Teaching English as a Foreign Language - aka TEFL

i found the follwing website:

http://www.onlinetefl.com/

Acreditation is claimed from accreditation

accreditation by the ODLQC (Open and Distance Learning Quality Council),

price for the whole course is about 300 euros

is that possible to do such a certificate at this price?

and how usefull is it?

 

Looks legitimate enough.

 

Hi,

I moved from the U.S. to Sweden and one of the first things I did was the Bridge-Linguatec online TEFL cert, which is very similar to the OnlineTEFL program you are looking at. www.bridgelinguatec.com

No, I am not teaching English currently, as Sweden has strict requirements on what you must accomplish (academically) before you can teach. You need to check your local requirements. Remember, these TEFL certs are geared for people wanting to teach English in underdeveloped countries that don't have the strict regulation of western, industrialized, wealthy countries. You can get a great job in Thailand, Eritrea, Yemen, Brazil, China etc with a TEFL cert. You'll get nothing but snickers in places like France, Norway or Denmark.

I took the cert to show potential employers that I am serious enough about teaching English that I was willing to pay for and put forth the effort for this cert. I also wanted to offer private tutoring and I figured the cert would be a legitimate marketing tool, which I feel it is. That said, the cert was almost worthless. No online TEFL cert will prepare you for classroom instruction. However, if you are serious about TEFL, then look into CELTA. It is a more respected degree and requires a TEFL cert of some sort, if I remember correctly.

My advice is to look for a Trinity-based TEFL cert. I don't know of one offered online, but then I haven't looked too hard, either.

 

Here in Switzerland you can teach English if you take the Cambridge Proficiency Exam ( http://www.cambridgeesol.org/exams/cpe.htm ).

I don't know if you can learn for this exam via distance learning, but I know that it seems to be widely accepted.

Brandon

 

I agree definitely about the cost of a Tesol cert. I paid US500. If I had known about degreeinfo.com beforehand, I wouldn't have bothered.

 

I already have a California teaching credential in English. If I teach English abroad, do I also need this certification?

 

Sometime ago when I was a columnist for ESL Magazine , I wrote a feature article called Distance Learning for ESL/EFL Professionals . While a little dated, it's still worth a read for people interested in the field.

As for the online certificate program, I have never and will never recommend such a program *unless* they have somehow worked out the practice teaching that *must* be a part of such a course. Typically, these programs are just a few weeks, so it becomes imperative that you do some in-front-of-student time.



Tom Nixon

 

TEFL

Being a registered teacher I looked into doing a TEFL. There were several options open to me both distance ed and conventional courses taught at local colleges and universities. The course fees ranged between $5.000 and $3000 CDN. However, I looked into the renumeration for those in the profession. Unless you were teaching in the school board (where they preferred to have BA English grads) the renumeration was meagre. So I spent $50 and trained to drive a fork lift truck. This qualification has prooved far more useful than I ever imagined. Furthermore, fofk lift drivers in general are payed more and there are more vacant positions.

Roy Maybery