Thread: How Long do You Want to Teach in Thailand?

I remember when I had taught in Thailand for a couple of years, I thought it was wonderful and I would be happy doing it for ever. 12 years on, sick to death of it and starting to earn money in other ways.

Is there anyone who has taught for more than 5/10 years in Thailand and still likes it? I can only think of one guy I know that still loves it after 10 + years, and he's far from normal.

What are you going to do when teaching becomes boring as hell?
Newbies, how long do you give yourselves?

Originally Posted by beuasawnlaew

How Long do You Want to Teach in Thailand?

Another year and a half.

When i arrive i will give it 2-3 years and then reassess my situation, it has to come down to money at the end of the day.
All the best.

I did it in BKK for 15 years. A lot of fun and good memories, but got tired of having to spoon feed, school/teacher politics and being expected to entertain. Class sizes of 50 meant with some of the classes it involved more controlling than actual teaching.

Not to mention, slave to the WP, visa tied to WP, 7 days to leave, etc. A while back, that wasn't the case. Still had your remaining visa time regardless if you cancelled the WP.

Last 3 years, I also taught computing which injected some well needed motivation.

Those 3 hour Saturday morning classes were painful.

I'll be back next year, but to engage in other work. If that goes flop, then there'll be another 'very enthusiastic' teacher in the market. He he

Good topic, moved to the Staffroom.

Originally Posted by filamel

if you stay in Thailand three years .... over the next 35 years back in the US or wherever you will suffer for those 3 years career-wise, and will never catch up again ....

Believe me, you quickly fit right back into the rat race and become as arrogant and evil as the rest. In fact, two years after leaving teaching, I look upon quite a few of my current colleagues as sad fucks who never had the balls to do anything else. I’m not going to boast that I’m better than them, etc, that’s sad. But if my performance at work has suffered because I taught English for five years, I’ve not noticed yet.

A few weeks back, I had this appraisal meeting with some big boss. When he heard I'd worked in Thailand, he just assumed I'd been there doing similar stuff as my current job.

Ten years or more as a teacher, yes I agree it’d be hard to do anything else. Less than that and, assuming you had skills before, it’s really not so hard to go back.

But what skills got transferred from my teaching days?

Surprisingly, doing presentations isn’t one of them. Most of the time, I’m talking to people who know more than I do and interrupt all the bloody time with questions I can’t answer!

After a few years of teaching, I found I can run big meetings pretty well, i.e. making gobshites put a sock in it and getting others to speak – sound familiar? None of my colleagues can do that and I dread their meetings, if I bother going.

I’m based at a UK company in Germany and notice most of my British colleagues talk in bloody complex gobbledegook to the Germans, who barely understand a word. And we have Japanese and other customers, and I cringe when my colleagues rabbit on to them.

I could name a few other benefits, but I honestly couldn’t think of any problems in my current job due to my five years of teaching.

Well done Hodd, top man, here here!!

If you're teaching in Thailand for the money, you're in the wrong business. I feel you got to want it for other reasons and most of all you have to enjoy doing it, otherwise your life will be miserable.

Teaching in Thailand is not for everyone, you got to be special, I applaud those who are teaching today and in the past, your job are very important to lots of children.

So teachers, be proud of who you are, the money is nice to have but at the end of the day, when it's all over and done, you can't take any of it with you.