Teaching English Abroad During Covid

Latrice Coates TEFL Information Alumni Experiences I am sure you’ve seen the sponsored posts floating around your social media feed of travelers in these candid, well-desired places with the caption “I quit my 9-5 to travel the world & so can you”. I did quit my federal 9-5 job to travel the world full time and I’m here to give you the scoop that most influencers don’t tell you about moving abroad... Margaret Paton TEFL Information Alumni Experiences Are you interested in teaching English online? Like you, I’m a new starter to this career of teaching English to non-native speakers, so I wanted to share five tips on what not to do in your early days. Leo Salazar TEFL Information Alumni Experiences Working from home brings both opportunities and challenges....  [Read more]

Rhea Latchu Destinations Teaching Ideas Within the last months, many countries have been implementing various restrictive measures to reduce the spread of COVID-19. Thus, many of us have had to adapt to drastic changes in our day-to-day life. Lots of EFL teachers, myself included, are currently stranded in foreign countries with expiring visas and/or contracts. Many are faced with the absence of physical contact from others. Some have even lost their jobs and are currently without an income. Numerous EFL teachers aren’t earning their full salary. In addition to that, the ones who were used to face-to-face classes now have to adapt to online teaching. Can you imagine facing all these challenges, while dealing with the fear of contracting the deadly virus? Yes, it is my life! The most...  [Read more]

Zainab Sadriwala Alumni Experiences Teaching Ideas “The most challenging of the tasks during this COVID era has been to make my children read” states a frustrated Amena; a mother of two children, one in the primary years and the other in middle school. “It was much easier for me to monitor them and ask them to read and follow the schedule when they knew they had to report to their teacher. The school environment is just so integral for sustaining discipline in young people” she continues. Like Amena, there have been many parents worldwide trying to strike a balance for their children to maintain their healthy habits, which not only helps them develop academically but also grow in every aspect. Reading is one of such instrumental habits that young children should develop and more...  [Read more]

Zainab Sadriwala Alumni Experiences It’s almost been many months since we started the process of transitioning towards online education due to the COVID-19 outbreak. In fact, there has been a complete shift from the traditional way of teaching to a virtual method. The world has come to believe, and more so understand, that virtual classrooms remain the need of today. Initially, it seemed a rather uphill task for many but with time and effort, teachers around the world have jumped on the bandwagon of teaching online. This remodeling of our classrooms has generated new innovative methods of teaching which, even in the post lockdown period, should not be forgotten or done away with. In this blog post, we discuss some of these useful methods and learn how we can incorporate them into our...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina TEFL Information Alumni Experiences Teaching Ideas Watching videos is an effective way to switch between different activities or time fill. Modern students are more likely to watch videos or look at images than to do worksheets or read. Videos are also excellent sources of audio-lingual information that develops listening and speaking skills. However, to use videos during the online ESL lessons, it is essential to follow several rules that our TEFL expert shares in this article. Before watching videos, think carefully about the exercises you’ll give to your student and the purpose of this activity. When planning online ESL lessons, understand your student’s needs, and set up appropriate goals to make sure the video activity will be useful. Also Read: "The Way to...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Alumni Experiences One of the most important things to consider when teaching business English is what your students want out of the English lesson. When you talk about business English you aren’t talking about teaching adults versus teaching children, these are business professionals that often work in international trade where English is the language of business. You’re unlikely to go over the names of utensils in English in a business English class unless the students you’re working with are looking to open a restaurant, and even then being able to coherently discuss how much it costs to open a restaurant and the operating costs of a restaurant are more important than them knowing how to correctly pronounce knife. In fact, if you go over utensils or other...  [Read more]

Anastasiia Ovchinnikova Visa and Legal Budget and Salary Destinations TEFL Information Alumni Experiences In the post-epidemic time, qualified TEFL teachers grow in real demand in China again. If you consider this TEFL destination, we suggest you read carefully the article written by our ITTT TEFL expert who shares their important experience of job hunting in this country. Anastasiia Ovchinnikova Visa and Legal Budget and Salary Destinations Alumni Experiences Are you considering China as a TEFL destination? Read our TEFL expert's story to find out where to go - a small town or big city - to enjoy your stay in this beautiful country most. Linda Dunsmore Budget and Salary Destinations Japan has been a popular destination for teaching English abroad for many years. This is...  [Read more]

Mia Santarelli Alumni Experiences Teaching Ideas Popsicles, sunscreen, sidewalk chalk, bubbles, watermelon, backyard picnics, riding bikes, and lemonade stands. These are a few images that come to mind when I think of summertime and the magic of relaxing with family in the warmth of the sunshine. As a child, I remember playing with my siblings in the yard, running through the sprinkler, doing arts and crafts projects, and drawing roads with traffic signs on our driveway that we would navigate along with our bikes or scooters. Although plans for summer 2020 around the world have been altered, there are still many opportunities to engage children in unique learning opportunities. Under the circumstances surrounding COVID-19, young learners are participating in school in their homes, as...  [Read more]

Margaret Paton TEFL Information Alumni Experiences So, you’ve got your shiny new TESOL or TEFL certificate in hand. What now? Like you, I’m a new starter to this career of teaching English to non-native speakers, so I wanted to share five tips on what not to do in your early days. In short, having been a K-12 teacher might not get you through, be flexible about your availability, you might need a police check and your skills might not be valued in particular countries. Build up some experience, even if it’s voluntary. Even before I enrolled in the ITTT TESOL course, I was already reaching out to agencies who were hungry for native English speakers for tutoring work. There must have been one too many of these sponsored posts popping up in my Facebook news feed, I figure. Maybe I...  [Read more]

Leo Salazar TEFL Information Alumni Experiences With the advent of social distancing as a precautionary measure against the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic and the associated increase in people working from home rather than face-to-face, effective communication has never been more important. We share advice here on how you can improve your communication skills online. This information is especially useful for those offering online services, such as online English tutors. In response to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, many companies are shutting their doors and sending their employees home in order to keep them healthy. For those who work in blue-collar positions such as manufacturing, maintenance or service-industry jobs, the consequences may be reduced pay, being furloughed...  [Read more]

Anastasiya Akpinar TEFL Information Alumni Experiences Teaching Ideas The Covid-19 pandemic began all of sudden and covered the world with silent panic and frustration. Quarantine rules provided by governments influenced all social spheres of life, including education. Schools were closed, and the teaching process was stopped. A solution was quickly found: universities, schools, and even pre-schools started giving lessons online. Most of them use the same application for online studying – ZOOM. Why, among so many other video-communication applications, do most of us choose Zoom for teaching? Let's have a quick summary of the tool. The Zoom application was designed for online business meetings and conferences. In short, it works this way: That way appeared to be fast, simple, and...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Teaching Ideas Firstly, what is classroom management? Let's startup with a little introduction, explanations, and strategies. Classroom management creates a set of expectations used in an organized classroom environment. It includes routines, rules, and consequences. Effective classroom management leads the way for the teacher to engage the students in learning. Effective classroom management means implementing strategies that create a safe, fair, and rule-based learning environment for children to flourish in and learn from. Promoting and assisting students to understand the procedures and expectations of the teacher and classroom through positive reinforcement, high expectations, and discipline instills independence and enhances students' growth. Well of course as a...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Teaching Ideas The best things I have learned as a teacher and taking the 470H TESOL Professional Package are patience, persistence, and management of handling students. With this course, I found that I felt much more confident in areas such as classroom management and planning lessons but this is probably due to my own experiences and previous jobs and volunteering work. With the TEFL course, you can focus on your areas of weakness which are a good plus point. I found the course to be flexible and I appreciated that I was able to work at my own pace, spending more time on the areas I needed to. This aspect gives the TEFL course a more personalized feel, rather than having to rush through and risk not understanding things fully. This post was written by our TEFL...  [Read more]

Sahil Gazi TEFL Information Alumni Experiences Teaching Ideas Lingos are of significant interest to linguists because they exist within the subsets of linguistics, by observing the significance of individual words or sentences through semantics and their meaning in a broader social context through pragmatics. In this scenario, the subject is in a particular group of lingos. They are a repeating phenomenon, and, as such, they are referred to as being in a "limbo." It happens everywhere globally, and their development starts and stops on average around the same age groups. Primarily, the vocabulary changes with popular culture, based on location and time period. Pragmatically, it determines how connected one is to the pulse of the generation, breeding a sense of friendship and relatable...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Teaching Ideas Effective teaching and learning emanate from a conducive classroom learning environment. It is a cornerstone of all teaching and learning processes. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Thomas M. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs or opinions of ITTT. Classroom management is a term used to describe the process of ensuring that classroom lessons run smoothly without disruptive behavior from students compromising the delivery of instruction. It creates a set of expectations used in an organized classroom environment. It includes routines, rules, and consequences. Effective classroom management paves the way for the teacher to engage the students in learning. It is a challenging aspect of teaching...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Teaching Ideas I’m a young ESL teacher in China, and I is Chinese. English is a compulsory subject for all Chinese students and reading skills have gained raising importance in the national tests for English subjects. Besides this, reading itself is fun and beneficial. I always try to let my students “learn through English” instead of “learning English”. From my experience, a successful reading class for young learners should consist of the following steps: This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Fang W. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs or opinions of ITTT. If the book is about animals. I may ask the students some questions like “what animals do you know?” ,“ what is your favorite animal?”....  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Alumni Experiences Many Chinese students face the common problem that although they spent 10 years studying English at school, they can't pronounce an English sentence correctly, and they are not confident enough to communicate in the language. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Mengru W. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs or opinions of ITTT. Our students struggle to speak in English, they are good at writing and reading, but cannot speak, even though they studied the language from third to 12th grade. Most of the students also study English at a language center, but they still find it hard to completely reach the goal, even when they go to college, speaking English is just like their nemesis. Also Read:...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Teaching Ideas In my experience gained the past few years, one of the most challenging experiences for me was to effectively teach beginner students. Since all my students were absolute beginners (learners who have had no contact with English at all), I had to find ways to make the learning effective, differently to teaching false beginners, who have some form of understanding of the English language. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Alida K. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs or opinions of ITTT. To further add a challenge to my teaching methodologies, all my learners were very young. This essay attempts to describe the most effective methodologies I applied when teaching 2-3 yr old absolute beginners....  [Read more]

  There’s only a handful of cities in the world that truly deserve ‘must visit’ status and Hanoi is certainly one of them. While most people can only dream about a fleeting trip to Hanoi – if they’re lucky – ‘living like a local’ and working as EFL teacher in this magnificent city is a realistic proposition for anyone with a sense of adventure. Hanoi is Vietnam’s capital city and the seat of government. It’s noticeably smaller than Ho Chi Minh City in the south, but the pace of life is similarly frenetic. While Ho Chi Minh City is often referred to as Vietnam’s ‘engine room’, Hanoi is more of a ‘grand old lady’. It’s tough to pin down what makes Hanoi such a special place. Is it because there’s history, culture and art on display in seemingly every...  [Read more]

Pritam Nagrale Teaching Ideas As the Covid-19 pandemic continues to ravage the world well into 2021 and shows no visible signs of ebbing, there’s an additional burden that teachers have to face nowadays. And that pressure comes from designing effective lessons for online classes. The new normal, as we know it today, dictates that we stay at home and take every precaution to avoid the contagion. This brings us to a question: How to design effective lessons for an online class? Is it that easy? I will try and answer both these questions in this article while providing six topmost tips that might help you create superb and engaging lessons for your online classes. Let’s begin by exploring the reasons for designing effective online lessons. The first one, of course, is that any...  [Read more]

  If you crave adventure and a lifestyle that’s out of the ordinary, Phnom Penh, Cambodia is the perfect location to launch your ‘teach English abroad’ journey. The transformation of Cambodia over the past three decades from a country characterised by occupation and trouble, to a Southeast Asian powerhouse, is phenomenal. There’s an insatiable demand for English language skills in Cambodia - and a chronic shortage of TEFL qualified people to teach English. What does this mean for people just like you? Simple! It means opportunities galore. Phnom Penh is the capital city of Cambodia and the nation’s international gateway. With a population of around 2.5 million people and a relatively confined central business district, it has a noticeably slower pace of life than you’ll...  [Read more]

Federico Riva Destinations TEFL Information Teaching English in 2021. A few people have told me about their teaching journey already, so keep letting me know what your plans are in terms of teaching English abroad or teaching English online. Somebody said they're interested in teaching online, so that's really cool. Someone new has just joined us from Laos, hi there. We have Margaret who is also teaching online, very cool. I’m going to talk a little bit about teaching English online in this presentation. Juliana says hi, I think you've watched before as I recognize your picture, thanks for tuning in again. It's really good to see new faces and old faces in our TEFL family today. I have prepared some visuals that I'm going to share with you guys later and I will keep an eye on the...  [Read more]

Federico Riva Destinations TEFL Information oday’s exciting topic is the top hiring seasons for teaching English abroad. We're going to go over different countries on different continents and what their hiring seasons are, so when's the best time to go job hunting. Also there will be some tips for job hunting in those places as sometimes you need to get hired in advance when you're still in your home country and you can do online interviews, but in some countries you need to apply in person. So we're going to talk about that as well. Thanks so much for tuning in and as always please don't forget to like and subscribe so that you never miss a live session. We go live twice a week, one time with me on Fridays, or Thursday depending where you are in the world, and my colleague Liza goes...  [Read more]

Federico Riva TEFL Information Hi, I am back for another live session this week. My name is Linda from ITTT. I took a break last week, I was traveling a little bit in Korea, not too far but I got to enjoy the cherry blossoms. That's why there was no live session from me last week. But I'm back this week and I'm super excited. Today we're going to have a Q&A session, so you guys can ask me questions about TEFL and TESOL, teaching abroad, teaching online, whatever you want to know about. So something a bit more casual, let's have a chat. I would like to get to know you guys better and you can get to know me, ITTT and TEFL. If you can see me and hear me please drop a hi or something into the comment box so that I know that everything is working well. Hi Yanisha, thanks for joining....  [Read more]

Federico Riva TEFL Information Alumni Experiences Teaching Ideas Hello! Liza is here and if you are guys getting on this stream, let me know if you hear and see me. We are about to start. Today's live session is devoted to teaching English as a non-native speaker. Okay, let me check if anyone is here. Hello! my name is Liza, and today we will talk about teaching English as a non-native speaker. Let me show the name of the session. Hello guys, if you are watching right now, write down a couple of words. I can see your comments, and let me know where you are from? I'm curious. And let me introduce myself quickly. I'm now staying in my hometown in Russia. It is called Yekaterinburg. It's pretty cold today, but the day is so sunny, so I had to close my blinds because my home office space is...  [Read more]

Federico Riva TEFL Information Teaching Ideas Today, we are talking about setting realistic goals, basically having a realistic timeline for how long it takes from actually taking a TEFL course to going on to teaching English either online or abroad. If your goal is to teach English in 2021, what do you need to do? What are the steps? Okay, let me add this little graphic here, so that's what I've prepared for you guys. Setting realistic goals for teaching English in 2021 and as always please leave your comments at any time. There's also going to be a Q&A section at the end of the session so there will be plenty of time to ask questions and for me to answer them. I am working this whole live situation by myself so I might miss a question here and there, but like I said at the end...  [Read more]

Federico Riva TEFL Information Teaching Ideas Hello everybody, thanks for joining me. I'm just about to start so please let me know that you can see me clearly and hear me clearly, for this you can use the comments box. Okay, there are some good mornings, hello and nice to see you guys, thanks for joining. My name is Liza and I'm a TEFL expert and also an online English teacher. I'm glad to welcome you to today's session that is devoted to some ways to benefit from your TEFL certification, especially if you're a non-native English teacher. Right now I'm going to make my video a little bit smaller so that you can see the presentation. Okay guys thanks for sharing that everything works smooth, that's really important for me because I need to make sure everything is clear and you can hear...  [Read more]

Federico Riva Destinations TEFL Information Hi and welcome to another live session from ITTT. My name is Linda and I'm here today to talk about teaching English in South Korea. Let me just show you today's topic so that everybody who's joining knows what's happening today. Today we're talking about teaching English in South Korea and I'm so excited about this topic and it's actually been a super requested topic every time I do a live session. I've been living in Korea for almost six years and I have been teaching a few different classes. I have done summer camps and winter camps and teaching kids and teaching adults, teaching business English, teaching conversation, teaching full-time at a kindergarten and elementary school with afternoon programs and stuff like that. So I hope that...  [Read more]

Federico Riva Destinations Alumni Experiences Welcome to another live session this week and we're on at a different time this week. Usually we're a little bit earlier, but we have a special guest today, and that's because she's based in Germany. So we had to change the time a little bit. I’m Linda from ITT, you've probably seen me before, if you've watched us live and I’m here with Brit today. Hi Brit! Hi, thanks for having me, and painting your time to meet my schedule, and thank you so much for getting up early.I know it's early in Germany right now. just have my coffee and I’m good to go.That's awesome,where in Germany are you exactly? so I’m based near Trier, which is along the border with Luxembourg. So very close to Luxembourg? I had one chance to go before all of the...  [Read more]

Federico Riva TEFL Information Teaching Ideas Hi my name is Linda from ITTT, international TEFL and TESOL Training and I'm back again today for another live session. If you can hear me and see me please let me know as I'm trying out a new mic today so if that is working well it would be good to know. So please leave a quick comment to say hi and where you're watching from. I have been living in South Korea for five and a half years, so for me right now it's 10:00 a.m. Friday morning. Let me know where you are tuning in from and what time it is where you are. We can get started on today's topic which is the best government programs for teaching English abroad. If you're interested in teaching English abroad then you should definitely keep watching as there's a lot of good stuff coming...  [Read more]