Teaching English as a Foreign Language
May 29, 2008
Many recent mails have asked questions about coming to France and teaching English. Although English is a compulsory subject in all schools and most people in France have been taught English for seven years of their live, or more, the level of fluency is very low. Living in France it is not necessary or even useful to speak English unless you work in the tourist industry or are involved in an export business. With teenage children we meet many young people in our home and they very rarely can understand English and never speak it even after years of compulsory schooling. So it would seem there may be a big demand to teach English - but I see little real evidence to support this.
I was going to write more about this but an article in the April edition of The Connection gives a lot more information about TEFL - teaching English as a Foreign language - and refers to some other trades and professions if you move to France
Comment by Annie Young
Hi
I’ve been teaching English for 15 years now. More and more companies are owned by European or American companies and they need English for meetings and communication between the subsidiary and head office. The people I teach are everything from people who work in maintenance who need it for manuals,to computer technicians (for software) accountants ( presenting figures to head office) and sales people( dealing with customers). The companies I work with range from wine producers through carpet manufactures to providers of safety clothing or medicine.
The job itself is not secure as it depends on work coming in to the language school and the large number of Brits around means it’s not wise to complain about conditions - there is always someone there to take your place! Having said that you meet a variety of people, find out what goes on in the area and from time to time find out you have made a difference to someone’s job.
I don’t have a TEFL qualification and I think giving someone the confidence and skill to use the English they have is more important than getting bogged down with grammar. I suspect tho’ the people who write a lot of the jargon for the TEFL courses wouldn’t agree. I do agree that having a TEFL qualification at the start would have helped my confidence but I don’t think I’m any better or worse than the couple of colleagues I have who did the course.
I enjoy reading all the different subjects you cover
Thanks
Annie
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[...] have been writing about teaching English in my blogs and this has opened some email conversations which often bring many other things - this [...]
Comment by Hugh Tavenner
I draw your attention to the following found in a search for Cactus
The TEFL Blacklist: Cactus TEFL (still up to their old tricks)
The Guardian are promoting Cactus TEFL as a holier than thou place to seek impartial advice. I can’t believe that money isn’t changing hands. …
teflblacklist.blogspot.com/ 2007/04/cactus-tefl-guardian-spin.html - 96k -