Teaching English - Qualifications?

[sidsanuk]

Guys,

 

I am curious about the qualifications required to teach English in Thailand.

 

From the teaching perspective, do they require a teaching degree? I have 4 years teaching experience from way back in the UK, but my quals are business, not teaching (Masters in Logistics)

 

From a subject perspective, what are the range of qualifications and what is the best one to get? I have seen TEFL, TESOL etc etc advertised locally here in Sydney.

 

The reason that I ask is two fold.

 

1. I want to help my wife with her English. She is quite good, probably just good enough to go to Uni here in Sydney. She has a first degree from St Johns (marketing) in Bangkok (not quite Chulla I know) as is toying with the idea of doing a Masters here. But the big issue for her, is that her English is not really good enough to get a job here in Oz. Mainly issues with pronunciation and grammar.

 

2. We will probably retire to LOS at some stage and I thought it could be a useful qualification to have in my back pocket. Who knows? Hopefully I won't need to work beyond 60 (50 now) if business goes well, but heh....shit happens.

 

OK. Now to the obvious responses :-)

 

I know I don't need a teaching qualification to teach my wife English. I am a native English speaker. But it would help a lot, knowing the best way to teach, overcome learning blocks etc.

 

I know that I can just send her to an English School. Done that, a few times. She really needs one on one coaching now, for pronunciation and grammar.

 

She can learn from books, CDs the net. Done all that. Still no substitute for coaching by a native English speaker.

 

Any assistance most appreciated. And OK, I know my spelling and grammar are crap.........so no need for wise cracks re wanting to teach English :-))

 

Sid

[ultras67]

The answers are

 

it depends

 

 

It depends what level you want to teach, what school you want to teach at, what you want to teach, where you want to teach.....

 

 

For the majority of teaching jobs any degree is fine. If you want to teach english then you should get a TEFL or CELTA certificate - one that is 4 weeks long and has at least 6 hours observed teaching. You will be very grateful for it when you start teaching.

 

Some universities may want Masters degree to teach.

 

The better schools will want you to have a recognised teaching creditial from your own country.

 

pay will be 20k a month down at the dark end up to 100K plus for full pukka international schools.

[Flashermac]

The Thai government retires you at 60. In fact, most unis and rachaphats won't even hire you if you are over 55 now. But private universitites often will. Unfortunately, you probably end up teach ridiculously large classes of students who couldn't get into a government uni. Many private unies are simply money making businesses. (Assumption is perhaps the sole exception.)

 

 

 

 

 

[Flashermac]

p.s. St Johns is called a college, I think. it is Catholic run like Assumption and a bit above the run of the mill.