Benefits of Teaching Abroad

You may have been considering teaching abroad for the culture, the change of pace, or simply to have your travel paid for. Here are some more reasons to choose this career path today:

1. The training is painless.
     A TESL certificate can be attained through a 100 hour course, and most schools offer evening/weekend sessions or online courses. The fees start at about $500 USD, and many schools have services to help with the job hunt.
     If you have some extra cash and want to start your travels immediately, larger ESL schools offer four week TESL training in exotic locations around Europe, Southeast Asia, or Central and South America.

2. You can be a student in your own classroom.
     Regardless of age, the students you teach will be excited to see a foreigner take an interest in their culture. Most will gladly offer tips about local foods to eat, places to see, and things to try.
     Young students can teach you a lot about pop culture or local slang, and simple conversations will give you insight into their family lives and customs.

3. A year is a long time…
     …to experience a whole calendar’s worth of festivals, holidays, cultural events, and seasonal foods. You’ll get much more insight than a single trip. Also, worldwide holidays like Chinese New Year or Christmas are a bit different in every country. You’ll get to experience a unique version of a familiar holiday.

4. It’s a crash course in cultural sensitivity.
     Most expats reach the “Their society makes ZERO sense to me!” phase at some point. It’s a normal step in one’s adjustment to a new culture. Getting past this phase of culture shock means opening your mind to new and unfamiliar things. Whether the traffic laws are driving you crazy, or new acquaintances ask questions that seem invasive to you, be patient.
     You’ll come to appreciate the ways in which this foreign culture operates. Most often, you’ll note customs that strike you as far more practical than those in your native country.

5. You’ll get an instant network of local acquaintances.
     Whether you’re teaching in a language centre or public school, you’ll be amongst colleagues who speak English. Regardless of their level of expertise, they’ll likely be keen to practice their English conversation skills with you. Not only will you have new friends, but your coworkers can help you navigate the area and its customs better than any guidebook.

6. You’ll be tapping into an excellent grapevine.
     A lot of good jobs, and general travel tips, are accumulated by word of mouth. By meeting other teachers, you can get advice about new destinations or jobs from people who have been there, lived that.

7. It’s a resume-booster, even if you don’t want to teach long-term.
     You might worry that this job will look like a blip on your resume. Even if your teaching experience consisted of sing-alongs and barnyard animal flashcards, don’t underestimate the skills you developed along the way. Communicating across cultural barriers, using leadership skills to conduct classes, and picking up a new language (even just conversationally) are great assets.

Source: Anne Merritt

Christmas in South Korea

There are many Christmas traditions in South Korea, including the Santa Penguins Parade and the Santa Factory which will warm your heart and prepare you for your leave.

From Dogo News:
Every November, the March of the Holiday Penguins marks the beginning of the Christmas Fantasy, celebration at the Everland Amusement Park in Yongin, just south of Seoul. To the delight of both children and adults, the dozen or more tuxedo birds waddled solemnly some in Santa suits, while other posing as reindeers with antlers sticking out from their backs, instead of heads. These of course are no ordinary penguins, but endangered African Penguins, also know as Jackass Penguins, thanks to their donkey-like braying call.


From Zimbio:
The Santa Factory is group of men and women that prepares and delivers gifts to poor people as part of a charity campaign.

Why Christmas states other traditions include: 

• Department stores put on big displays of decorations. There's also an amazing display of lights in the capital city, Seoul. The lights are all over the city center including the bridges over the Han River.
• Presents are exchanged and a popular present is money.
• Santa Claus can also be seen around Korea but he might be wearing red or blue.
• A popular Christmas food is a Christmas Cake, but it's often a sponge cake covered in cream brought from a local bakery! Or you might even have an ice cream cake from a shop like Baskin Robbins.

Christmas in China

There are many things to love about teaching abroad. One of them is experiencing your culture through the eyes of a foreigner. Never is that more striking than when comparing the holiday songs you grew up with with those same songs in Chinese!

Here is a video of children in Hong Kong singing Christmas Carols. Look at the cute costumes.

Here is another video, complete with bells! This is more of a traditional pageant.

You can download 13 free Christmas songs here in Chinese. Enjoy!

Foreign English Teachers are Necessary

According to the Korea Times National, foreign English teachers are not only wanted, but are needed. Although the government has recently moved to reduce the number of foreign teachers, parents are arguing for them. The Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education conducted a study that found that 62.4 percent of parents felt that native English teachers are necessary at local elementary, middle and high schools. 

More than half of [parents] also answered that foreign English teachers’ placement at local schools was effective and 67.7 percent said they were mostly needed in elementary schools.

Korean teachers were also positive about foreigners’ role as assistant English teachers. Most of the respondents said foreign teachers were most effective for areas such as speaking, listening and pronunciation.
However, the respondents limited the effectiveness of foreign teachers to academically well-performing students such as those in the high ranking (46.2 percent) or the top level (30.6 percent) categories.

Most of them also preferred the placement of native English teachers at only elementary and middle schools.

More than 81 percent of foreign English teachers replied that they believe students are satisfied with their classes. About 90 percent of foreign teachers also said they are making a contribution to improving students’ English proficiency.

Some students disagree. “I had a class taught by a native teacher in middle school but I don’t think the teacher was very helpful. Personally, I think Korean teachers are more helpful in preparing for exams,” said Chung Yoon-sik, a high school senior at Choong Ang High School. This may be due to differences in focus on subject matter, culture, or examination preparation. Indeed, many American students are taught in preparation for examinations on the state or national level. This competition can be more intense in Asian countries.

The majority of parents (62.2 percent) also answered that the ideal type of English teachers at schools are “Koreans who are proficient in English communication skills and good at teaching.”
“In the long run, we need more Korean teachers who are well-trained and have excellent English skills. We need to improve the English capacity and quality of our Korean teachers to meet the demands of students and parents,” an official from the education office said.

A parent of a high school student who used to run a private English institute said, “I think foreign teachers are good for students to get used to foreigners and learn their culture but they’re not that helpful to beginners because they don’t understand well. Learning for one or two hours a week isn’t too helpful for these students. The best case scenario is increasing the number of Korean teachers who are proficient in spoken English so that they can guide these students.”

What's a jimjilbong?

A jimjilbong is a public bathhouse found in South Korea. It is part bathhouse and part spa. There are snacks and juices served, TVs to watch, comics and books to read. Plus, you nap, exfoliate, get clean, and sweat out your toxins.

"They are very popular in Korea and it is pretty typical for Korean's to spend 10 hours resting and sweating their way through a Saturday," says Rachel from Caucasian Invasion

"The walls of the bathing areas and saunas are usually decorated with very beautiful semi-precious stones, like rose quartz, agate, amethyst, and jade, in intricate designs. Don’t be surprised if you look up to see a big pink heart or star on the roof while sweating out the week’s stress in one of the sauna rooms," says Sara Stillman of Jeju Life

Travel is a wonderful way to experience new facets of a culture, immerse yourself in a way of life, and learn from others. What will visiting a jimjilbong teach you?

Christmas in Beijing, China

Travel can include all your favorite holidays, and even some new ones! What is Christmas like in Beijing?

A tour of the city, however, eliminates any doubt that Christmas was indeed being celebrated. And a celebration it was, as Christmas carols were played and sung in public complexes and Christmas wishes greeted us everywhere, complete with Santa and sleigh bells, including red-nosed reindeers. This is apparently a new phenomenon in the People's Republic of China, with its inception traced back to the 1980s Open Door policy of Deng Xiao Ping. Since then, the sight of the chubby old man with the red hat and thick white beard has become as common as Colonel Sanders, the other bearded man, who as the face of KFC has mushroomed all over China. In fact, public and private companies alike throw Christmas parties and restaurants and bars have Christmas Eve specials, featuring exotic wines and mystery gifts...For the Chinese, it is Christmas in so far as the theme song, "Silent Night," elicits a sense of holiness and peace and the myth of the magi promotes gift-giving. --Edmund Chia and Gemma Cruz, theologians

Source: NCR

What Should I Bring with Me?

Deck of Cards

And not just a regular pack, although that’s good too. Uno, Phase 10, any card game that you know how to play. Why? I’ve taught ESL kindergarten through adult, and the appeal of a good game of cards knows no age limit. I started every day in my Korean kindergarten class with a five minute game of Uno – they counted out loud, they talked strategy, they had fun speaking English, and they got calm and focused for the lesson to follow.

Flash Card Software

I constantly found myself scouring the Internet minutes before a class to find printable flash cards that were relevant to the lesson I was about to teach. Save yourself the trouble (and be a lot more organized than I was) by downloading software like CueCard – it’s free, the cards are printable, and you can add pictures and audio.

Portable Recorder

Of course, if you have a smartphone you’ve likely got an app for this already. If not, a digital portable recorder is incredibly useful when it comes to working on pronunciation with students. Often, a language student thinks they’re mimicking you perfectly when in reality something is off. Letting them hear themselves is invaluable. As a bonus, younger students love to hear recordings of themselves – a recorder gives you a fun way to encourage more speaking in class. You can also use these to record and document vocal tests to refer back to when a student questions his grade.

Classroom Planning Programs

An inherent problem with teaching ESL abroad is you don’t know your students (or their proficiency levels) until the first day. Particularly in the beginning, planning lessons and creating tests can be a scramble, and online templates might seem free but can have some pretty severe limitations. Before you go, download a few programs you can figure out how to use prior to day one, hopefully making your first week in the classroom a little less hectic.

Podcasts

A good ESL podcast can be a great classroom resource. It’s likely that, as an ESL teacher, you will be the only native speaker students hear. Podcasts can expose them to different articulations, accents, and ideas. Many also come with transcriptions you can print and use in class as a reference.

iPod + Speaker

Every ESL classroom I’ve ever taught in had a little stereo/CD player sitting in the corner, because the textbooks and workbooks the schools provided came with audio accompaniment. An iPod and portable speaker are ideal for using those podcasts in the classroom, not to mention the obvious entertainment value for you.

Audio Books

Again, fun for you, educational for your students. From my experience, the goal of using audio books wasn’t so much to get students to completely understand what was being said – Shakespeare is tough enough without the added language barrier. But when you’re working on a specific concept like idioms or phrasal verbs, an audio selection can really help enhance your lesson.

eReader

It’s an obvious choice, but I couldn’t leave it off – I would have been thrilled with an iPad, Kindle or Nook when I lived overseas. Even in the largest cities, finding a good selection of books in English can be tough.

Source: Matador Goods