Job Discussion Forums

sheepgirl · Joined: 15 Feb 2005 Posts: 15 Location: Quebec Canada

I took a 60hr TEFL course with Oxford Seminars, who give a job guarantee with their course. I have to stay in Canada at least another year to finish a masters degree in an unrelated topic.
I would like to do some ESL tutoring locally, then if I do go on to teach English in another country (preferably one with a better climate!) I'll be able to say I have some experience and if I don't at least I'll have learned to teach and that's a transferrable skill. Does anyone have any suggestions for finding ESL students? I'm in Guelph, Ontario which is a university town so there are international students around but I don't know how to find people that would be interested in being tutored, especially by someone with no other teaching experience.
My other question is that I never learned English grammar - I read a lot so I usually put the right words in the right places but you have to know something better to teach it than you do to use it. I've been taking grammar books out of the library to brush up (I'm up to transitive and intransitive verbs). Does anyone have any good titles to recommend?
Thanks in advance, Sara

nomadamericana · Joined: 18 Dec 2004 Posts: 146 Location: Minneapolis, MN

If you are just looking to volunteer and get some experience I would suggest finding an organization the works with local immigrants and refugees or an organization related to literacy. Maybe check at your university... with the international students office or couselor to give you ideas of where the international students go to learn English or find tutors.

herman · Posted: Sat Mar 12, 2005 11:42 pm Post subject:

sheepgirl,

For grammar books, if you really need to save time, you could start with grammar books specifically tailored to ESL/EFL teachers. The technical terms vary from book to book and from field to field (not significantly, but still), depending on the audience.

One title International House - Lisbon recommends for its CELTA course is "Grammar for English Language Teachers" by Martin Parrott (Cambridge University Press, 2000). It's a rather thick book but it's worth going through.

It's also still worth it to look at other grammar books tailored for other audiences and get a feel for how the language can be viewed and explained in many different ways (and terms).

Herman

stillnosheep · Joined: 01 Mar 2004 Posts: 2068 Location: eslcafe

Michael Swan: Practical English Usage.

A book on grammar rather than a grammar course and once you are teaching you may hardly ever need to refer to it but it explains 'correct' usage (when to say 'this', when to say 'that') wonderfully and gives you the confidence of knowing that you can find the 'rule' for any tricky question where you may well know what sounds right and what wrong in certain situations but may not be able to formulate a simple rule for students to follow; it's the Bible for EFL teachers.

bluffer · Posted: Mon Mar 14, 2005 10:38 am Post subject:

yup. Anything by Michael Swann.

For teaching - try putting ads in the little noticeboards in the universities, supermakets, local papers etc etc etc You will be bound to get someone that way.

carnac · Posted: Mon Mar 14, 2005 10:59 am Post subject: Grammar online

Please also see http://www.ohiou.edu/esl/english/grammar/, a very nicely done website on grammar.
Text "Grammar Express", publisher Longman I think (It's on my desk at work and I'm at home) is very helpful for both teachers and students.
Another great online resource is http://owl.english.purdue.edu/handouts/esl/.
Best,
Carnac

GambateBingBangBOOM · Joined: 04 Nov 2003 Posts: 2021 Location: Japan

sheepgirl · Joined: 15 Feb 2005 Posts: 15 Location: Quebec Canada

thanks for all your advice - especially Gambate, I never knew they offered anything like that at the university!
Sara

fluffyhamster · Posted: Sat Mar 19, 2005 5:29 pm Post subject:

http://www.eslcafe.com/forums/teacher/viewtopic.php?t=2288
http://www.eslcafe.com/forums/teacher/viewtopic.php?t=2549
http://www.eslcafe.com/forums/teacher/viewtopic.php?t=2802

carnac · Posted: Mon Mar 28, 2005 11:00 am Post subject:

Sheepgirl - I just copy/pasted this from a response I gave to another posting from someone who also had a grammar book question:

I very highly recommend The Grammar Book: An ESL/EFL Teacher's Course, Celce-Murcia and Larsen-Freeman, Heinle & Heinle. Not only covers all the grammar, but shows how to teach it and answer questions, as well as doing many other things. An excellent book, not just a grammar book. Goes far beyond basic prescriptivism. IMHO. If you can find/order it, take it with you everywhere as your bible. Nice fat blue hardcover book (adjective order) worth its weight in excess baggage. I loan many books, but never this one. (Except to one teacher who had the whole thing photocopied for his own personal use, 855pp.)
Read it cover-to-cover so you are familiar with it. Then for six months bring it with you to class even if you don't use it every day. A little extra ammunition in your bag.
Personal opinion/experience.

ps: Swan is, for me at least, not the best knife in the drawer. Old. (I hear them sharpening their own knives now: "Sometimes the old knives are the sharpest!"
Not in this case, sorry, disagree. Celce-Murcia blows Swan away.