Click on any of the underlined headings/links below to find out more. (last updated - 08/01/2021)
Hello everyone!
I just wanted to say THANK YOU for all of your messages, emails, and comments. It means the world to me to know how many people from all over the world are benefitting from this resource list.
ChatterPack is run on a voluntary basis in my *spare* (!) time to help share information and resources to those who need it. Have fun, explore the world from the safety of your home, and please stay safe.
Huge love to you all.
Claire Ryan
P.s. You can find my book, ADHD and Me - a guide for children and young people, at the end of this list - please do share the link with others who might be interested, and/or get in touch if you have any questions :)
Alternative lists of free resources including support, advice, and information for families. Please do share the links for these with others/family/friends
- School closures: Resources, information, and activities for families to support Home Learning
- Support, advice, and resources for families of children with: speech, language, and communication needs & special educational needs and disabilities
- Register for support if you are a vulnerable person - Government website (England only)
- Free, worldwide App connecting isolated people - chat on the phone with others who are isolated at home - Quarantine App
Virtual tours, and live webcams
- NASA Live: - Watch the earth from space
- Crystal Bay webcam - Lamai, Koh Samui, Thailand
- Explore Venice - through multiple webcams
- Arctic Travel Experts created 'virtual lights over Lapland' tour
- Future Learn - Explore the architecture and history of Rome, walking around a 3D digital model of the ancient city, with this free online course.
- Explore a Roman fort
- Museums from around the world - Virtual, online tours
- Access to 500 Museums & Art Galleries - Free, online
Animals
- Gorilla Webcam - from the forest corridor
- Alligators - Swamp cam
- Edinburgh Zoo: Pandas / Tigers / Koalas /Penguins / Rock Hopper Penguin Cam
Explore the oceans (underwater cameras)
- Aquarium – Otters, sea lions, pirana, jellyfish, and many others.
Birds
- Nests: Decorah Eagles / Giant flying fox / Hummingbird
- Falcons - Cliff view / Great Horned Owls
Online learning
- Introduction to Engineering - YouTube videos
- Open Learn - exploring children's literacy
- Open Culture - 1,500 free courses from top Universities
- 450 Ivy League courses - you can take online FREE!
- Open Culture - learn 48 different languages online - FREE
- University of Alabama - Free online archaeology and Egyptology Uni courses (create an account to log on)
- Open Learn - Free, online courses, Open university
- Future Learn - Free, online courses including languages, health, coding, wellbeing, creative arts, etc.
-
BBC languages - Learn languages online free
- Speak English fast! - 15 free ESL lessons in advanced English
- FrenchTeacher.Net - Free French study packs
- Sociology courses - Free online study
- Creative courses - Free online study
- Cambridge University Press - ALL 700 textbooks are currently available FREE in HTML format
- Cambridge university - Higher education/Undergraduate courses and resources
- Royal institute - Christmas lectures. A series of lectures presenting scientific subjects to a general audience in an entertaining manner.
- Learn 10 useful things to say in...
- Milan Presse - French magazines available to download
- Periodic videos - Science-related YouTube videos
- Infobase databases and video streaming collections - Username: JCS_Distance and Password: learning to access:
- iDEA - An international programme that helps you develop/demonstrate your digital, enterprise and employability skills for free
- U3A - Online courses for mature students
- Blocky games - Games to help beginners learn computer programming skills
- Scratch - Beginners computer programming games/projects
- T.K.S.S.T - Smart videos for curious minds of all ages
-
Guidance, and Support for International Students during COVID-19
Geography, nature, and history
- Tutorful - Top Geography websites, YouTube videos, and resources
- Project Noah – Global site where you can view and share wildlife
- Seterra - Free world geography, online quizzes
- Online film festival - Resistance in the Rainforest
- Kent Wildlife association - Simple ideas you can do in the garden to help wildlife
- World games - Geography games
- Wild Science - Podcast
- UK parliament - Politics, history, citizenship, etc. Written for children and young people, but lots of very interesting information, including how laws are made.
- Historical association - Learn about 20th Century history
Music
*Check the location/time zones of live-streamed concerts to calculate the UK start time. Time Zone calculator
- BBC Classical music content - Culture in lockdown
- Rotterdam Philharmonic musicians team up online to play Beethoven's 9th
- Concerts online - Various concerts held without audiences to stream online for people having to stay at home - list of live streaming concerts
- Free Opera - Dates confirmed until the end of March. Check the website via the link for future dates to be added
- Metropolitan Opera online, nightly streams
- Free classical orchestras - Live streaming performances
- Free Chamber music - Live streaming
- Berlin Philharmonic orchestra - Live streams and performance archive
- Announcements/lists - of worldwide performances being streamed
- Livestream concerts list - artists and bands
- Bands and artists - streaming performances
- Full-length concerts - watch online free
- Celebrities performing on social media
- Facebook Virtual Choir - Duet with a choir online
- Chris Martin (Coldplay) streaming from his home - YouTube
Arts and culture
- Parlia - The encyclopedia of opinion - mapping the worlds thinking
- Adobe Summit - online
- Andrew Lloyd Webber's musicals - streaming free online
- J P Brewer - View classic paintings online
- Walter's Museum - houses the highest artistic achievements from nearly every corner of the world. View some of the past, present, and future exhibitions
- Rob Biddulph an artist posting draw-along videos via Twitter here
- Google Arts and culture - Learn something new every day!
- British Museum - Free videos
- BBC Radio 4 - The History of the world - podcasts
- 50 things that made modern economy - Podcasts
- Marquee TV - streaming arts and culture
- Teaching history - 100 objects from museums across the UK with resources, information and teaching ideas to inspire your students’ interest in history
- Exploration of the day - Artistic website connecting people from around the world
- Drama Online - Online theatrical performances
- Black history - Telling the story of the black British experience
Literature online
- Kindle Unlimited - 2 months free access
- Gutenburg - Download free books, e.g. Shakespear, Edgar Allen Poe, Frankenstein, etc.
- Listening books.org - For people with Parkinson's Disease, visual impairment, fibromyalgia, ME/CFS, mental health difficulty or learning difficulty such as Dyslexia, which impacts the ability to read or hold a book
- Solomon Kingsnorth - Books in PDF, Word and audiobook format - Alice in Wonderland / Wind in the Willows / The Railway Children / The Jungle Book / Peter Pan / Black Beauty
- Read great literature online - Free Ebooks, poetry, classic literature
- Read Free Literature - also includes study guides
- 50,000 free ebooks - arranged by genre
- Open Library Access - Free
- Audible - Free for this period - Available in 6 languages
Learn a new skill or develop a current one!
- A tutorial resource guide to photography and editing - Adobe
- Learn to play the piano - Free Apple App
- Teach yourself to draw - Advice / Where to start? / Drawing tricks! / Sketching-basics / How to get the proportions right - faces / How to draw faces
- Free, 3 months lessons online - Guitar, Fender, Base, Ukulele
- Teach yourself to sing - 14-day free trial
- Teach yourself to dance - BBC ballet classes / Tap dance / Salsa dance / Dance Physique (dance fitness) / Take dance classes with Oti Mabuse - Facebook / Learn to Body-Beat with daily classes online
- Tai-Chi - the moves and the method - BrightEducation
- Craft projects - Sew, Knit, Crotchet, quilt, and fun for the family too!
- How to grow food at home from food scraps - DIY and crafts
- Improve your memory - Click the link and scroll down for a few free videos in this series
- Learn to touch-type - Free access
- Get creative with Digital Making at Home - New videos each week for 3 levels of experience
Miscellaneous & entertainment
- Great British Singalong - Radio stations unite
- Daily Kitchen Live - From the makers of the Saturday Kitchen show
- BBC Sport - Shares the greatest sporting moments
- A Question of Sport - on BBC Radio 5 live
- Football on the BBC - updated regularly
- Radio 4 - Comedy podcast, 'Now Wash Your Hands' featuring guest comedians
- Free colouring/relaxation images - To download and print
- Free Photography Challenge - YouTube
- Take part in making a Coronavirus time capsule / Make your own Time Capsule - Available in other languages / More ideas here
- Zooniverse - Digital volunteering opportunities
- Life Story Hub - Inspiring creative communication with the young and old using the arts
- NASA's complete media library - now available online
- Expeditions App- Free virtual Reality Augmentation app for all ages, to take virtual trips around the world to hundreds of destinations.
- Podcasts - Free to download
- Geopolitics - podcast
- A HUGE list of fitness classes - taking place online
- Musicals, shows, and movies
- 10 best Broadway shows to watch online free
- 76 free Musicals and theatre productions streaming online
- Wind in The Willows - How to stream the West End performance free
- National Theatre - Streaming shows on YouTube every Thursday
- Open culture - 1,150 Free movies to watch online
- Jamie Oliver - helps the nation with easy recipes, cooking tips, and ingenious hacks whilst many of us are staying at home. Jamie: Keep Cooking and Carry On starts Monday at 5:30pm on Channel 4
- James Dyson foundation - Challenge cards - how many can you complete?
- Board Game arena - Play board games online free
- Active bingo cards - ideas for movement breaks
- Roll20 - Build your own game - or play games with others online
- Latest free stuff - UK site (if you are outside of the UK, google 'latest free stuff' and add your location)
- Holiday Pirates - Updated Coronavirus information on travel
- Staying Put: A guide to planning for, arranging and funding care in your own home in old age including how new technology can help improve your lifestyle (£2.99)
Anxiety/Mental health/loneliness
- WeMeditate - Live streamed, guided meditation sessions
- Learn4MentalHealth - How to stay calm
- 10 minute mind - Free trial - mindfulness
- Tips for coping at home - Professor Susan Young
- Free guide for adults with ADHD - understand it to manage it. Develop daily strategies that enable you to live successfully and play to your strengths
- How to reduce high anxiety now: Thinking about past pleasant memories may help some people with immediate stress (article)
- Autistic Health and Wellbeing - a space for autistic people to share the things that they have found helpful and healing
- Get Sober - Free, online support for anyone struggling with alcohol addiction and staying sober during this period
- After Cancer - advice, and support
- Jan takes you into the woods to connect with nature during this period and to help with wellbeing
Prayer resources
*Check the location/time zones of live-streamed masses to calculate the UK start time. Time Zone calculator
- Spiritualism - English version
- Spiritualism - Spanish version
- Catholic Mass - streamed online
- Masses from around the world - streamed online
- God stories today - telling the stories of ordinary people - YouTube
- Jehovah's Witnesses - Online readings, videos, bible
ADHD and Me, by Claire Ryan, ChatterPack. Find out More
A handbook designed to help children and young people figure out what ADHD means to them as a unique individual.
Written in an ADHD-friendly format, the book includes tips and strategies to help children, young people and the adults in their lives to better understand their ADHD.
ADHD and Me is now available as a digital download! Find out more
Alternative lists of free resources, support, advice, and information for families - please do share the links for these with others/family/friends
- Support, advice, and resources for families of children with: speech, language, and communication needs & special educational needs and disabilities
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Would like to say a huge thank you for all this information, and the home teaching resources. It’s absolutely amazing and we will be pushing out to our RAF Families across the world for use and resources to tap into, especially during this strange time in everyday life. Very, very helpful!
Thank you so much for this brilliant list!
I just wanted to mention that you could add in a free meditation site I have found very useful
www.wemeditate.co
They have daily Live sessions and sessions of different lengths that you can access whenever you feel like it
A fabulous list and great ideas. Thank you
Thanks so much for this list. That is such a lot of work but will be really useful for children and adults alike.
Fiona Collins
Please keep me updated. I am from Navi Mumbai, India.
WOW ! Where do I start ! This is fantastic ! Thank you x
Thank you for sharing this amazing list. My mentor shared it with me and I have shared it with my networks which they have found useful!
Thank you so much for a well thought out comprehensive list. It will be of enormous help
to me as I’m retired and alone. Excellent! Well done you and may you help the rest of the NHS to weather the storm and come out of it without harm
This is quite an amazing list of resources. I have shared with all of our staff today and I am really grateful for your hard work in curating this list of informed links – especially at this time, Thank you!
Thanks for these Claire – great resources for children and adults that I will be sending out to our parents. I enjoyed watching the penguin cam at Edinburgh Zoo! Keep up the good work!
Thank you
Please add the Pray As You Go app and the Time to Pray app to your prayer resources. Thanks.
Thank you so much for the links I really appreciate it I am going to make full use of it
Thank you so much for this invaluable resource.
I’m a SENDCo at a secondary school and I’ve sent details of this site to our parents/carers of students with ASD. These students are getting overwhelmed with the amount of work being sent to them and are having major meltdowns. Your recommended sites are allowing them to access learning that they enjoy and they are so much happier.
Great resources especially at this time. Thank you ☺️. I’m going to have ab good look and definitely use these links to my advantage. Living alone is no fun so it will be a great help. I’ll tell others about it too. Take care stay safe and cat on 🤝
Hi. Great list of resources with loads of fantastic ideas for people to engage with. I represent the WEA, an adult education charity and we have a range of free online resources for people to sign up for. Can we add them to this list please? Thank you.
Thank you!
Can u pls find me a free Chinese learning online course
Would you be able to add our project clan- kind to you list of art courses?
Wonderful resource! Thanks!
Remarkable! Thank you SO much for putting this together. :-)
Amazing resources and ideas thank you so much for sharing! Already visited Lapland seen the Northern Lights, an aquarium in Georgia and a few national parks and shared with my class family and friends!
This is a wonderful list of resources thankyou…best wishes
Thank you so much! What a wonderful resource, so much to learn and enjoy. Best wishes, Maxine.
Thank-you so much. There are so many wonderful resources to check out here .Looking forward to it!! Sincerely, Cheryl
This is a stunning resource. Well done.
Such a generous gift. Best to you and yours xx
Hello! Thank you for this list! In regards to the Anxiety/Mental health/loneliness section, I would like to offer an additional resource – DinnerTalk. It is a video chat group, with the goal of providing pleasant conversation. Conversations are one hour in duration, free, and participants are from all over the world. Here are the links for more information: https://dinnertalk.wixsite.com/dinnertalk
https://www.facebook.com/dinnertalk.chat/
https://www.instagram.com/dinnertalk.chat/
Take care! Skye
Hello, would you like to add my daily Football Coaching to this? My group is called ‘Home Football Coaching’ and it’s totally free to watch – each weekday at 2.30pm for 20 minutes! Enjoy :)
I have been sharing this with our community online while our community cafe & hub is closed – thank you so much for compiling such a fab list to help get people through while in isolation x Stay safe Claire, stay well and thank you for your NHS work x
This is a wonderful lists of resources. Thank you.
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