Job Discussion Forums

[matt41]

Having just graduated with a 2.1 MA in History Iam preparing my trip abroad for this autumn. I am nearing decision time over whether or not I should fork out 900 pounds for a 4 week course on teaching english. In my research around the net i have found that certain countries (especially Asian) are willing to hire with just a university degree and ignore TEFL certification. This seems to have some logic as in a 9 month contract you would be trained up in the inital weeks.
For my financial situation 900 pounds could be spread out much further to pay for travel\living costs than a one off investment in a piece of paper that I have heard loses value once you have a year of teaching experience and a good reference. I know it is a real benefit to get the experience of CELKTA training but is it possible I might not need it to gain employment? Russia and Ukraine are my prefered destinations and for those who could help I ask the following questions-

1. Can you realisiticly get a decent contract and employers without the certicificate? Would only the 'bad' schools hire you and work you like a slave?

2. Will one year of experience gained from this first job be enough to annul the need for a TEFL certificate as you have gained first hand expericence of teaching classes? Or will I still be less employable than a graduate with certificate and no experience?

Please any advice or comments would be a great help at this critical juncture.... Although Iam glad that I will one way or another be making my move east in the autumn

[canucktechie]

I think a lot depends on your long term plans. If you just want to spend a year somewhere in the FSU then you might be able to find a dodgy school which will hire you without credentials. If on the other hand this is going to be a multi-year undertaking I think the 900 pounds and 4 weeks will be well spent.

At the risk of stating the obvious, take a look at the postings on this board and on tefl.com and see what the schools are looking for.

Also I should point out that schools are recruiting for the fall right now, so you have a very narrow window of opportunity. There is a posting on another thread about applying to a school prior to actually taking a course.

[BELS]

Yes ,You can get decent employment with a suitable degree and no CELTA. Howevever what is most important is experience in teaching English as a Second language,and do you have these references.If not a TEFL of any form is important, and by the looks of things a major school BKC, not a high payer by comparison , will only accept a CELTA, but their are many others. Really,it depends on your personal situation. Whats your purpose in staying in Moscow, long term, short term.

[Wonderwall]

One of the problems of TEFL is the amount of crap teachers that effectively have got no idea what they should be teaching and how they should go about it. The CELTA is supposed to help to 'solve' this by giving participants a crash course in pedagogy, techniques, phonemes, grammar awareness, etc. so that participants at least learn something about the 'what', 'why' and the 'how' elements of EFL teaching.

In principle it is a good idea and indeed when it was originally administered by the Royal Society of Arts it was a prestigious qualification which meant something. However, since UCLES (the money making arm of Cambridge University) took it over there has been a distinct drop in the prerequisites to join the course which has meant that many people receive a CELTA merely because they paid a lot of money to take the course.

Case in point; last year I worked in a large school in Moscow and was asked by the Recruitment Department to interview some of the people who had just gained CELTAs with them. As the Teacher Training department was based at the same location I asked the Teacher Trainer for her opinion of the three applicants whom they had just awarded CELTAs to. To my shock horror (not!) She told me that of the three - none of them were very good and that one in particular was a complete no-hoper and that under no circumstances whatsoever should we consider employing him!!!

She was right. After interviewing him, an introverted ex-Ostrich farmhand from Ohio who never finished college and talked in monotones, I recommended that we should reject his application. Strangely enough (not!) the Recruitment Department gave him a job.

So what's the moral of this tale? Essentially, International House Schools and The British Councils ask for the CELTA for historical reasons rather than pedagogical; it was John Haycraft the founder of IH and the IH London team who outlined and were prominent is designing the Original CTEFL, in the days before there was an 'A' on the end of this acronym.

In reality a CELTA means nothing really as it only attained its status value because of the standard of the people who were accepted and then gained the qualification. However, like most things it has been 'dumbed down' in order to raise revenue for UCLES and supply demand for 'Travel while you Teach'/gap-year people who have been conned into thinking the CELTA is their passport to the world.

More important than a CELTA is a "personality". In the classroom, teachers have to 'engage' learners and no amount of games/activities will deflect the students attention away from the fact that the person in front of them is "boring". Ipso facto, when students complain that a class is boring they mean the teacher. No surprise there.

Also a sound working knowledge of English grammar is also essential - not necessarily for communicative approach teaching purposes per se, but because students often throw questions about anything and everything at you whilst you're trying to get them to do a meaningless 'communicative' activity that they've done a hundred times before with every other CELTA 'qualified' teacher, and I use the term 'qualified' here very loosely.

Essentially, it's all common sense really. If you don't want to work for IH or the BC, save your money on a CELTA course and just buy a good introductory book such as Learning to Teach, etc. or just browse the numerous EFL/ESL websites for ideas; and then apply to one of the many jobs that just require you to be in good health, have a degree (or not), speak English, and be from an 'Inner Circle' Native-English Speaking Country... oh yes, and did I mention you need to be outgoing a have a 'personality'?