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tall kid
Joined: 22 Jun 2006
Posts: 8
Location: Austin, TX
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 Posted: Sat Nov 18, 2006 1:11 pm Post subject: BA linguistics |
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I'd like to teach overseas with the appropriate credentials. What can I do with the BA linguistics down the road other than teach ESL? I read it was one of the least marketable degrees available.
While we're on the subject, does anyone have a BA in linguistics and if so, what was the coursework like?
Andrew |
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saint57
Joined: 10 Mar 2003
Posts: 1221
Location: Beyond the Dune Sea
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| Posted: Sat Nov 18, 2006 2:22 pm Post subject: |
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Some jobs require a degree in any field.
Some jobs require a TESL certificate.
Some jobs don't require any degree or certificate.
Some jobs require an MA.
Some jobs require a real teaching certificate.
I don't believe I've ever seen an ESL job where the qualification was a BA in linguistic. You may be able to squeak an extra $50 per month out of some language schools in Korea or Japan, but they'll more than work that $50 out of you.
If you're really interested in the field of linguistics then go for it. Personally, I chose to study business because it's quite easy. I was piss drunk most nights in university and still graduated with a B+ average which left many doors open to me. If you graduate with anything less than a B in linguistics, you may want to burn that degree. |
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Gordon
Joined: 28 Jan 2003
Posts: 5309
Location: Japan
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| Posted: Sat Nov 18, 2006 2:30 pm Post subject: |
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Study what interests you. Honestly, it doesn't really matter what your bachelors is in. Having the BA is important for many countries. It is the masters level where the importance is placed on applied linguistics or tesol.
I studied history and glad for it, I like history. |
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tall kid
Joined: 22 Jun 2006
Posts: 8
Location: Austin, TX
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| Posted: Sat Nov 18, 2006 2:51 pm Post subject: |
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What degree is actually going to help me teach english? I've been told a BA english isn't that helpful because it focuses on literature, where linguistics is more grammar.
Secondly, the MA TEFL program at my school is really competitive and I've been told they only accept about 20 percent of applicants. I wanted to make sure I am competitive.
A senior ESL professor at a local community college told me linguistics and foreign language study are more beneficial to teaching ESL than BA English. I realize employers overseas probably don't know the difference, but I'd like to know which one would actually benefit me as a teacher. I'd like to to be a professional teacher and actually be able to answer my student's questions, not just be an American with a certificate on vacation. At the same, I don't want to waste money or time unecessarily.
Andrew |
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saint57
Joined: 10 Mar 2003
Posts: 1221
Location: Beyond the Dune Sea
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| Posted: Sat Nov 18, 2006 3:56 pm Post subject: |
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| I'd like to to be a professional teacher and actually be able to answer my student's questions |
I guess it depends on what you want to do. What exactly do you want to teach and at what level? |
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wildchild
Joined: 14 Nov 2005
Posts: 519
Location: Puebla 2009 - 2010
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| Posted: Sat Nov 18, 2006 6:24 pm Post subject: |
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What can you do down the road?
A great many things, I would say! 
But then there is the question of marketability and I would say that falls largely on you, not the degree. As long as you know that when you study Linguistics, you study human language and as most humans use language in most things that they do, you will be a kind of expert in...all things 
Language is used to make business deals and fail at business deals. You can help a company to adjust their communication strategies so as to secure the next business deal.
Language is used for propaganda and mind manipulation. You can help the government to adjust their communication strategies so as to keep the masses in order. See Lakoff, G., among others.
Langauge is used when creating translation software and online dictionaries. You can help these companies to update their content and software. See computational linguistics.
Language is used to make others love us and hate us. You can work as a relationship counselor to couples or families on the rocks. See Deborah Tannen.
You can work as an ethnographer in West Africa or the Amazon transcribing and documenting previously undocumented languages. See SIL or the CIA
What is the course work like?
Well...there is a natural order of the course work and one would be best served if one follows it. You start off real small by analyzing the individual sounds (phonetics) of the languages of the world or of human language. Later, you get bigger by putting the sounds together to make syallables (phonology). Then, you put syllables together to make words (morphology). Words together then make sentences (syntax). Sentences make paragraphs (discourse analysis). Paragraphs make discourse and whatever and all of this makes up a pretty big damn chunk of what is known (and not known, of course) as humanity. Now, along each of these steps mentioned above, you analyze the hell out of everything and that's where it can get a bit tedious. But some folks dig it. For example, all the different possible meanings of sounds, syllables, words, sentences (semantics). Later, what language is used for, such as ordering a beer or blackmailing a neighbor (pragmatics). Some folks get a kick out of learning about all of the different, similar and strange sounds of humans, such as the ever elusive R sound of the French. Others are quite put off by all of this and can't wait to get to discourse analysis and study about propaganda techniques and exploitation methods and what not. So, in a really small nut shell, there you have it. |
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tall kid
Joined: 22 Jun 2006
Posts: 8
Location: Austin, TX
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| Posted: Sat Nov 18, 2006 9:14 pm Post subject: |
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Saint 57 -
As far as what kind of teacher I'd like to be, I keep reading TedKarma, Denise, Justin, Gordon and the other reputable teachers on these boards saying the better qualified you are, the better jobs that will be available to you. I assume that means some type of university or community college, or some job where the school isn't paying you just for being a native speaker, but because you have something you can offer students.
I don't know much about the ESL world, other than what I read here and other places online, but I am seriously persuing it and I'm looking for all the help I can get. I like to hear about the teachers who make this profession work long-term. They say it has ups and downs, but overall most seem to really like it. I want to be that kind of teacher. To all you teachers out there, if you had to go through college again knowing then what you know now, what would you study for a BA? |
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coffeedrinker
Joined: 30 Jul 2006
Posts: 149
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| Posted: Sat Nov 18, 2006 10:32 pm Post subject: |
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| To all you teachers out there, if you had to go through college again kowing then what you know now, what would you study for a BA? |
I think what I studied - Sociology and Philosophy - has served me very well. These were fields I was interested in and which allowed me to develop critical thinking skills that can serve me in class. I don't think teaching well is about learning facts that you then just pass on to students.
In a field like EFL, yes, it's important to know grammar rules and vocabulary words, but you have to be able to motivate students, to figure out when they understand and when they don't because if you're waiting for them to ask you questions you're not doing your job, to respond to what's going on in the room at that moment, and to offer something different than what they've received in their previous English language instruction - because yes, they've had traditional grammar teaching and here they are in your class, still not able to use English as well as they'd like. Did I learn how to do this in Sociology classes? No - but I developed skills which I can apply in a number of situations, including in the EFL classroom.
I've worked with a guy with an MA in English who gave an Elementary class a lecture on the tense system. Clearly he knew his stuff, but I don't think that made him a good teacher in this case. This is one example and is not meant to imply anything negative about an MA - I'm using it to illustrate my point that being a good/professional/effective teacher is about a lot more than academic background.
I agree with what the others have said here - study something that is interesting to YOU and allows you to develop your own critical thinking skills. Linguistics might be that for you, and it might give you a step up if you later go for an MA...but I don't think it's the "magic" degree (nor is any degree) for teaching you everything you need to know to teach EFL.
I don't think the main problem with "bad" EFL teachers is that they "can't answer their students' questions" and if you imagine yourself in a university-like setting where students ask earnest questions about separable phrasal verbs and non-defining relative clauses, you may well be in for a surprise.
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Gordon
Joined: 28 Jan 2003
Posts: 5309
Location: Japan
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| Posted: Sat Nov 18, 2006 11:07 pm Post subject: |
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Coffeedrinker touched upon this, but I have to say that as a teacher, you are much more than a grammar expert. You have a personality, and over time will accumulate lots of knowledge about the world with varied interests. All of this will serve you well as a teacher.
What you study at your bachelor's level will not make much difference. I bet you will learn more in a one month Celta tefl cert than you will in a BA in linguistics. If yu love syntax, grammar, phonology.... then study linguistics. If not, it will be a long, long 4 years and may probably turn you off teaching. |
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Glenski
Joined: 15 Jan 2003
Posts: 12844
Location: Hokkaido, JAPAN
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| Posted: Sun Nov 19, 2006 1:04 am Post subject: |
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| What degree is actually going to help me teach english? I've been told a BA english isn't that helpful because it focuses on literature, where linguistics is more grammar. |
I wouldn't know many details about any of the above because my degrees are not in a teaching/English related field. However, I can give you this advice from Japan.
A BA degree in any field is the minimum requirement for entry level work. Any field, from anthropology to zoology. The main point is that teachers seem to be native English speakers (or their equivalent) and hold a bachelor's degree. These requirements get you past immigration for the work visa. Employers may have the same or different criteria (it is usually the same, though).
You can start out in conversation schools or the JET programme, but after that, a career is pretty limited. You could progress to mainstream schools (public schools usually get ALTs from dispatch companies if they don't already have JET ALTs; private schools hire directly, but tenure is very rare, so you have to change jobs every 3 years). You could drift from these types of jobs, or string together some PT/FT work and increase your salary, but do you want to do that? Is a single high-paying FT job your goal?
Universities pay more, but even they have some disadvantages:
1) They usually require a minimum of a master's degree, publications, and teaching experience in Japan.
2) Tenure is just as rare.
3) Early on, you may be teaching the same sorts of courses as you did in conversation school and high school, but to a different crowd. Some may be motivated, some not.
4) Some of your university classes may be huge, on the order of 50-100 students.
There are also business English outsourcing companies, and you might even consider starting your own teaching company, so the options are pretty numerous, even if you don't have a master's degree, but the stability for most positions is tenuous.
What will help you in the long run? My opinion is that you need to have some sort of TEFL/TESL certification to help you learn how to teach. I hope others will chime in, especially those who went through linguistics or English degrees, if their experiences are to the contrary, but from what I've gleaned in the past 8 years or so on forums like this is...a mere degree in linguistics or English doesn't train you how to teach the language. You may have a background in grammar and structure and perhaps an application (like literature), but to jump into a foreign country and start teaching it involves more.
1) You need to understand the culture. Some countries are less open than others, so you have to know how to open them up. And, in countries with very open students, how will you handle them?
2) Teaching in a conversation school vs. a mainstream school can be very alike, but they have their differences, too.
3) You also need to realize what the point of your teaching is. That is, are you there for teaching grammar (usually not because that is often reserved for the native speakers of that land) or for oral conversation skills (more often the case, whether students have already been taught grammar rules or not). So, how would you plan a lesson for low beginners who hardly know enough English to understand a lengthy (shudder!) presentation on present perfect?
4) ESL vs. EFL. There is a difference. Do you plan to teach in a native English speaking country, where your students may come from several backgrounds and countries, or in a place where English is not the second language, but everyone speaks the same local tongue and have no real chance for English immersion outside of your once a week class?
5) You need to understand the business itself. That is, after all your university training, will you be willing to start at entry level despite having a master's degree and work side by side with someone (or under someone) who doesn't even have a degree in your field? What about being an ALT instead of teaching solo your first year--would this be beneath you?
So, will a BA or MA prepare you for all of these things? Those are the questions you need to ask your departments. |
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saint57
Joined: 10 Mar 2003
Posts: 1221
Location: Beyond the Dune Sea
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| Posted: Sun Nov 19, 2006 3:07 am Post subject: |
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| I keep reading TedKarma, Denise, Justin, Gordon and the other reputable teachers |
Why is saint57 not on that list? I'm reputable.
If your goal is to teach English at a univeristy, then the people listed above can give you a very clear answer.
I currently teach business studies in a Canadian pre-university programme in Malaysia. It's exactly what I want to be doing right now. I have a B.Comm and B.Ed (Business Studies/ESL).
Depending on where you want to go, the qualifications will be much different. An MA and a B.Ed are both highly marketable, but they aren't interchangable. |
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spiral78
Joined: 05 Apr 2004
Posts: 11534
Location: On a Short Leash
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| Posted: Sun Nov 19, 2006 7:17 am Post subject: |
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I'm reputable too
Another degree that can be quite applicable is BEd. Directly related to teaching - but applicable over a wider field. If you really want to make a career teaching ESL/EFL/EAP at the university level, obviously you don't want to study Elementary Education, but learning about teaching and learning would likely be as applicable as linguistics.
Overall, I agree with the above posters - study something that appeals to you!! Sociology, psychology - they are all applicable to teaching. Linguistics is too, obviously. Do what you want. |
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tall kid
Joined: 22 Jun 2006
Posts: 8
Location: Austin, TX
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| Posted: Sun Nov 19, 2006 7:24 am Post subject: |
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Thanks all for the feedback. I'd like to be well prepared if I do decide to make the plunge into ESL. Fortunately, I've got the time and resources to begin working with the proper background, not just falling into the job by change. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but since I'm in school now, I can get a headstart, I just need to figure how best to prepare.
Glenski, what is ALT?
Saint 57 is reputable, who said he isn't?
Andrew |
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Glenski
Joined: 15 Jan 2003
Posts: 12844
Location: Hokkaido, JAPAN
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| Posted: Sun Nov 19, 2006 7:34 am Post subject: |
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ALT = assistant language teacher
And, I always thought I was pretty reputable, but I'll let the omission go.  |
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ls650
Joined: 10 May 2003
Posts: 3484
Location: British Columbia
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| Posted: Sun Nov 19, 2006 2:48 pm Post subject: |
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| saint57 = 'other'. |
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