TEFL Course

Two months ago, I took a TEFL (Teaching English as a Foreign Language, also known as TESL (Teaching English as a Second Language)) course in central Birmingham.

I said then that I didn't have time to write about it and that I would soon. Two months later counts as "soon", right?

Well, anyway, I took an intensive weekend course at the Thistle Hotel, Birmingham with UK-TEFL. It cost me £195.

Saturday was an 11-hour day and Sunday was 9. It was a pretty exhausting couple of days! But it was very enjoyable; the other students (although much older than me) were very friendly and we were all pretty much on the same level. The teacher was very kind and helpful, she made everything very accessible.

Having only just left school, I expected didactic rows of chairs with a blackboard at the front and an authoritarian instructor with a cane. Well, not quite... but you get the idea. It was very relaxed, we were clustered around tables and there was a lot of movement and activity.

The teacher had spent two years teaching in Japan and did a lesson completely in Japanese so we would know what it felt like to have a foreign language spoken to you and you not having any idea what's going on. Of course, that didn't quite work for me as I understood everything she said! She even asked me what the word for "write" was at one point because she had forgotten!

There was free mineral water, tea and coffee, and little glasses on each table filled with sucky sweets.

There was a lot of teaching practice (with us roleplaying as students) and lesson planning. I took pages and pages of notes, and typed them up afterwards. I have them here in Japan with me in a file and I made a contents page so I can find all the information I need really easily! (I know, I'm so cool.)

The teacher recommended 'How to Teach English' by Jeremy Harmer so I asked for that for Christmas.

There's no guarantee you'll pass the course so try your best and look engaged! If you don't pass, just write "attended a TEFL course" on your CV/ resume and then it's up to the employer to ask if you actually passed it or not! There's no final exam or anything like that, whether you pass or not is based on your performance throughout the weekend, although at the end, she gave us each a stimulus material (I had an ethical magazine) and about an hour to prepare a lesson based on something in there. My lesson was for High Intermediate students (we could choose the level) and I had them use the pictures and text to debate their opinions on deforestation. It worked quite well.

I really recommend doing a TEFL course like this (not neccessarily with UK-TEFL, although I found that they were very good) because it gives you a little bit of credibility here.

I haven't told anyone that it was a 20-hour course, and no one has asked to see the certificate. People have been saying "with your education background" and things like that to me, and I'm like "yeah, a weekend of education background", and 14 years of school, but I don't think they were referring to that.

It looks great on Gaijinpot.com and Jobs In Japan.com ads too.