Job Discussion Forums

[kitten]

Hello my name is Danielle and I am very interested in learning how to become an ESL teacher and would like some info about what you do as teachers. I am a senior in high school and am currently involved in a teaching program. We are required to write a paper on any topic of teaching, I chose my passion. However, I am not quite sure how the whole system works. How do you get a job abroad? What are some of the requirements? Is it difficult to get a job in smaller/rural areas? Do you need funding? If you are interested in working in areas that are very far away from civilization, deep jungle areas for example, how do you go about doing that? Should you be accompanied by people, meaning can you go by yourself or is it better to go with a group? How does the government play into what you teach / how you teach? If you are a missionary going in to teach not only English but your religion as well how should you go about that? (That is an optional question that you may or may not feel comfortable answering) Do you have to know a basic knowledge of the country�s language? These are just a few questions that I have. I would greatly appreciate it if you could help me out by answering as many questions as you can. Thank you so very much.
Danielle Nelson

[Twisting in the Wind]

Hi Danielle,

First of all, I'd like to say welcome to our forum. It was very brave of you posting here, you being just a senior in high school, and I laud your interest and efforts! I'll try to answer as many of your questions as I can. First, remember, ESL--English as a Second Language (for countries where English is the primary language, like the US)/EFL--English as a Foreign Language(for countries where English is not the primary language) is not relegated just to exotic non-English-speaking areas. There are ESL schools in the US and Canada, Britain and Australia, and other English-speaking countries as, well. You don't necessarily have to go far from home to get a job teaching ESL.

[kitten]

I was just looking for any place that could give me some information and i stumbled upon this. Actually you cleared something up for me i did not know that there was a such thing as EFL, i thought that it was only ESL. Actually that is what i really want to do is teach EFL not ESL. Thank you very much
-Dani-

[Twisting in the Wind]

I didn't answer your "Should I go with others or by myself?" question---You can do it both ways. For some countries it is better to just "show up" because employers don't like hiring from such a distance because they go to all the trouble of faxing documents like degrees and certificates and then the person doesn't show up anyway. You arrive in the country, find an affordable hotel, and then with all your documents: degree, ESL certificates, recommendations from other schools, etc. you go door to door to language schools asking to talk to the Director who's in charge of the hiring.
Or you can call the schools first and tell them you're in the country and set up an interview.

Other schools/countries will hire from a distance. Maybe another poster can give you more details about this.

Either way, it's likely you will be "going alone." You may have been hired at the same time as some other teachers, but most likely you will be traveling to the country alone and meet the other new teachrs once you're there. The exception to this would be non-profit agencies or church organizations who might train their people in the home country, such as the US, and then you all leave as a group to the target country.

[kitten]

umm are all the answers that you gave me the same for becoming an EFL teacher??

[Twisting in the Wind]

Remember, I'm not the "guru" of everything that is ESL/EFL. Other people will start to post and may disagree with me or have things to add or think about things in a different way than I do.

First, I've never taught ESL/EFL outside the US, so my answers are a bit skewed and not maybe representative of the experience a lot of other posters may have.

In my opinion, though, based on my long, but limited experience, ESL and EFL are exactly the same thing. They're just different names for the same material. ESL/EFL has a lot of terminology.

The qualifications appear to be the same for one as for the other. A BA and some kind of specialized ESL training. Sometimes experience is good enough and the school will waive the extra training requirement. For example, many positions say they require an MA. But if you have experience, they will take that in lieu of the MA because it's better to have an experienced teacher in the classroom than one who has all the credentials in the book, but has never stood before a class before. A lot of schools in English-speaking countries want their applicants to have had foreign (EFL) teaching experience because I think if you've had this experience you're more likely to be able to adapt to the ESL classroom.

[Twisting in the Wind]

[Guy Courchesne]

Pretty much agree with all that the Texas Twister had to post Kitty.

Let me add a bit.

On government influence (interference? lol). In some parts of the world, you would be monitored closely by the goverment if not hosted by them. The JET program I believe is an instance of this, though someone out in Japan should answer that.

In Latin America and most of Europe, you would expect to be working in the private sphere...straight language centers, and not in public education. Much of Asia is the same.

On big city/small town/jungle, Twister has it right. The bigger the city, the more services available, including jobs, education, culture, etc. While they exist, it is hard to find EFL projects out in the sticks, so to speak.

Twister is also right about watching your back abroad. There are many an unscrupulous who would take advantage of being green in the EFL world. The trick is to keep checking back here to Dave's where we watch out for such places. There's a scam warning at the top of every thread.

There are options for going through a recruiter to locate a teaching assignment. This is a more common thing in Asia - China, Korea, Taiwan, etc. Recruiters can be good if you are really unsure about the whole process, though it seems there are quite a few unreputable recruiters out there. Ask lots of questions and double check all info you get to be sure.

One quick tip on acronyms. Generally speaking, ESL is the work you do in English-speaking countries (USA, Canada, UK, etc) EFL is the work you do in non-English-speaking countries (Mexico, Thailand, Japan, Germany, etc). The terms do get interchanged quite a bit, so don't be put off if someone abroad accidently refers to ESL instead of EFL and vice versa.

[kitten]

thankyou

[Guy Courchesne]

A pleasure, as always.

But don't go away yet. There are umpteen other people hanging around in here who should have lots to add.

[Twisting in the Wind]

Yeah, we're being really gentle to you, Danielle. You should browse around the forum a bit to see what we're really like.

But because you're a youngen, we'll take it easy on you....this time....

[Guy Courchesne]

That was ominous haha

Speaking of ominous, I just bought that webcam. Now I'm going to be very dangerous

[Twisting in the Wind]

Can you see me??? Right now???

[Guy Courchesne]

[GambateBingBangBOOM]