So firstly, I apologise for not posting for a few days. I've been away for the weekend and have been enjoying this (highly rare) Welsh heatwave! Right now, I'm still outside attempting (vainly) to tan, but mainly just feeling like I'm roasting. And I swear my poor little laptop is actually sweating!
Anyway-onto business! Today's post is to help anyone out there who wants to sign up to a TEFL course, but isn't quite sure where to start. However, I just want to state that I am by no means an expert on TEFL course providers or the wide range of TEFL courses available-so if you're looking for a more comprehensive guide, click here to have a look at an article from The Guardian which really helped me when I was trying to decide. What I can offer, however, is my own personal experience as a complete no-hoper, with no idea of where to start.
So, if you are struggling to find the right TEFL course for you, can I just say that I FEEL YOUR PAIN. One of the things about TEFL is that there are a lot of course providers out there; so when you Google the phrase 'TEFL' and see the search results, it can all feel a bit bewildering. Furthermore, it can be even harder to figure out if a course provider is 100% reliable or not; because unfortunately, there's quite a few scams hanging around. My advice regarding avoiding scams would be that if a deal seems too good to be true, it probably is. I mean, I like a bargain as much as the next girl; but let's face it, a £25 TEFL Course probably won't get you more than a couple of flimsy lesson plans, at best. Avoid like the plague.
This is also one of those situations where it's probably best to go for the most mainstream option (apologies to all the hipsters out there); because if a lot of people have already signed up to it, it's likely to be relatively decent. In the case of the UK, TEFL Org UK is probably the most popular course provider out there, and definitely appears to be the most Kosher, even from first glance. Although I spent some time ummming and arrring about it, I eventually decided to go for TEFL Org UK because:
-They offer a really good range of courses, and you can tailor your course to individually suit your needs
-There's a really good support network available, from forums to an online chatting service with TEFL 'experts' (I spoke to a rather nice young man called Lewis through this the other day, he was pretty helpful).
-Their courses are cheap(ish), and there's often an offer or deal going on so you can save an extra bit of dollar.
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| The TEFL Org Wales logo is particularly pretty (YAAAAY Cymru!). |
On the latter point, money and how much to spend can often be a point of contention for many. In the case of TEFL Org UK, courses range in price from £79 for courses focusing on specific areas of TEFL Teaching, to £399 for a comprehensive 150 TEFL Course, which covers pretty much all the basics and a few extras. Although I can understand that most of you won't want to spend any more money than necessary, my advice would be-go for the most comprehensive course that you can afford. This is due to the fact that the more hours of training you have under your belt, the more likely you are to get a decent job-and also, the more prepared you're likely to be for any situation that may come your way! The afore-mentioned lovely Lewis also informed me that as a rule of thumb, most employers expect a minimum of 120 hours of training from you, and that doing any less than this may severely limit the job opportunities available to you. All of this makes perfect sense, of course; as the best language schools will want confident, able teachers secure in their abilities to do their job well.
In the case of TEFL Org UK, the other important decision to make is whether to take a purely online course, or whether to also invest in 20 hours of classroom teaching on top of your online lessons. On this point, I would say-DEFINITELY take the classroom-taught course if you can. I'm going to write another post about my experiences of the classroom course, so I won't go into too much detail here, but I will say that my intensive weekend in Cardiff helped immensely-and was a lot of fun, too! You can do the classroom component of your course over 2 days (typically a weekend) or 3 days (typically weekdays) depending on what suits you best, so it's convenient even if you have a very busy life. It does cost a bit extra, but this is definitely a case of money well spent.
With all of these decisions made, you should be in a good position to sign up to your TEFL Org UK course, and start the TEFL journey. In my case, I signed up about a month ago to the 140-hour Premier Combined Course. This sounds like quite a plush option, but there was actually an offer on at the time which meant it only cost me £259 (which was less than the 120-hour course at the time). So far, I've been really happy with it-the online course is a little dry at times, but (as afore-mentioned) the classroom course is great, and there's loads of resources available to help you along the way. I'll give a more detailled evaluation on it when I'm a little further into proceedings.
Also-although the TEFL Org UK course is good, I've since discovered that doing a CELTA or Trinity CertTESOL is even better, if you have the time,energy and finances to committ to it. It's all classroom taught, and you will get hands-on classroom teaching experience, which seems to be pretty invaluable. It also maximises your TEFL career prospects-some language schools only accept this qualification. Ah well-at least TEFL Org offers that extra bit of flexibility.
Anyway-it would be great to hear about your TEFL experiences with course providers etc. If you have any top tips-then please share them. I may even include them in a future post!
Also, if you have any questions, then please ask them. I'll help as best I can (although as this post proves, I'm definitely no expert!).
I'll be back with more soon...in the meantime, hope you all continue to enjoy this amazing weather!
The Tiny TEFL Teacher xx
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