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[Mark Loyd]

Recognise this situation form Sandy's blog?




The production line principal - �bums on seats� - get their money and get them out - was the philosophy here. Resources were scarce with a few well-thumbed texts bundled into a cupboard and teachers having to illegally photocopy texts for class use. When the use of the photo-copier was too heavy, warning notices in French were issued to all employees.

Management had no formal teaching or professional qualifications. All planning and reporting was in French. There was no understanding of the pedagogical aspects of language teaching � the proprietor told new recruits that all they needed was a white board and marker pen.

Meetings were often hastily convened and conducted totally in French. Notices were distributed demanding our presence at the end of a day when some colleagues weren't teaching and would have to make a 50 mile unpaid round trip.

Once I sent my apologies for a hastily convened meeting for which I was unavailable. I was called to the office of the proprietor who demanded I sign a document saying that I would attend a rearranged meeting on the following Saturday morning. I flung it across the table and threatened resignation. His parting shot as I slammed shut the door, �and don�t steal any of the books� followed by a muttered ,"I'll never understand the English".

The next day I received an apology. Pragmatism ruled the day. Important contracts had to be completed.

New students were tested at registration but there was no attempt to standardise the results. It was left to the subjective judgement of the teacher to determine the base-line of each student. Record keeping was worse. Comments on 'progress' amounted to glib phrases saying, " nice chap", "a good lesson" or "plenty of potential".

Unstructured discussion was the excuse for unplanned lessons where if s/he was lucky the student might 'catch' some new vocabulary or grammatical structure. Continuity of planning was impossible with clients often having 4 or 5 different teachers and a timetable that changed every week. We could never be sure if we would have the same student twice. In a school of 4 teachers over forty came and went in 3 years!

Students learn English because they need it for business, education or travel. They all need reassurance together with a sound grammatical foundation, a working vocabulary and above all the opportunity to talk, talk, talk.

Too often the reality is ill-equipped, poorly resourced language schools run by people with little understanding of teaching and learning and staffed by overworked, exploited and inevitably ineffective teachers.

And still the number of language schools grows as people exploit the commercial potential of teaching English, the global language.

I started teaching English as a second language with the same hopes and aspirations as I had had throughout my teaching career. I wanted my students to succeed, to enjoy the thrill of learning. I wanted to be part of a successful team who could make the school proud of its reputation and standards of excellence.

More satisfied clients would lead to bigger profits and bigger profits might lead to better resources and pay. It was a dream. A dream that was shattered by the grim realisation that no matter how hard we worked or how successful we were, little would change. Ultimately it was the students and the English language that were the losers.

[Mark Loyd]

NB

Of course the real losers, as well as the students and English Language are the TEFLers.

[BERRY]

Amen