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haller_79
Joined: 09 Mar 2007
Posts: 145
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 Posted: Mon Jul 11, 2011 7:36 am Post subject: |
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Full blown teaching?
I suggest that you get the requisite teaching experience in your own country, then come to China. You owe it to yourself and to your students. Otherwise, you'll be singing songs in college class rooms when they really need vocabulary exercises, and conducting wacked-out psychodramas when the students need to work on writing and reading comprehension.
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I agree that you owe it to *yourself* to learn to teach in your home country first (for many reasons that I have come to realise through bitter experience). However I do not agree that you owe anything in particular to the Chinese students - teacher quality is the RESPONSIBILITY OF THE SCHOOL and its hiring procedures. |
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GuestBob
Joined: 18 Jun 2011
Posts: 270
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| Posted: Mon Jul 11, 2011 6:03 pm Post subject: |
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| haller_79 wrote: |
| ...However I do not agree that you owe anything in particular to the Chinese students - teacher quality is the RESPONSIBILITY OF THE SCHOOL and its hiring procedures. |
This is the most backassward argument I have ever encountered. Please, give me one good reason why a school hiring you to teach means that you shouldn't be concerned about the quality of your teaching.
I agree with others who have said that you should be technically competent to teach English from the start of the class - does this mean you have to be a qualified teacher in your home country? No.
There are plenty of way to be competent in the Chinese English classroom - degrees in Education, English or Linguistics are great, other Humanities can be good too, especially if coupled with drive and enthusiasm. Past experience working in education is always going to be useful. If your background is different then maybe you might benefit from a CELTA course to help you build your skills and knowledge.
Whatever way you do it, you do owe the kids in your class a decent lesson. After all, they are paying your wage. How angry would you be if some half baked traveler rocked up and started trying to teach a seminar when you were in Uni? |
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7969
Joined: 26 Mar 2003
Posts: 5782
Location: Coastal Guangdong
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| Posted: Mon Jul 11, 2011 7:00 pm Post subject: |
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| haller_79 wrote: |
| However I do not agree that you owe anything in particular to the Chinese students - teacher quality is the RESPONSIBILITY OF THE SCHOOL and its hiring procedures. |
Fully in agreement with the post by GuestBob. The student is the paying customer. If anyone deserves quality in the education delivery service, it's them.
I've heard numerous times how students are disappointed with some of their classes, and more-so some of the teachers (both foreign and chinese). I'm familiar with a few of these teachers and I know how they operate so the students concerns are justified. Just because some schools hire garbage masquerading as a teacher doesn't preclude the students right to quality education.
BTW, without those students we don't have jobs. At the very least, we owe them the decency of doing our best. Anyone who disagrees isn't fit to be teaching a class. |
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Miles Smiles
Joined: 07 Jun 2010
Posts: 1294
Location: Heebee Jeebee
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| Posted: Mon Jul 11, 2011 9:02 pm Post subject: Re: Completely Overwhelmed!! |
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| The Great Wall of Whiner wrote: |
| Miles Smiles wrote: |
| The foreign teacher should be capable of teaching language when he arrives, not months later when it finally sinks in that he is expected to be doing something in class. |
This is an untrue message to new teachers.
Many schools openly advertise for teachers with no experience. Many ask for (and secretly require) no experience at all. Many schools want FOB's that they can mold the way they like them.
Not all, but many.
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I have no idea where others have taught in the past, but in every school where I have taught, the FT has been expected to be able to teach when he arrives.
I have seen the NO EXPERIENCE NECESSARY advertisements for FTs and the schools certainly don't sound like the kind of place where I'd want my own kids to go to school. |
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Sophisticate
Joined: 29 May 2010
Posts: 38
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| Posted: Fri Jul 15, 2011 8:26 am Post subject: Re: Completely Overwhelmed!! |
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| MissCeliaJ wrote: |
Hello,
I'm a recent university graduate and qualified TEFL teacher (140 hours online course) and I'm looking to do a year teching in China - but I'm completely overwhelmed by how many jobs there are. I've not done full blown teaching before and I haven't a clue what I should be looking for in a potential job.
I don't know much about China and I'd love to go anywhere, really. Can anyone suggest any good schools to get in contact with, or any particular jobs they've seen in China that I should apply for?
Any comments would be useful
Thanks very much,
Celia
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Females tend to not last long in China. If you come, you will soon see why. It can be very hard to take the life in China. Good Luck! |
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Sophisticate
Joined: 29 May 2010
Posts: 38
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| Posted: Sat Jul 16, 2011 12:38 am Post subject: Excellent! |
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Last edited by Sophisticate on Sun Jul 17, 2011 7:30 am; edited 1 time in total |
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Miles Smiles
Joined: 07 Jun 2010
Posts: 1294
Location: Heebee Jeebee
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| Posted: Sat Jul 16, 2011 11:14 am Post subject: Re: Completely Overwhelmed!! |
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| Sophisticate wrote: |
Get teaching experience to teach in China? Really? Really? Of all the instructors here at my university, I am the only qualified one (with nineteen years of experience), and it does not make a bit of difference! They are bored with real, modern, communicative teaching. These students cheat, plagarise, do no homework, and are very, very lazy. They want an entertainer who does all the work for them. Try taking attendance suddenly and see how many are absent!
The instructors at my university are goofballs and usually show movies. |
This is precisely WHY all teachers-- no matter where they teach--- should be experienced. Granted, one must start somewhere, but even in the west, one is required to have an advanced formal education PLUS
x number of hours of student teaching before he can teach without close supervision.
From experience, one learns how to deal with the problems that you cite. |
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igorG
Joined: 10 Aug 2010
Posts: 1473
Location: asia
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| Posted: Sat Jul 16, 2011 12:47 pm Post subject: |
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Local employers aren't exactly happy about the experienced FTs, especially China experienced FTs. We can assume why, can't we?
Applying for jobs around recently, the more a FT asks the worse. "you worry too much" will be probably said.
| 7969 wrote: |
| Take some time to read through the pages of this forum. The main reason the stuff is archived is to help people who need info. |
Yes, but be aware that not all posts come from FTs on. There are plenty of wolves in sheeps clothes on. The main reason is that if the forums were too negative, FTs applications would drop. |
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Miajiayou
Joined: 30 Apr 2011
Posts: 283
Location: Nanjing
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| Posted: Sun Jul 31, 2011 1:17 am Post subject: |
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My advice for a first job would be to stay out of the first tier cities like Beijing and Shanghai. You really need to have experience AND be in the country already in order to properly navigate the job market in the big cities.
My first job was at a public college in a medium-sized city. Typically, those schools are pretty lucky to have you and don't try to screw you out of pay or airfare because... well, because your pay will hardly be worth trying to screw you out of. But, you'll be legal and will likely have fun. It is a good first job. |
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Non Sequitur
Joined: 23 May 2010
Posts: 4724
Location: China
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| Posted: Sun Jul 31, 2011 7:58 am Post subject: |
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Miajiayou is right and newbies should mark the comment.
I'm seeing too many - some with no experience or even a prior job - setting strings of preconditions:
I want Shanghai.
I want 12000 pm
I want an apartment that's close to school and no more than 1000pm.
I want 20 hours pw max and no office duties ie promo work, like being on show when not actually teaching.
I want
I want
Get that first job. Use it to find out if you can teach and if you'd prefer small kids or college students.
Use it to learn to deal with the Chinese who even if acting perfectly normally by their estimation, are taking real liberties by yours.
In the West, we expect/demand and usually get, all the information we want. In China people have no expectations like that and if they do have information are unworried that that info is wrong or contradicts what they told you yesterday.
Add to that the fact that many job seekers are out of synch with the hiring cycle. A case of 'I'm ready now so China should be too'.
The perfect job may be out there but the chances of hitting on it first time are slim. |
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