating the resources we’d like to use ourselves… then being challenged by the need to let people know about … Continue reading

ESL Extras: fun beginner ESL reading books with activities from Clare Harris at The Book Next Door

I got a lovely comment recently from a teacher asking which book follows Six Stories from Hope Street, so I thought I’d list the ESL Extras reading books in order of difficulty, starting from the easiest…   Prelim and literacy Welcome to Hope Street (Prelim) is a ‘prequel’ to the Hope Street stories, specifically for preliminary or literacy learners who are … Continue reading

Welcome to Hope Street cover: ESL Extras fun pre-beginner reading book with activities from Clare Harris at

The new title in the ESL Extras series is out: Welcome to Hope Street. This introductory reader, at sentence level only, is designed for migrant learners still gaining literacy skills in English. So if you have learners who aren’t quite ready for Maybe Next Year or My Job is the Best, this might work for them. The challenge of the ‘prelim’ class … Continue reading

  My Job is the Best There’s a new book out in the ESL Extras ‘Hope Street’ series, but this time it’s not available through bookshops…it’s free to download from the ESL Extras books page of this site. Like Maybe Next Year, My Job is the Best is at Beginner A level – for learners who are moving beyond reading single sentences, … Continue reading

2015 Jul 26

“ESL books that sound like we do”: a new review

Not a Ballerina blog reviews ESL books

I have a lovely new review from Amanda Kendle, on her Not a Ballerina travel blog, called ‘Learning English in Australia: ESL books that sound like we do‘. Here she’s describing Six Stories from Hope Street: They are simple (and all told only in simple past tense) but manage to be interesting – very tricky to achieve! There are stories of late … Continue reading

Sign up for the (very occasional) Book Next Door newsletter

Email Format