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The Culture Course Scam: was it a job interview or clever marketing?

Published on 10th March 2010 05:14

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I went on a job interview at a reputable language school a few weeks ago. They allegedly had a number of positions open for English teaching at a government school which had received a special bilingual program grant from the MOE. Not more than 5 minutes into the interview, the subject matter changed from my qualifications and the position for which I was interviewing, into a sales pitch for a culture course being offered at the end of February. Of course, the interviewer exerted the usual pressure of insisting that you couldn't get a WP without having completed the culture course. He kept touting how great his school was in being able to offer the culture course and showed me all the materials that they forward onto the MOE upon their student's completion of the course. ...

Notes from the Bangkok International School Job Fair

Bold As Love

Published on 20th February 2010 17:15

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I am currently in my third year of teaching young learners at international schools in Bangkok. I don't have a teaching qualification from my home country, so my options to break into top-tier schools are somewhat limited. A few months ago, I decided to register with one of the international school search firms. There are several (easily found with Google). The application process was relatively painless, cost me about 7000 baht to get in their search database system. Once you're in, you can search for openings worldwide.

There are two job fairs in January in Bangkok, and one more coming up in March. As a newbie, here are a few impressions of what one of these job fairs is like. We were told that there were about 450 candidates teachers, and it looked like about 100 schools. Not sure how many real openings were on offer. We were told that typically about 50% of candidates receive a job offer at the fair. Obviously, some offers might materialize in subsequent days as school needs and openings change.
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Another Day Another Battle

peelieorion

Published on 6th February 2010 18:39 Number of Views: 774

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Yesterday a student of mine came to me with a speech she was supposed to present at the opening ceremony of our town's Tomato Festival. Written by her Private teacher it was the usual concoction of over formal English with inapproriate long words. The student, new to my school, has been studying with this private tutor for 2 years which probably explains why she is 23rd out of 24th in my M3. anyway I sat with her and simplified the whole thing so at least she could read it and wouldn't lose her face.
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6 Comments

Why I'm Glad to No Longer Be a Crap Teacher in Thailand

garro

Published on 27th January 2010 14:05

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Personal Stories

Sorry about not posting on here for a while, but I gave up teaching a couple of months back. I felt a bit sheepish coming here and being among you fine pedagogues. I have just written an article about why I left teaching. I will provide an abridged version here ( for those people too miserable to link) but you can click on the link to read the full thing. I will be interested in any criticisms or comments.

Three months ago I decided that I no longer wanted to be a teacher in Thailand. I had spent seven years trying to make it in this career, but for most it I just felt like a fraud. The truth is that to be a good teacher you need to have a passion for it; this was something that I just did not have. I knew that it would probably be easy for me to continue my job as a mediocre teacher and keep on collecting the pay checks; many other people do it. I just could not live this way though; life is too short.

Why I'm Glad to No Longer Be a Crap Teacher in Thailand - Associated Content - associatedcontent.com

Building a teaching portfolio

wangsuda

Published on 24th January 2010 22:57

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Regardless of how good the job market seems, it never hurts to make yourself more hirable. There are several ways to do this: show up on time for the interview (ten minutes early is even better); wear dress slacks, a dress shirt, and a necktie; be neat in your appearance (well-groomed hair, SHAVE); and have a teaching portfolio.

A teaching portfolio? What is that? Simple - it encapsulates your teaching career into one, easy-to-read book. There is nothing worse than interviewing a candidate and watching him/her pull out dog-eared documentation from some shabby-looking satchel for me, that is a black mark against you. If you cannot organize yourself for an interview, how can you organize a class? For those who have been teaching longer than one year, and plan to make teaching a career, a teaching portfolio is essential.
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A Bigg Intimidation

Matthew

Published on 20th January 2010 07:16 Number of Views: 2737

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Personal Stories

So I have this Sundays gig at the Andrew Biggs Academy which I think is a fine little school down on Rama the Fourth. The materials are fun and the students are motivated and bright. The atmosphere is casual and as laid back as a new language school scrambling to get everything together prolly can be.

So I set up in my class and met my students and got started. They've got one area with a huge room that can be divided into three with sliding folding room divider thingies. They do funny aerobics stuff with the kids when they open it up.

So I'm teaching in one of these half-rooms. Not five minutes into my lesson it becomes clear that I'm being overshadowed, somehow.
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114 Comments