Job Discussion Forums

[omar805]

It's been interesting reading the various posts in the forum recently to uncover the motives that we have for becoming international teachers.
Apparently, many of us see it as a means of travelling the world, others are in search of a good woman/man, and for some, it's purely economic and they're looking for places that pay the best salaries. And of course, we mustn't forget those that do it for philantrophic reasons.
So, have we covered all bases? Or, are there others out there that we haven't heard from as yet?
What's your angle?

[bnix]

There are many reasons.Although your post mentioned some of the MAJOR reasons,it is only the tip of the iceberg.

There is one which I suppose would come under the economic rubric...people who have spent their time, money and efforts to obtain what they originally thought might be a marketable degree(s)are nonplussed to discover upon graduation that they are really part of a large unemployed group of graduates who also fell for the same lies.

One of my former colleagues in Saudi said it pretty well:"I didn't REALLY want to come overseas to teach.But after going the traditional route,sending out dozens of resumes.....and sitting on the couch for months...waiting anxiously for the phone to ring....I decided I better do something else.The job obviously was not going to come to me...so I had to go to the job...wherever it might be."

Too many educated people...everybody(well, almost) has a degree,or even two or three,certs,,,all kinds of pretty papers.....but when almost everyone has qualifications,the qualifications do not mean that much anymore.This is not ALWAYS the case,but it is OFTEN the case.


Other reasons for going into TESOL? Lots.Because it is such an unregulated field,almost anyone can get some kind of job in it...and all kinds of people have latched on to TESOL as an "easy"option to solve their problems(usually it isn't such an "easy" option)

Some people are running from something(the old apocryphal...but not so far from reality joke that Jack the Ripper is teaching at some private school in Asia and doing quite well,thank you)...people running from the law...people trying to avoid paying child support and or alimony...alcoholics trying to dry out...alcoholics trying to get cheaper booze...

I am sure none of us know all of the reasons.Because it is often so easy to pretend you are a "teacher"...a lot of people try it.I am not saying they succeed all of the time...but they do try it....

[Roger]

A combination of circumstances both favourable and unfavourable, plus a little of what I pompously might call 'chutzpah' led to my being implanted in CHina's body now.

A relationship came to an unwanted end after ten years of togetherness. And the house in which I rented a flat was going to be demolished. Two unfavourables that could have been met with a stiff upper lip, a weekly drinking binge and a permanent gloomy mindset.
Instead I chose to take those savings from my bank account, converted them into TC's and began touring China.
Teaching had fascinated me even before that because my former partner was, and still is a teacher of German in her native France, so I was sufficiently well-disposed towards accepting job offers that eventually were made to me while I was touring China.
Being multilingual myself, I believe I am in a better position than most to do a useful job provided I am not just being taken advantage of as a marketable exotic Western face.
My initial intention was to stay put for a couple of years, maybe three or four. There was that HK girlfriend, and I thought I might relocate permanently to the Fragrant Harbour.
The years kept coming and going, and I am still here and going rather strong. Sometimes I think I should strike out to stake a claim as a self-employed man in China's market. After all, if you don't know more about teaching than your employer does you don't belong here in the first place. And also, you don't need to stay put in the ESL field - many come here with a view of setting themselves up in other careers - lawyers, restaurateurs, bar operators, grocery operators...
Maybe I am dreaming, and those dreams help keep me going even when red flags are popping up left and right of my path. I am somewhere half-way through to realising this dream - I still need an official sponsor for my visa, thus an employer, and I always manage to wheedle that extra freedom out of them that allows me to work on my own as a self-employed tutor, with all the risks that this affords me.

[Kent F. Kruhoeffer]

Greetings Omar805:

"What's your angle?" A very good question. First, I think there are reasons for entering EFL, and then there are reasons for staying in EFL. They are NOT always the same reasons, at least not for me.

bnix et al. have commented well on many of the reasons for entering EFL. I don't really have much to add to that.

As for the reasons why some people choose to stay in the field, I have 2 of my own, which I will happily share with you:

1. First and foremost; I actually love teaching English. This was not true for me when I first entered EFL over a decade ago, but the passion for teaching English has developed slowly over many, many years, and through the realization that the English language is very much like a bottomless pit. Just when you think you know what you're doing, some clever Russian student will raise his hand and say something like this: "Kent; in the sentence "She was the sadest girl to ever hold a martini" ... what part of speech is to ever hold a martini?"

Those clever Russian smart-alecs!

2. Secondly, but equally important for me; teaching EFL represents a kind of modern-day 'fountain of youth'. There's always a new class, a new city, different (and strange!) food, new challenges, a 'funky' new culture to sift through ... and yet another language to mangle, as I stand in line at McDonald's waiting to order my Happy Meal.

From my perspective, this extraordinary combination of factors and daily challenges helps keep me young-at-heart. For me, the past decade in EFL has flown by so fast I can hardly believe it. Basically, I'm 41 going on 16.

Regards,
kEnt

[johnslat]

Dear kEnt,
You undoubtedly already know this, but, being a self-declared " grammar maven ", I can't resist:

" "Kent; in the sentence "She was the sadest girl to ever hold a martini" ... what part of speech is to ever hold a martini?"

I'd say it's an infinitive phrase being used adjectivally ( to describe " the saddest girl " ). Actually, I think the sentence would read better if it were put thusly:
" She was the saddest girl ever to have held a martini. "

And, by the way, just where the heck did you find that sentence? I totally agree with you about the English language's being " very much like a bottomless pit " ( although an " unscalable mountain " might be a prettier way to put it ). Being a teacher means being a life-long learner, too. And even if I should live to be 100+, I figure that when I finally depart this earth, I'll have a good command of about only 20% to 30% ( and that's likely an optimistic overevaluation ) of what there is to know about the language.
Regards,
John

[scot47]

She was the saddest girl to ever hold a martini ?

My students do not ask questions like that - martinis or no martinis.It is an adjectival phrase using the infinitive, modifying "girl". And it has a split infinitive. Sounds like Chandler.

Where I am I see neither girls nor Martinis. Fortunately I have reached that age where celibacy is not a great burden and I stopped using C2HO5H many moons ago.

[itslatedoors]

Why would you ever want to teach your students that something is called an adjectival phrase?It's unneccessary jargon.However I do agree that Eastern Europeans do tend to come out with questions like that...I think as a result of a previous over emphasis on grammar and outdated teaching methods.

[Kent F. Kruhoeffer]

Hello Folks:

itslatedoors is absolutely correct. Russians (and other East Europeans?) often ask UNbelievable grammar questions of their teachers. Not all of them do this, but you've got to be on your toes here for the ones who do. It's also one of the reasons why I regularly try to discourage 'newbies' from coming to Russia to teach English.

fyi: The student who asked this particular question was a young man in his late 20ies who had 'sat in' on a class to decide if he would sign up for the full course, or not. He claimed he had heard this line in a film. In my opinion, he was just testing me to see if I knew my 'stuff' or not.

Anyway ... my point in even mentioning this silly grammar-question was to highlite the 'bottomless pit' analogy that I had made in the same paragraph. I knew 'to ever hold a martini' was being used as an adjective here, but the answer didn't immediately spring to my lips, if ya know what I mean.

InGrammarWeTrust-AllOthersPayCash,
keNt

[rogan]

In my case, after 20 years teaching in the State system in the UK I became Headmaster of an International school in France.

A year later the owners disappeared with a lot of cash and a lot of debts and I had to start working again to support my family.

Over the last 12 years I have noticed that most of my colleagues in the TEFL game seem to have problems of one sort or another. Many seem to be running away from bad situations at home, hoping that they will solve their problems in a foreign country.

Most don't, of course !

[Lucy Snow]

And did you ever try to explain to an Eastern European student why it's not important to know something as arcane as that?

But it's not just students in this part of the world; at the university I taught at in Japan, I was constantly getting into conversations with English Linguistics students like this:

"Teacher, is this sentence correct: 'Jane ironed the shirt flat.'"

"No, it isn't, because 'ironing' implies that the item will be smooth and flat, therefore 'flat' is unnecessary."

"But is it correct?"

"No, as I said before, the word 'flat' is unnecessary in that sentence."

"So it's correct?"

"A native speaker of English would never use that kind of sentence construction."

"But is it correct?"


I would eventually run out of the room screaming.

[scot47]

"outdated teaching methods" ?????????

I for one think that the teaching methods used in the old days produced better results than we get from some of the performers these days !!

[johnslat]

Dear scot47,
I'm not so sure that ANY methods are " outdated "; it's been my experience that different students learn differently. Some respond well to a " grammatical " approach, whereas others do better with a " communicative " one. I suspect we all learn differently, so perhaps the most successful " method " would be an eclectic one that makes use of the best of everything available. But what I do find amusing is how when/if you read the " professional literature ", every few months someone " discovers " a new method that " makes all the others obsolete ".
Method of the month.
Regards,
John

[Ria]

I am a wannabe ESL/EFL teacher. I don't know what will keep me teaching once I start, but a love of language and interest in other cultures motivates me to pursue it.

keNt: "...the saddest girl ever to hold a martini.." This is indeed a line from a film, although for the life of me I can't remember which one! (I saw it recently)

[Guest]

[Roger]

itslatedoors,
I have to take you to task for your unnecessary comment on grammar!
Outdated? Perhaps "wrong"?
I can't disagree with you any more violently than I do!
I would like to have more intellectually-interested students here in the Far East than those "communicatively"-trained, unmotivated, communicatively-challenged memorising robots with their Pavlovian reflexes that tend to translate every single word, and get lost in their translation in every other sentence.
Perhaps you and your consorts have not learnt how long grammar has been taught at schools throughout the world, beginning in Greece a few thousand years ago, and why this has become an essential part of any language acquisition process.
We can clearly see here in China and in other parts of East Asia where mostly Americans teach English where the communicative approach leads to.
I am sorry but I can only disagree with you. I also find students interested in the mechanism of a language to be a lot more interesting as students.
My Chinese students usually prefer to talk about themselves, dating, drinking, regurgitating the latest brainwash from Zhongnanhai, and they often are unable to pick up anything new from sources not endorsed by their Big Brother!
I sometimes think Big Brother is a big, big friend of the "communicativists".