Job Discussion Forums

FreakingTea · Joined: 09 Jan 2013 Posts: 167

I've just accepted an offer at a training center for adults in Dalian. I'm quite looking forward to it all, and the interviewer said he really liked my responses. I'll be working harder than here at the university, but it's something different, and hopefully more interesting on the whole. No office hours, at least.

So I know these places like to have confidentiality clauses in their contracts, and if sharing their super secret formulas wigs you out, feel free to leave out anything incriminating. It's just that I've seen very little said about what actually goes on in a training center lesson. It can't all be following a book and pointing at diagrams, can it? Do schools tend to make you follow a PPP format or similar? Some of them seem to cover the first two P's with a computer, and then make the FT cover the last P, which makes sense.

Dan123 · Joined: 08 Jan 2014 Posts: 112

I teach adults and kids. Most of our adult classes do have a format in which we're scheduled to teach x pages of a book each lesson, but we're given a lot of freedom too. If we want, we can go completely off topic and teach something else.

I tend to mainly stick to the book for lower level classes, but for the higher level classes, we mainly tend to just talk together and have discussions about things, with me just correcting them and throwing in new vocabulary whenever necessary.

I find them to be a lot easier than kids classes, at least in terms of planning.

Mr. English · Joined: 25 Nov 2009 Posts: 298 Location: Nakuru, Kenya

Most adults who come to such classes are interested in improving their speaking skills and are interested in learning about foreign culture. Go armed with knowledge of current events and be, as best you can, prepared to talk about sports, television, film, work, and more. I often start such meetings by going around the room and asking each person to tell me something about the past week, something interesting or exciting or unusual that happened. With those who have nothing to say, ask them about their work or where they live and how long they have lived there or what their hobby is or anything to get them talking.

FreakingTea · Joined: 09 Jan 2013 Posts: 167

I am in no way prepared to talk about sports, but the other things I can do. Thanks for the advice. Looks like I have a lot of TV and movies to watch... Cool

davelister · Joined: 15 Jul 2013 Posts: 214

FreakingTea · Joined: 09 Jan 2013 Posts: 167

How common is the old style vs. the new style in Chinese language schools? Old style definitely sounds more interesting to teach, but if the software is effective, the new style could be perfectly valid. Just more of a rip-off for the students because they could do that stuff for free at home. Then again, I'm used to teaching myself languages and would never pay to use someone else's computer to learn on proprietary software. (But if I didn't know how to learn a language on my own, I'd rather pay to use software than pay to be taught by a totally inept teacher if those were my choices.)

Non Sequitur · Joined: 23 May 2010 Posts: 4724 Location: China

I worked a private from my day job at an adult language school in Dalian in 2005.
My memory is a bit hazy now but my suggestion is check out the style ie teaching or lab supervision before you sign. Mine was old school and about 15 students per class.
OP can PM me with specific questions if he/she likes.