Mrs Kiwi

Hi, was wondering if anyone could help me.

I have an English degree and am considering going for my TEFL qualification (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) so that I could get a job in a language school in Brisbane teaching English to foreigners.

My questions are;
Is there anyone out there who has used a TEFL qualification in Oz?
Is there a big market for teaching English a foreign language in Oz?
Is it easy to get a job in a language school in Oz?
Is TEFL a recognised qualification in Oz? If not, what is their version?
Does anyone know of any language schools in Brisbane city?

If there are not many jobs in this field then I won't bother exploring it as an option or doing the course. If however there are definite opportunities over in OZ then I'll go for it.
Thanks
Kelly

NickyC

If Brisbane is anything like Sydney there are literally hundreds of schools teaching English and the students are almost 100% chinese and japanese.

esperanza

I've investigated this too. There is always demand for TEFL, the problem is that there are also always hundreds of people doing it as part of their gap-year, so the pay is not that great. On the plus side it can be very flexible, if that's important to you, and obviously it can take you all over the world if you are interested in that. It is also something you can do very quickly in comparison with how long it takes to train for many jobs - four weeks and you're done. There are some better salaries and great tax breaks to be had in some places - middle east for example.
Personally I decided not to go with it because I am looking for something with a 'professional' salary rather than a gap year wage. Although I'm sure if you pursued it and gained extra experience & qualifications then the money might go up - eg you could specialise in teaching business english to japanese businessmen, or set up your own language school, and then I'm sure the money would be better! Good luck with it - if you find out anything else then do share!

Mrs Kiwi

thanks guys.
I must admit I haven't investigated the salary side of it yet! Doesn't sound good? Exactly how bad is it, roughly?!
Also, does anyone know how much the TEFL course costs and whether it can be done via distance learning?
Many thanks x

mick and beck

You can do the tefl course online and do it at your own pace, which is great if you need to fit it around work etc. I know of one company that does it, i-to-i, but not sure how much it costs.
However a friend of mine told me that to teach english as a foriegn lang in countries like oz, canada then a tefl is not sufficient. She had done a course called teaching english as a foreign language accredited by cambridge university but in manchester (called the celta - certificate of eng lang teaching to adults), which cost about £800 to do a few years ago.
Not sure how correct this is though, and whether it is actually possible to teach eng lang in oz with a tefl...

Mrs Kiwi

Oh, ok, thanks for the tip.
Can anyone else shed any light on this? Is a TEFL qualification accepted in Oz or is a CELTA the one they want?

esperanza

As I understand it, it depends who you want to teach. TEFL is fine for teaching children/teenagers as well as adults. CELTA is not so directly useful for teaching kids. But I imagine the principles are all the same, and in many situations the two courses are effectively interchangeable.
You're looking at about £1000, very roughly, for a month long course.
Anything else is not worth doing (imo) if you want to do TEFL as a proper job - you will see weekend courses, online courses, etc which will be much cheaper - but how exactly would an online course prepare you for standing in front of a class of real people? The month long courses will include a lot of practical experience & assessment, with feedback to help you improve. You also get the benefit of working alongside other people, starting to build a tefl network, and often they can help you find a position afterwards.

(No I don't work for one of these companies!)

If you fancy an experience, it can work out much the same price to go away for a month and get your TEFL somewhere like Barcelona or Prague, I was always tempted by this. Sure you could do it in Sydney too, which might then help in terms of finding a job in Australia.

Why not do a googlesearch for tefl jobs? There are plenty of websites out there targeting tefl teachers.

Mrs Kiwi

Thanks, £1000 was about how much I thought it would be. You are right when you say an on line course would never be as good, but I'm not sure I like the sound of taking a month off work to do the course, especially and we're currently saving so hard to get to Australia. Still, if something is worth doing, its worth doing well. I must admit I'm quite put off by the earlier posters on this thread saying TEFL jobs had lousy pay.
I have some serious thinking to do.

therhodes

If you're put off by taking an entire month off work to do a course, why don't you look into the possibility off doing one at weekends or in the evening?
Good luck with whatever you decide