TEFL/CELTA/CELT answers...

Marie212 · 11-10-2012 08:40PM

darragh_k wrote: »

I did the CELTA last year in IH Barcelona, I was in two minds as well and was going to do it in Dublin.

Go to Barcelona, you won't regret it!!

Cool!

How did you find the course overall and living in Barcelona? I'd really love to do the course abroad, I guess it's just the fear of actually going and doing it by myself that's holding me back..

Did you go out by yourself? I imagine it's grand once you get there and make friends with people on the course though?

darragh_k · 12-10-2012 12:10PM

Yes I went by myself, great experience. Course takes up most of your time so you don't have a lot of free time for sightseeing or anything like that.. You'll become close with your group probably because you all spend so much time together and it's an intensive course.

JayC5 · 12-10-2012 05:32PM

darragh_k wrote: »

Yes I went by myself, great experience. Course takes up most of your time so you don't have a lot of free time for sightseeing or anything like that.. You'll become close with your group probably because you all spend so much time together and it's an intensive course.

Hey Darragh,

Just wondering how much it cost you to do the CELTA abroad, and what was the accommodation prices like?

JC

O-Deazy · 29-10-2012 03:50PM

Like a few of you I'm also looking into a CELTA course abroad. As it stands I would have to move to Dublin to do the course anyway, so why not move to the country I would like to teach in and do it there? The two places I have been looking at are IH Barcelona and IH Buenos Aires. Has anyone completed the CELTA course from either of these institutions and if so how did you find it?

From reading through this thread it appears to be very intense over the 4 weeks but also is much more beneficial in comparison to some of the online tefl courses available. Also was work easy to find on completion of the course? And finally would you need to speak the native language if you want to do the courses abroad?

Thanks in advance

StradBally · 30-10-2012 02:48PM

O-Deazy,

These courses are highly recommended - www.activelanguage.net/

Four of a kind · 30-10-2012 08:58PM

O-Deazy wrote: »

Like a few of you I'm also looking into a CELTA course abroad. As it stands I would have to move to Dublin to do the course anyway, so why not move to the country I would like to teach in and do it there? The two places I have been looking at are IH Barcelona and IH Buenos Aires. Has anyone completed the CELTA course from either of these institutions and if so how did you find it?

From reading through this thread it appears to be very intense over the 4 weeks but also is much more beneficial in comparison to some of the online tefl courses available. Also was work easy to find on completion of the course? And finally would you need to speak the native language if you want to do the courses abroad?

Thanks in advance

I'm in the same boat as yourself regarding doing the course abroad, since moving to Dublin and doing the celta there would work out way more expensive. My girlfriend and I are looking at Thailand, specifically Chiang Mai to complete the celta. Although Vietnam as suggested by Ads by Google here also seems a possibility.

SeantheMan · 22-11-2012 05:29AM

Hi all, I plan to leave my job in March or so, and have been looking into this TEFL/CELTA . There are so many different sites with TEFL courses, but from reading here it seems CELTA is the way to go if you want the best.

I am looking to do a course in Dublin, from the Acels site I found the below, however the price is €1,500 for the 4 week course.

http://www.theenglishacademy.ie/tefl-celta/what-is-celtra.html?d4dad6935f632ac35975e3001dc7bbe8=ab287879447426e9eea3c8c077ead0e6

I also found the below, which is CELT , apparently it is also recognised, a 4week course but is €500 cheaper than the above.

Can anyone clarify as to whether one is hugely different from the other CELT/CELTA with regards to the 2 I listed, would a foreign recruiter recognise any difference ?

http://www.learnenglishireland-swan.com/teaching-courses

Is this what others here have paid , is it the expected price-range , is it worth that much ? Or can you suggest anywhere else in Dublin ?

Ultimately I'd like to get a job teaching English in Korea/China.

Crann na Beatha · 22-11-2012 03:57PM

This post has been deleted.

yosser hughes · 22-11-2012 04:11PM

SeantheMan wrote: »

Hi all, I plan to leave my job in March or so, and have been looking into this TEFL/CELTA . There are so many different sites with TEFL courses, but from reading here it seems CELTA is the way to go if you want the best.

I am looking to do a course in Dublin, from the Acels site I found the below, however the price is €1,500 for the 4 week course.

http://www.theenglishacademy.ie/tefl-celta/what-is-celtra.html?d4dad6935f632ac35975e3001dc7bbe8=ab287879447426e9eea3c8c077ead0e6

I also found the below, which is CELT , apparently it is also recognised, a 4week course but is €500 cheaper than the above.

Can anyone clarify as to whether one is hugely different from the other CELT/CELTA with regards to the 2 I listed, would a foreign recruiter recognise any difference ?

http://www.learnenglishireland-swan.com/teaching-courses

Is this what others here have paid , is it the expected price-range , is it worth that much ? Or can you suggest anywhere else in Dublin ?

Ultimately I'd like to get a job teaching English in Korea/China.

You can also try International House http://www.ihdublin.com/ihdublin/Main/Home.htm
As far as I know the CELTA qualification has more recognition abroad but I'm open to correction on that.

SeantheMan · 22-11-2012 06:29PM

Could you reply to my questions above in the meantime ? :P

yosser hughes · 22-11-2012 06:39PM

SeantheMan wrote: »

Could you reply to my questions above in the meantime ? :P

I've replied to some of your questions already. With regard price,well you can look that up yourself.
I did the CELTA and it is a very intense course but in my opinion it was value for money and the training was excellent.
The CELTA will open more doors .

SeantheMan · 22-11-2012 07:01PM

yosser hughes wrote: »

I've replied to some of your questions already. With regard price,well you can look that up yourself.
I did the CELTA and it is a very intense course but in my opinion it was value for money and the training was excellent.
The CELTA will open more doors .

Can I ask where you did it ? Price ?

Also, I went to an All-Irish primary and secondary school.
Although I have a perfect grasp of the english language, my knowledge of grammar and it's "tenses" with regards to English is lacking, the reason being we focused on Irish grammar.
I understand the grammar, it's just the terms really.

Will there be a need to brush up on this prior to an interview, will I be asked "what is the past participle" or something similar ?

Finally, If I apply for an interview for the course , do they take place well before the course start, or nearer the course date. As I already have a job and would need to plan accordingly (assuming I got accpted ) for handing in of notice to the job etc.

Also, the link you posted for the website seems to be down.

yosser hughes · 22-11-2012 09:06PM

SeantheMan wrote: »

Can I ask where you did it ? Price ?

Also, I went to an All-Irish primary and secondary school.
Although I have a perfect grasp of the english language, my knowledge of grammar and it's "tenses" with regards to English is lacking, the reason being we focused on Irish grammar.
I understand the grammar, it's just the terms really.

Will there be a need to brush up on this prior to an interview, will I be asked "what is the past participle" or something similar ?

Finally, If I apply for an interview for the course , do they take place well before the course start, or nearer the course date. As I already have a job and would need to plan accordingly (assuming I got accpted ) for handing in of notice to the job etc.

Also, the link you posted for the website seems to be down.

The link works for me.
I did the course in Dublin and the cost was about €1700.Considering the amount of effort and hours our teachers put in and the training provided I reckon it was good value when you break it down by the hour.
The grammar is fairly important and to be honest most people aren't great with it, but you will have to teach it at some stage and will definitely have to teach it during the course and you will be assessed on that. You should buy a few textbooks. Scrivener is recommended and another one I can't think of but there's loads out there.
I was given a grammar test with the interview but I honestly can't remember anything about it. The interview was about two weeks before the course started.
I suppose at the end of the day they want your money so are unlikely to turn you down unless they feel you really couldn't hack it.
maybe you should drop in to one of the schools and speak to someone about it?
Whatever you do, best of luck with it.

SeantheMan · 22-11-2012 11:18PM

Cheers for the detailed reply. I'll have a look at getting hold of some English grammar books.

Link is working now too

Would you reccomend the 12 week part-time course over the 4 week fulltime or vice-versa ?

http://www.ihdublin.com/ihdublin/Main/CELTA.htm

Charisteas · 22-11-2012 11:34PM

yosser hughes wrote: »

You can also try International House http://www.ihdublin.com/ihdublin/Main/Home.htm
.

With IH, if you fail the assessment, are you allowed to re-take it as many times as you need to pass? And do you have to pay the registration fee and assessment fee again?

And during the teaching assessment part, who are you actually 'teaching'? Is it a room full of real students, or just a few assessors?

Charisteas · 22-11-2012 11:39PM

Price of Turnips wrote: »

Hey i received a job in Brazil with a 120 online i-i TEFL cert. In Brazil if you can speak English you can get a job, there are millions of English schools that want gringos.

Is that rule only in the big cities though? I plan to live in a smallish city an hour outside Sao Paulo away from the hustle and bustle.

SeantheMan · 23-11-2012 12:01AM

Looking at the application for IH now, read through it all and ordered some of the books they recommended, so I can brush up on my Grammar before applying.

They do have a small sections with some questions, one or two I would even be unsure about the answers to.

E.g. Below - 1. What is the mistake / 2. Correct version / 3. Why ?

Is it because she has answered the question with a question on the same subject that she has already answered, (these days, isn't he.) or the use of the comman between "days, isn't" Nothing jumps out to me as being completely incorrect.

2) Speaker A: “Is John ill? He’s lost a lot of weight.”
Speaker B: “Yes, he’s rather slender these days, isn’t he?”

This is what I mean about my grammatical knowledge not being up to par due to attending an Irish school.

Another question below

3) Speaker A: “Why didn’t you answer the phone?”
Speaker B: “Because I had a bath”.

I know it should be "Because I was having a bath" - but the grammatical knowledge as to why one is correct/incorrect escapes me. I am not able to point and say , 1 is past participle, the other so-and-so tense.

Morzadec · 23-11-2012 12:25AM

SeantheMan wrote: »

Looking at the application for IH now, read through it all and ordered some of the books they recommended, so I can brush up on my Grammar before applying.

They do have a small sections with some questions, one or two I would even be unsure about the answers to.

E.g. Below - 1. What is the mistake / 2. Correct version / 3. Why ?

Is it because she has answered the question with a question on the same subject that she has already answered, (these days, isn't he.) or the use of the comman between "days, isn't" Nothing jumps out to me as being completely incorrect.

This is what I mean about my grammatical knowledge not being up to par due to attending an Irish school.

Another question below

I know it should be "Because I was having a bath" - but the grammatical knowledge as to why one is correct/incorrect escapes me. I am not able to point and say , 1 is past participle, the other so-and-so tense.

Seriously don't worry about these things, you'll figure them out as you go along. Where are you planning on teaching? The importance of grammar could vary from place to place.

I've been TEFL teaching for nearly 3 years but I can't figure out what's wrong with that first example. It might be that he's answering with a question, but the answer sounds natural so to be honest I wouldn't correct a student for saying that.

The next example he should be using the past continuous (an ongoing action in the past). We often use this when a past action interrupts another past action. The student here has used the past perfect which you use to refer to a past even before the past. (Past Perfect is the past of the past).

Seriously most students will pick up what they're doing wrong when you correct them without an in detail grammar explanation.

Don't stress yourself on these things, there's way more to teaching than grammar knowledge

Also, by the way, English kids and Americans don't learn grammar either. You might find you have a few Irish-isms in your vocabulary, as well as some pronunciation which is different to the standard and which might confuse students. Maybe you have to iron out these things, but in general I think Irish people as a whole speak as well as any other English-speaking nation, and our grammar knowledge is no worse. It's awful across the board for the average Joe to be honest

SeantheMan · 23-11-2012 03:36AM

Thanks for the detailed reply.
Planning on teaching in Korea/China , or somewhere in Asia.

I understand the requirement isn't as big over there, but the CELTA also lets your teach in Ireland, which I don't need. But if I'm going to get "some" qualification, I would like the recognised CELTA over a 100hour-mostly online-TEFL .
I would still like to gain entrance and attempt to pass the CELTA first, hence I'm worried that if I can't grip these initial questions pre-interview, then I'll struggle later on.

I have ordered the 4 books on grammar/teaching that they listed in the application, totalled about 130euro. But I figure that I will have them forever, and regardless of getting into/passing CELTA or not, they will stand to me and I will gain invaluable knowledge from them.

23-11-2012 07:03AM

Why not do it in the country you want to teach in? Cheaper living costs and easier to find a job after.

For the first example, I think it's completely wrong.. Him losing weight has already been established. Asking the person to reaffirm their observation while agreeing that he's sick based solely on the first person's observation seems way off. My grammar sucks but I think "Yes, you could be right. He does look slender these days" would be better. As it is, speaker A's only response is to agree with what he already said.

For the second example, the response has to be past continuous.

yosser hughes · 23-11-2012 11:07AM

In the first example the use of the word slender is inappropriate there. It should be "thin" instead. "slender" has more of a positive connotation whereas "thin" matches with the assessment that the person doesn't look well.
In the second example Morzadec is correct, the past continuous should be used in this instance.
I would fully agree with Morzadec, don't worry about it too much. Learn it off if you can but to be honest you learn these things when you are teaching them. I know that sounds strange, but you will do these lesson plans and will have to get it straight in your head beforehand.
With regard teaching practice, in International House, we taught real students, with an assessor sitting at the back of the class.
I'm not sure what happens if you fail, with regard re-assessment etc.

Morzadec · 23-11-2012 12:13PM

Just realised I made a massive brain fart in my explanation of the 2nd example. I was right that it's past continuous but for some reason I thought the student had used the past perfect, when he hadn't. He had used just the past simple - hope I didn't confuse you.

Like I said, it's possible that grammar knowledge is more important in other countries, but certainly in Spain it's not too important. Basically in the CELTA course I learned some of the very basics but then you really learn it by teaching it.

It's like anything -

Do you learn a language by studying it in a book or by using it and practising it?

Do you drive a car by reading a manual or getting in the car and trying it out?

Basically what is way way more important than grammar knowledge is an outgoing, friendly, fun and good-natured approach to your students. Honestly if the students like you they will give you the benefit of the doubt if you are unsure on a grammar explanation (or vocab explanation which is often more difficult).

Also I would say the majority of the time the student doesn't need an explanation because they can work out themselves or even know where they've slipped up.

Eventually the grammar knowledge will come to you and you'll feel confident explaining almost any question.

I'm talking about TEFL teaching in Spain here, so it could be different in other countries.

Morzadec · 23-11-2012 12:17PM

SeantheMan wrote: »

Thanks for the detailed reply.
Planning on teaching in Korea/China , or somewhere in Asia.

I understand the requirement isn't as big over there, but the CELTA also lets your teach in Ireland, which I don't need. But if I'm going to get "some" qualification, I would like the recognised CELTA over a 100hour-mostly online-TEFL .
I would still like to gain entrance and attempt to pass the CELTA first, hence I'm worried that if I can't grip these initial questions pre-interview, then I'll struggle later on.

I have ordered the 4 books on grammar/teaching that they listed in the application, totalled about 130euro. But I figure that I will have them forever, and regardless of getting into/passing CELTA or not, they will stand to me and I will gain invaluable knowledge from them.

I knew nothing of grammar before my CELTA course. Really nothing - I knew what a noun, a verb and an adjective were and that was the extent of it.

Even after my CELTA course my grammar knowledge was pretty poor. I had more awareness about it but I still had huge holes in it. You won't cover all the grammar in CELTA.

Seriously the world is crying out for native English speakers. Don't worry if you don't know grammar at this stage

SeantheMan · 23-11-2012 04:00PM

Morzadec wrote: »

I knew nothing of grammar before my CELTA course. Really nothing - I knew what a noun, a verb and an adjective were and that was the extent of it.

Even after my CELTA course my grammar knowledge was pretty poor. I had more awareness about it but I still had huge holes in it. You won't cover all the grammar in CELTA.

Seriously the world is crying out for native English speakers. Don't worry if you don't know grammar at this stage

You passed it ok then I take it ?
Anything people should really focus on ?

Morzadec · 23-11-2012 04:53PM

SeantheMan wrote: »

You passed it ok then I take it ?
Anything people should really focus on ?

Yeah passed it with merit. The only way you could fail is if you didn't put in any effort or were too busy to attend classes and complete assignments, or were if you had some sort of social interaction problems - like extreme shyness, problems interacting with people etc...

Everyone is nervous when doing their first teaching practice but you get over it eventually.

In my opinion good people skills is the number one thing you need to be a good TEFL teacher (again perhaps I'm talking from a teaching-in-Spain perspective).

Don't stress about it anyway, for me one of the main positives of this job is that it's usually very stress-free

Stayfrosty2 · 26-11-2012 12:02PM

Did mine in the Centre for English Studies in Dame Street Dublin. Have to say the course was excellent if very intense!! I'm currently doing a HDIP for secondary teaching and I have to say that i learned so much more from the CELT Course than the HDIP. Plus the teaching experience you get from it is fantastic. Wasnt too expensive either, 1000euros.
I'd definitely recommend it to anyone wanting to do a CELT course.

Just make sure you dont have much else on your plate at the time, its seriously time consuming!!!
And I wouldnt worry about the grammar, out teachers said you wont gain a serious understanding of it until you actually head out and have to teach it to students.

ViveLaVie · 27-11-2012 08:36PM

I am in the middle of applying to the CELTA at the moment. I rang the office in college to see was it ok to apply now for the January course and enquire about hours etc and the woman I spoke to intimidated me a lot. She basically said I wouldn't get in as there have been so many applications already.

I am really interested in it and have a background in languages but she said all of that is irrelevant - suitability is the main thing. I asked what kind of criteria they base suitability on but she wouldn't say.

Is it really this difficult to get into the course? $:\$ I want to be as well prepared as possible for the application process.

Denerick · 27-11-2012 08:45PM

Once you apply and are initially accepted, do you need to do an interview and all that BS? My problem is that I will need to apply months in advance as I will have to give notice on my current job. (Will be doing CELTA abroad by the way)

Crann na Beatha · 28-11-2012 12:38PM

This post has been deleted.

Charisteas · 28-11-2012 09:57PM

Anyone with any experiences doing a i-to-i 120 hour online TEFL course?

Seems like a good course to get my foot in the door so to speak, I really don't think i'm ready for CELTA yet.

TEFL/CELTA/CELT answers...

Comments