I’ve been vacillating for over 3 months on whether on not to get TEFL (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) certified. I finally decided recently that I just want to go for it. Plus, I figure it can’t hurt to add another notch to the resume/CV. Now the problem has been deciding who to take the course with. There are a few programs that I could do in Spain and then there are the plethora of options for completing the certification online. I’m definitely leaning more towards the online route. I’m torn between i-to-i or getting the CELTA through Cambridge.
Ideally, I wanted to get this done before arriving in Spain, but I think I may just do it once I’m there. There is an examination center in Madrid for the CELTA so that won’t be an issue. I just think I could really benefit from something like this. I don’t have much experience when it comes to teaching a foreign language and if a person asks me why something is the way it is grammatically or phonetically, saying “Because it sounds nice that way” isn’t really going to cut it. And, let’s face it, English is one of those languages that has the least amount of structure. At least in Spanish and French there are rules and those rules are pretty much always stuck to. How do you begin to explain why the words heard/beard and dead/bead look similar, but are pronounced differently?
A person in the facebook group for auxiliares posted this clip from I Love Lucy and it shows the eccentrics of the English language perfectly:
Lady in Spain 