1) TEACHER TRAINING COURSES

Many people get in touch with IATEFL asking about the plethora of teacher training courses available nowadays. A typical query is "Should I spend my time, energy and money on "X" course? Will it be a good course? Will it help me to get a job?"

IATEFL cannot endorse any particular product and can take absolutely no responsibility for what happens to anyone going on any course. However, we thought it might be helpful to give a few pointers.

We will start with advice that holds good for the UK and add other advice from other parts of the world as we gradually build it. If you can help with this, please do send in a text from your part of the world that we can add to the tips below.

REASONS FOR TAKING A COURSE

First of all, consider your reasons for going on a course.

1. Do you want just a taster?

Let's imagine you are considering a career switch or are just thinking about being a teacher of English to speakers of other languages. If you have friends or relatives doing the job already, the best idea is to talk to them and to pop into their classrooms, on invitation, to see what it is like. Perhaps you are not in this happy position and you do not want to spend a LOT of time and money finding out if the job is for you. Then you can take a language course yourself for a few weeks and watch the teacher and the class carefully. Alternatively, pop into a local school and ask if you can observe a few language classes. Failing that, consider taking a very short "taster" course. Such a course might be anything from a weekend to a couple of weeks long. It would be comparatively inexpensive and should state clearly in its advertising material that it is only a taster course. This means it is designed to help you to see if ELT is a possible job for you. Even on a short course such as this you would expect there to be some spaces on the time table for discussion of e.g. The English language, how people learn languages, working with groups of students, teacher roles, planning lessons, materials available. A little peer teaching would be useful for you too. You can expect a reading list and that your tutors have been actively involved in ELT for several years themselves in different contexts and at many different levels. Don't be afraid to establish this before you pay!

2. Do you want a real entry-level qualification?

It is still possible to get a job teaching English without any qualification and people sometimes wonder why they should spend time and money on a qualification. Three reasons for doing so are:

1) You will feel more confident and relaxed about the job, knowing that you are trained to help your students learn,
2) The better jobs are not usually open to those with no qualification,
3) You will become part of a professional community of English teachers with access to many useful resources.

If you want to have an entry-level qualification that is recognised world wide so you can get a job fairly easily, there are several routes you can follow.

Universities: Several UK universities offer courses leading to a certificate level qualification of similar standing to the UCLES and Trinity qualifications described below.

Exam Boards: University of Cambridge Local Examinations Syndicate (UCLES) has a business stream that deals with English Language exams. It is called Cambridge ESOL Then there are Trinity College courses.

These two exam boards run internationally recognised courses that are well established and carefully controlled and vetted. If successful, you will end up with a Certificate. These short, intensive courses involve a strong practical teaching element.

You can find more details of these courses and lists of centres that run them on the following web sites.

UCLES: http://www.cambridgeesol.org

TRINITY: http://www.trinitycollege.co.uk/
tesol@trinitycollege.co.uk

We would suggest you stay away from courses that offer qualifications which employers may not recognise. Stay away too from claims that you can be taught all you need to know about teaching over a weekend or a week or so! Employers tend to prefer certificates from either of the two main exam bodies, UCLES or Trinity, or certificates from a properly accredited university.

The courses described above do not, however, qualify you to teach in most state school systems. For this you need qualified teacher status (QTS). In Britain nowadays there are many routes to a teaching career. Some involve a Post Graduate Certificate of Education or B.Ed degree but there are lots of other options. Have a look at the web site of the Teacher training Agency (soon to become the Training and Development Agency for Schools)

www.tta.gov.uk

3. English not your mother tongue?

Maybe you have married someone who has English as their mother tongue or for some other reason you find yourself wanting to teach English in the UK but a 'non-native speaker' living in a land of 'native speakers'!
Rightly or wrongly, it is probably the case that people who travel to the UK especially to improve their English, do seem to expect that their teachers be so-called 'native English speakers'. So what can you do about this?

First of all, work on your own English...attend pottery or cookery or other classes, read, go to films, listen to the radio, have conversations.. In other words get your own English as good as possible in all manner of topics and situations. Then offer your services (free at first?) to local schools where there are lots of children needing to improve their English or in areas where there is a huge demand for help with incoming adult populations who need to improve their English.

In the TESOL world, there are many second language speakers who teach English. The Co-ordinator of the IATEFL Special Interest Group for ESOL says,

" My advice to people wanting to get into ESOL teaching is this. Further and adult education colleges often have in-house teacher training courses. So if people feel their English is good enough, they should talk to the head of department and/or apply to do teacher training. They should indicate that they would welcome advice on their English, and either signposting to language development courses or pre-teacher training courses if their English is not yet good enough or support while they are on-course.

I agree that volunteering is also a good way in. Many Further Education colleges run 'how to teach as a volunteer' courses. These can provide a good stepping-stone to doing teacher training for a CELTA or Trinity certificate.
BTW it may be worth pointing out that the CELTA or Trinity certificates are a good starting point for people who want to teach in the 16+ state sector. However, more training is required.

Once your own English is really competent and you have proved your usefulness, you will stand a better chance of employment in any related sphere.

4. Do you want a more advanced course?

If you have been teaching for a few years and want to get a more advanced qualification, then your main options are to take the Diploma courses of UCLES or Trinity College (See contact details above) or to take a Master's course at an institution of Higher Education. For lists of such courses with contact details and short descriptions, see the 'EL Gazette' annual listings.

A more advanced qualification can offer you professional benefits both in terms of your own feeling of competence and in career terms. More advanced qualifications aim to anchor your present practical teaching skills in a theoretical framework, and improve your practical skills. Such qualifications can also open doors to career development, for example to materials writing for a publisher, to positions as senior teacher or director of studies, and to teacher training positions. Good places to look for jobs are:
www.elgazette.com
See also ‘The Guardian’ newspaper on Tuesdays and ‘The Times Educational Supplement’ (TES) for jobs in the state sector.

5. Topping up?

Once you are qualified and have been teaching for a while, you may well want to develop professionally. You may want to brush up your English. You may feel a bit out of date in your methods. Perhaps you get interested in drama, or multiple intelligence theory or want to teach content and language integrated lessons. In this case, although you will want an attendance certificate, you are probably not looking for a formal qualification. You may well then be looking for short intensive courses you can fit into your holiday periods. There are many of these run by the British Council, private language schools and universities. Ask around to find out if your friends and colleagues can recommend any. Check the staff to make sure they are well-trained and well thought of in the field they are offering. Look at the publicity materials and web sites carefully, comparing numbers of hours, prices, locations, numbers of participants on the course etc. See if you can get e.g. EU funding from the Socrates/Comenius project.

6. Are you changing career?

Many people come into teaching English as a second career, and have built up a certain amount of expertise and know-how which might allow them to specialise in a particular sector of English Language Teaching. This is very common in the teaching of English for business or professional purposes, for example. An entry-level qualification is still recommended, but some employers will value non-EFL experience just as highly. There are also entry-level courses designed specifically to cater for this market. IATEFL has two SIGs (Special Interest Groups) which focus on this type of teaching, and a visit to their web sites will yield lots of useful information. If you are interested in this area of teaching - see www.besig.org, and http://dudeney.com/iatefl/espsig/

And finally…

We hope you have found these notes useful. Please do let us know if you find any inaccuracies in them or if you can add further information. We are sure that IATEFL members and web site browsers alike will find extra information useful.

All good wishes

Tessa Woodward

President of IATEFL 2005-2007

IATEFL office.