Job Discussion Forums

sjbear · Joined: 17 Jan 2009 Posts: 2

I am currently living in Hanoi and would like a career change and wish to become an English language teacher.. I have a BSc degree and I am confused about the CELTA, TEFL and TESOL courses available in Hanoi. So far I have found only CELTA courses available here (Apollo/ IH) , I understand that the CELTA is the most difficult of the english teacher courses, naturally I would prefer to do something easier to get me started as I have no experience in the field.. I have seen some TEFL courses available on internet but I have not found a face to face TEFL course available in Hanoi. If anyone can give me some advise on course options available in Hanoi and what certificate do I need to get me started I would be most grateful.

jhawkguy77 · Joined: 07 Jan 2009 Posts: 12

Hi sjbear....

I am new to most of this too but I have been researching for a while. As I understand it the following applies:

TEFL - Teaching English as a Foreign language. This is used to teach students English as a foreign language. ex: Teaching a kid in Vietnam English

TESOL - Teaching English as a Second language. This is used to teach students English as a Second language. ex: Teaching English to a kid from Vietnam who now lives in the US but Vietnamese is their first language.

CELTA - Cambridge English Language Teaching Accreditation - This is used to teach English as a Foreign language to Aduls.

With that said TEFL and CELTA are the most popular. CELTA is the most internationaly recognized certificate but is the hardest and most times geared towards teaching adults. If you are wanting to teach students from 5-20ish in Hanoi I would suggest the TEFL Cert.

I am not in Vietnam yet so I do know what institutions currently offer the TEFL. I am sure there are members on this board who do know and can help you in that aspect.

inky · Joined: 05 Jan 2009 Posts: 283 Location: Hanoi

The above information isn't quite accurate. TEFL is just an acronym for teaching English as a foreign language, it has no specific reference to teaching young learners, and it doesn't refer to a particular course or qualification. There are many different 'TEFL' courses run by different organizations, some good and some bad. The CELTA certificate is one of them, and is considered by many to be the best. The Trinity certificate is also highly regarded. In Hanoi you can do the CELTA at Apollo or Language Link. If you want a better-paying and more secure job, you should do the CELTA because it gives you real-life teaching experience, with observation and feedback. The cheaper and less-challenging TEFL courses are done on-line and offer no teaching practice; thus the better schools are less interested in hiring you (because the bulk of your training has to be done on the job, by your employer).

skarper · Joined: 12 Oct 2006 Posts: 477

Wow. Why isn't there a sticky on this basic topic? Maybe it's in what you need to bring...

Anyway.

There is the Cambridge CELTA and Trinity CertTESOL. These are equivalents as far as international recognition is concerned. I consider the CertTESOL to be a little better and more practical, but it is not as well known, especially in Asia. Both are quite challenging and though few seem to fail, many fail to complete or finish with lacklustre grade Cs that are not accepted by most employers.

You can do a CELTA at Apollo in Hanoi and HCMC. ILA have a course too but only in HCMC I think. And Language Link do theirs in Hanoi. Language Link have the most experience running the course and I've heard good reports about it and them in general. So I recommend them over the others.

Alas - both courses are geared towards teaching small groups of adults in a mixed language environment. Neither has much on teaching kids/teenagers or dealing with classes of 15+ students. This is what you will find yourself doing most of the time in Vietnam. Plus, a lot of CELTA/TESOL stuff is hard to employ with business English classes that take place off site. Many people don't get on with the very prescriptive style of teaching demanded during these short intensive courses and words like 'brainwashing' get bandied about. That aside, you do have to dance to the CELTA tune or suffer accordingly, and applicants need to bear this in mind.

A good side of some of the online 'imitation' certificates is that they are more realistically geared towards Asian situations and far easier. But the bad side is that they are imitations and not externally moderated. You get a certificate that was easier to pass and much cheaper but which means next to nothing. You might or might not learn something useful, it's a lottery and depends on the trainers and your own motivation/abilities. If you're unhappy with the provider you have nowhere to go to complain.

My advice to anyone contemplating starting out in TEFL is to do a CELTA or Trinity CertTESOL or nothing. Don't waste money on any of the alleged 'scam certificates'.

There are special courses for teaching young learners, either as a top up or in place of a normal CELTA. CETYL is one of these, moderated by Cambridge like the CELTA. These are very good too, from what I've heard.

It is possible, indeed easy, to work in Vietnam without any certification or even a degree. If you don't want a work permit and are willing to work on short term contracts using tourist or business visas then you will find plenty of work opportunities. You might not be paid as much or find work as easily as if you had all your bits of paper, but there are many people working here and making money who are missing one or other of these.

Most of the bigger employers ask for both a degree and a TEFL Cert of some kind, so if you have them you have more options.

It would be nice if the VNese government body responsible investigated what kind of qualifications indicate a good and professional teacher and issued some kind of 'teaching Visa/permit' directly to the teacher. This would allow such individuals to live in Vietnam indefinitely (subject to renewals) and work as teachers. I'm not holding my breath for this - but if they're serious about improving standards of EFL in Vietnam it is a logical step.

No doubt the current rather chaotic situation suits them for some reason or another.

sjbear · Joined: 17 Jan 2009 Posts: 2

Thankyou jhawkguy, inky and skarper, your comments have been very helpful. 8)

motown · Joined: 07 Jun 2008 Posts: 68

Where can you do a Trinity course in Asia?
Also, does anyone have a comment on the Bridge-linguatec course in Vietnam.

inky · Joined: 05 Jan 2009 Posts: 283 Location: Hanoi

http://www.englishforasia.com/en/trinity/

jhawkguy77 · Joined: 07 Jan 2009 Posts: 12

jarvis1981....

I am going to go with the Bridge-linguatec course. I have e-mailed them and also talked to them on the phone. I am going to take the course here in the U.S. in March or May. I wont leave for Vietnam until July. They keep trying to talk me into taking the one in Vietnam since that is where I want to teach but I think I am just going ot do it here.

They told me the Vietnam course is a 4 week course. 2 weeks of the course is taken in Cambodia and 2 weeks are taken in Saigon. I have an online brochure they sent me if you are interested I can e-mail it to you. It does not have a lot of specifics about the course in Vietnam but rather an overall preview of the course.