Job Discussion Forums

[phantombedwetter]

[jasminesialkot]

You said that Russian students want teachers to do their homework for them? I don't think that's a good idea, what about cognitive thinking and learner independence? For me, what my MA is telling is the vast importance of making it student centered. I don't see how it can be that if we do their homework for them. These posts are very useful by the way!

[jasminesialkot]

Ok, please excuse me, I want to ask something. There is a school in Kazan, this is in Russia, but they are saying it's a kind of republic maybe. Now they are not asking for money at all, that's good as I got warned not to send anything in the way of money at all- and I do not have it anyhow to send to schools. They are asking for ten pictures of me. I will not send, is that normal? 10? So I am not sending them anyhow. I am sticking with BKC for now, they aren't asking anything like that and there is all kinds of bad speak about them in this forum, but for me, up to now, they are number 1 ok, no complaints, but they are asking for this CELTA. This is just going round and around. I thought Russia would be straightfoward, and now this.....

[jasminesialkot]

That's why I am getting a very negative and bad view impression of teaching in Russia, it does not seem very well organized or ok for a girl to go alone there overall. I need more support than this. If it's going to be like a mess, then no one will go there, not only me. That's just honesty speak.

[Zajko]

It IS straightforward: you need a CELTA/TEFL certificate if you want to get a job and teach anywhere reputable and respectable (whether you like this or not). Full stop. A desperate cowboy-outfit somewhere may hire you without one but (as a previous poster said) please don't then come complaining on this forum in a few months/weeks time with a sob-story about how you were taken advantage of.

Based on your rather off-the-wall postings here, I'd question in any case whether you'd be advised to take a teaching job in Russia (in the event that you can find one) - or perhaps, indeed, anywhere else. You don't give the impression that you really have any idea what you're getting yourself into.

[jasminesialkot]

So all teachers in Russia have a CELTA or are in a bad situation. OK, that's your view- but is it really reality, maybe, all I know is that teaching is about people, it's personality, having a great time and knowing how to make students feel they wan't to come back for more. If you mean stuff like lesson prep, methodology, language analysys etc, all of that is on me [b]MA online], that's what I am trying to explain- but you are out to underestimate me, of course! Am I such a threat to everything, I am just one person! But I have a photograhic memory actually, again, honesty speaking, I basically memorized all of the MA text materials, I know that course from A-Z, when I get me job, then I will apply it. Now if you add it all up, in Boots, I was earning much more money than what teachers with CELTA are earning in Moscow, you have to think about that- before you tell me to get lost and go and pack me shelfes. I no I can do this teaching 101%- the problem is that this is not a first time teacher friendly envirnoment to be in, and maybe it's not even very friendly under any circumstances. If it's not friendly- THEN I DO NOT WANT TO GO!!

[spiral78]

I've worked on a long-term project in Moscow, along with a team of other teachers who rotate in and out of the city.

Unfortunately, our very well-qualified and talented 'brown' teachers have had problems - not necessarily with students, but on the streets/metro/daily life.

I don't necessarily recommend that a dark-skinned woman, however qualified, should feel confident in Moscow, at least.

Also, unless your spoken English, both in formal and in casual situations, is structured very differently from your postings, Russian students aren't likely to place much confidence in you.

As for a teaching approach, Russians tend to be serious, hard-working, and time-stressed. They aren't there to be entertained or have fun - they need to maximize their time and appreciate a serious, hard-working approach to teaching and learning.
In Russia, it's not so much about personality and having a great time. Unless maybe you are teaching teenagers or children.

They also tend to discount westerners who make claims like the one you're making about your MA materials. People who downplay their skills verbally are more respected in this culture.

No, I wouldn't think that the teaching situation in Moscow would feel very 'friendly' to you. I'd advise consideration of some different location for your first teaching stint.

[Zajko]

...me job?
...me MA?
...me CV?
...me students??

....me shelfes????

I don't want to be pedantic for the sake of it, but we're talking about someone who wants to teach others how to use the English language and claims to be capable of taking an MA in such here. I mean, without wishing to be rude - 'just honesty speak' and all that - are you serious?????

[rusmeister]

Look out for villains like the one in "The 3 Billy Goats Gruff"!

[jasminesialkot]

I want to explain something as some of you seem to be delighting in scaring me off. Only I am not so easily scared (but I am getting some serious doubts, maybe). Now you all know about my ethnicity, right, yes, we have been chatting about that. But how much do you know?
Here's something to think about and the Russian police on the metro thinking of hassling me should think on it also. Now in 2004, we had at our school a history project, our council paid for a special test to be done, we got a kit, and have to provide a sample of spit. Then everyone returned this promptly and it got sent to a hospital in Cambrdige or Oxford, anyhow, all the results came back and there was ONE big surprise, and guess what? This doctor HIMSELF came to our school to read the results out and he told like this, "Now we have one girl here and she's Pakistani, but 40,000 years ago, her great great great great ancestor lived in Southern Europe, in Greeece". Now he asked who it could possibly be, we were mostly Bengali, Pakistani, Sikh etc, all the whites were first to put their hands up. The doctor said, "No, guys you have another ancestors", and then he said, "Will Jasmine please stand". Now I was shy number 1 of course, and he said full of intrigue and amazement, "I have been searching for someone like you for more than 20 years." So I said, "How come?"
And he said, "You are the perfect Aryan. Your ancestor left Mount Parnassus, probably their descendant, was a soldier in Alexander's of Macedon's army went to India and stayed. Jasmine, you are a direct descendant of King Alexander the Great's soldiers." So when I get to Russia, although I am Pakistani, I might want to tell these racists and police and the like that I am a direct and pure descendant of Alexander's soldiers and a Aryan. So they should think what they meaning when it comes to racism- all racism is lies and nonesense and for fools.

[jasminesialkot]

Why are you guys trying to:-
1) Destroy my confidence?
2) Scare me off?
3) Tell me I can not do this when I know I can?
4) Playing all the time on either me race or class aspects of how I talk-which is the way people REALLY talk in the real world.
5) Running down or ignoring me strong points, like, MA- which I have now memorized, a real interest in getting better, determined to give it a try and think about it.
6) Pretending that there are NO British persons teaching who don't have CELTA, let alone paid lots of money for a MA online. This is what we are saying when we talk about racism, its coming from YOU, sexism also, plenty of that here and also class hatred. If you do this to new teachers then they WILL NOT STAY

[oxi]

Please, please go to Russia, tell the police your Alexander the Great story, then post here telling us what happens.

[jasminesialkot]

When I worked at Heathrow in Boots the Chemist everyone in the airport from pilots to security were after me and when I broke me arm even police from aviation tactical showed up with sweets and flowers. That's just honesty. And you think I need this two week CELTA thing to deal with a class? I know exactly how to play this, now some persons here are saying I don't know how to teach but what is really going to happen is every guy in the class is going to start shouting "We want Jaz, we want Jaz." And others will complain if I am not teaching them telling like this, "we want Jaz because she's fun and sweet and makes us like English." That's what I am telling, maybe you have CELTA, but if you do not have the personality-then what is the point? I don't have CELTA, I have a MA online, it will take me time to finish, but, more important, I have the personality.
As for me Alexander the Great story, I will tell it if those persons are being racist- TO MAKE THEM THINK!

[Zajko]

Actually we're trying to save you from getting yourself into a position which you clearly understand almost nothing about and aren't remotely qualified for - as every post of yours makes ever clearer.

If you don't want to listen, go ahead: but, as oxi said, please (a) tell us how it went down after you've found / if you find a job and (b) don't expect sympathy then. And - as I'm quite sure you know - this has nothing to do with 'me race' (BTW some of us from London may talk like this in informal situations, but we don't write like it) or class, sex or anything else. It's about someone whose grasp of written and grammatical English is clearly poor, who doesn't think they need the most basic qualification to do a professional educator's job, who waffles on about their incredible abilities, and who thinks they understand everything about a situation they're evidently clueless on. Whether you're white, black, blue, male, female or hermaphrodite couldn't be of less interest to anyone.

[phantombedwetter]