Do you need teacher training and qualifications before your first TEFL job?
I was a trainer on 4 week certificate in teaching English to adults courses (similar to the Cambridge CELTA) where some of the trainees already had teaching experience before they came on the course, mostly because they had decided it was still worth the money to work in better schools and/ or work legally (in Turkey, for example, you need a teaching qualification to get a visa). Having seen such people at the beginning and end of their training courses and having been able to compare them with TEFL noobs, and also being totally out of that end of the business now and so able to give my completely honest opinion, here are my two Turkish lira on the matter:
All the teachers who had teaching experience before any kind of TEFL training had got into very bad teaching habits, and most of them looked like they were going to fail the teaching practice part of the course in the first two or three weeks. Most finally came through quite well, but with on average with a range of marks only slightly higher than people with no teaching experience at all (who also often had the handicap of less life experience to help them). Certainly all the teachers would have been better at their jobs having done the Certificate first and then taught for a year or two rather than visa versa- without a single exception.
Ditto people with Primary school teaching experience and MAs in TESOL with no teaching experience
Conclusions:
1) There are jobs you can get without a TEFL Certificate, but there are more and better ones you can get with
2)You will do your job better if you get training first, and it will also make your job easier on you
3) If you put off training until later, you will not get as full benefit from it as you could- quite apart from the wasted years of teaching not as well as you could have before that you get round to doing it.
4) It is expensive, and schools do become training centres partly for financial reasons, but you will soon get your money back if you choose your post-CELTA job carefully and/ or when you start getting promoted. Anyway, it’s much cheaper than any kind of IT, NLP or business training.
5) If you really think 4 week certificates etc. are just lucrative money making scams (as some people do), if you want to get in on that game you will need a CELTA etc. to become a CELTA trainer and rake it in (?) yourself
(NB. This is a polished up version of an answer of mine to a thread on the TEFL.net forums)
November 18th, 2007 at 10:55 am
its funny you posted I was discussing with someone the other day who’s started teaching without a CELTA qualification, but 2 weeks of fast fwd training.
I must admit even though the job I do in an eikawa may be nowhere what the CELTA prepared me for (in terms of class sizes, interaction, etc…) I dont think I would have been able to last this long and get as much as enjoyment as I soemtimes have (and frustration too!) if I hadn’t done it.
No matter how pissed off I maybe at having to spend 2h with one person in what seems to be a totally pointless exercise in PR, money making and giving the impressiong of ‘having your money’s worth’, I can at least turn that time to good use and really do something productive for them and myself.
I’ve noticed that in the last few months, coming to the end of my first year of ‘teaching’, i’ve started going back to a lot of the CELTA stuff I learnt and making it work better than I had before.
Definitely a recommended move, and as I thought when I did it too, even if coming to japan or wherever the person wants to go doesnt work out, you have a qualification that can get you a job pretty much anywhere!
November 30th, 2008 at 2:50 am
I think it is very important to go into any course after you have real-life experience in the classroom with the right attitude- specifically, the right motivation. If you are going to CELTA course only to get your certificate in order to find a better job, then it will be probably hard-going.
I had taught for many many years and only now, am I trying to get my certificate. In my initial interview, it was mentioned that old hands in the teaching profession tend to get set in their ways and this could be a potential problem. However, I never quite saw it that way. Yes, I have my teaching style but that doesn’t mean I have nothing to learn. Many of the things I have before done haphazardly or even accidentally, I can now see can be improved upon and streamlined. I am very happy with my course instructors because they have found a nice balance between respecting my experience and offering valid suggestions for improvement.
I admit it is rather grating to hear a noob- with a total of 3 hours teaching experience criticize your methods in the classroom, but probably no more so than for any other training teacher.
Perhaps one reason for experienced teachers to have such a hard time in the training courses is that many English teachers have already reached their “burnout point” by the time they have sought their certificate. They have, in effect, grown fat and lazy and I can assure any person thinking about taking an intensive CELTA course.. you had better be prepared to give up some socializing and some sleep because it is no walking in the park. Your experience does not count for a whole lot because, if the course is any good at all, you really have to take it seriously and follow the regime, especially when it comes to administrative issues, such as lesson plans and proper classroom procedure.