Job Discussion Forums

[ktodba]

After just over ten years in EFl / ESol / whatever you want to call it I've noticed a trend for people who can talk about how good they are and use education buzzwords such as 'added value, differentiation, inclusivity' - to get preferential treatment in the UK - surely the ability to play buzzword bingo is not indicitive of a good EFL teacher? Or have I missed the point?

Should we worry about using buzzwords to get the job in the first place or developing the skills needed to do the job? For that matter, is there any point having the skills without a piece of paper that says you have them?

I'm old fashioned I'm afraid and prefer to work with people who can do rather than people who can talk - does this make me less likely to get hired or promoted if people don't know me?

[thrifty]

Are you a native speaker?

Will you work for the pathetically low pay and conditons?

You have got the job.

[tedkarma]

Bullsh*tters are common in every occupation, but they don't usually last long.

Hang in there, do a quality job and things do come to you.

If nothing else - you have delivered value to your students.

[Deconstructor]

Bullsh*tting is always fundamental especially in EFL. You gotta remember that most of the overseas DOSes (and many in Anglophone countries as well) are clueless as to what it means to teach English. If you actually did a kick*ss job, that is to say, if you immersed students in English, did not provide ready made answers and made the students work for them and depend on themselves to learn, if you provided interesting reading, listening and speaking materials and stayed away from bullsh*t grammar and vocab games and tasks, not only the DOS would hate you, the students would as well. The latter is particularly stupid because s/he want easy answers to something as complex as language. And you, my friend would be out on your ear faster than the DOS could say, YOU'L FILED! THE ENTIRE EFL INDUSTRY IS BASED ON DOING IT THE WRONG WAY, which means peddling easy answers and creating the illusion that something is being learned.

[Henry_Cowell]

[Deconstructor]

[Henry_Cowell]

Actually, I'm not a teacher. And I sincerely hope that you are not a teacher as well.

If you can't find the error, you might want to get a refund for that M.A.

Oops! There's another error in the sentence that follows the one I quoted.

[Deconstructor]

[Henry_Cowell]

Daring can only lead to embarrassment for the person issuing the "dare."

Hint #1: Look up the term "comma splice."
Hint #2: Look up the term "subject-verb agreement."

If you didn't continually and smugly rant about what sort of training is (and isn't) appropriate for English teaching, I wouldn't point out your own English errors.

[Deconstructor]

[Henry_Cowell]

He denies the mistakes even after they've been identified. So much for that "M.A. in English." Perhaps the elementary TEFL certification that he so despises would have helped him spot such basic English mistakes and correct them.

Ah -- the irony! The emperor has no clothes. Or, rather, the "deconstructor" cannot "construct."

[Deconstructor]

[Henry_Cowell]

The deconstructor has been deconstructed. He continues to divert attention from the fact that he cannot recognize and correct errors that are taught in every beginning English class.

But no amount of diversion will hide the sad truth:

His much-vaunted graduate degree in English never taught him what all four-week certification courses teach.

How's that for irony?

[guangho]

[Henry_Cowell]