Job Discussion Forums

[bonfire4]

Hi, I've been searching around these message boards for hours and I'm having troubling finding answers to some basic questions, so I thought I'd post them here, and that way others being directed to this site can find answers quickly on broad topics.

The questions I was hoping some of you could answer for me are:

1)is a TEFL/TESOL certificate really necessary in China (Shanghai specifically) because a friend of mine in South Korea says most teachers don't have them.
2)do you need to apply for a tourist visa before you get to China, and then get a working (Z) visa once you're there? Or can you just show up on vacation and get your working visa once employed?
3)Is there a strong market for Business English teachers? If so, are there specific English Teaching schools that look for such teachers? Is the pay for such positions any different?
4)How do you find the Mandarin instruction courses offered by your employers (if they offer them)?
5)For those of you trying to learn Mandarin, do you find that locals encourage it, or only try to practice their english? (I've had this problem in other areas of the world)
6)If you did get your TEFL, would you recommend getting it in your home nation, or in China?
7)Do you recommend securing a job first, or landing in China and then hunting?
8)Who has had some great or terrible experiences with schools in Shanghai?
9)Would you recommend buying some Mandarin books/CDs prior to leaving for China?

Thanks for all your help, its good to advice and news from the 'front lines'.

Cheers

[SIH]

[daodejing]

As for #5, I can speak about my own experience in China, which is probably similar to other places in the world. You will end up speaking whichever language is more convenient. If a Chinese person can speak more English than you speak Chinese, you will speak English with that person. It takes a lot of discipline to attempt to communicate in a language that is not the best for the people involved.

One solution is to go to a rural or small city where no one speaks English. One problem with that is people's Mandarin will not be that good..they will speak with a thick accent, although that is not the worst thing in the world. You can just speak as they do and work on your pronunciation later I suppose, or take lessons to get your pronunciation down and attune your ear to the local accent. The other thing is that your social life in the countryside may not be that great because you'll be amongst hicks. The perfect situation is to find a bunch of educated, open-minded young people from the city who don't speak English that well and don't mind dealing with your beginner's Chinese, but that is hard to find, especially in Shanghai. Locals like to speak their local dialect as much as possible, but they seem to catch on right away that foreigners speak Mandarin, if anything.

I think I'm going to show up in Shanghai myself after getting an online TEFL certificate from the link in the first reply.

[tw]