How do I teach reading to ESL students online?

For young ESL learners, follow the same stages as first-language reading instruction, adapted for the screen:

1. Phonemic awareness. Hearing and producing English sounds. Pair sounds with visuals before letters.
2. Phonics. Letter-sound correspondences. Start with short vowels and high-frequency consonants. Screen-share decodable text — one or two sentences at a time.
3. Sight words. High-frequency irregular words ("the", "of", "said", "was"). These need memorization, not decoding. Dolch and Fry lists are the standard sources.
4. Decoding practice with leveled readers. Free or low-cost libraries include Oxford Owl (free with registration), Reading A-Z / Raz-Kids (paid), and Project Gutenberg for older texts.
5. Fluency. Re-read the same text 3-4 times across lessons until it sounds natural rather than decoded.
6. Comprehension. Ask "who, what, where, why" questions after reading. Push from literal to inferential as level rises.

Online-specific: screen-share the text and use a cursor or annotation tool to track word-by-word. Have the student read aloud — silent reading on a screen is too easy to fake.