Family, Parenting and Education

One of the things you must be vigilant on when you are both a parent and a TEFL teacher is unscrupulous schools. In some locations, it can be tough to find a school that you can afford to send your children to. Public schools can be out of the question for non-local kids and international schools can be prohibitively high.

In this void, there are sometimes school that spring up. When these schools are registered with the local government, they can be a Godsend for parents, but what happens when these schools exist solely to take money from parents and don’t deliver a quality education to the students? It’s a travesty.

In Thailand, foreign students are not allowed to study at public schools and they have to pay higher rates to study in private schools. Education expenses can make it difficult to teach English abroad if you have kids.

Right now there is a developing story on TEFLWatch where accusations are being thrown around about Faith Christian Academy in Thailand. There are those who are saying that the school is not legally registered and is operating illegally. I hope that this isn’t true and would hope that the school would quickly prove to everyone that they are legal. We need quality education for our kids, not carpetbaggers trying to take advantage of a tough situation.

When I teach English, I always try to do my best to help them learn English in real life situations. That means that I try to take them on a field trip at least once or twice per semester. We try to visit different locations or I try to give them surveys to make.

By doing this, I force them to use their English outside of the classroom. This use of English outside of the classroom is one of the best ways to help them improve their English. It might mean taking them out to a restaurant or have them visit a store. With these real world situations, they learn English in a more natural way, and they do it out of necessity.

Any ideas for improving this? Ideas on where to take them?

It seems like now is the time I am getting ready to do some extra work on some school papers I am trying to put together. It sometimes seems so difficult dealing with the reams of paperwork just about every school wants to throw at teachers. I find myself buckling under the weight sometimes. I have come across one way to keep track of it.

I keep 5 stacks of papers on my desk, one stack for each day of the week and I deal with it when I can. Ok, I know that isn’t the answer you were looking for, but many of us do it.

How do you stay organized under the onslaught of massive paperwork?

It is kind of sad the passing of a great leader, especially when it is a leader who has done a lot to help people around the world. I may not be Mormon, but I think the passing of the Gordon Hinckley is a sad day for people around the world who can see the good things made in this world thanks to the work of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. I see a lot of good they have done in helping people both spiritually, emotionally and financially.

I remember there work back in my hometown in the Philippines where they would help people who didn’t have food enough to eat and how they would open their church to activities. Not to mention the humble way the missionaries would go door to door sharing their version of the Gospel. I appreciate much of what they have done and I hope the Mormon Church continues its work under new leadership.

I think our family just might visit the local Mormon Church this Sunday to learn even more about their work and express my condolences in person to followers of their late leader.

I like to make easy dinners when I am pressed for time. I have come up with 3 easy dinners that I like to make when I find myself short on time and I need to make food fast for the family. These are nutritious and filling meals that don’t require a lot of prep time or effort.

1) Mac and Cheese with ground beef. The easy part of this is to the boil the beef alongside the noodles. It cooks the beef and since Mac and Cheese is so easy, you get a hearty meal in no time at all.

2) Ramen Noodles with Tomato Sauce. Ramen noodles cook up so fast and easy. They are time pressed cook’s best friend. Adding a little tomato sauce to the noodles creates a cheap and easy spaghetti. You can even add a bit of canned corned beef and you have something that is very close to the real thing.

3) Super Scrambled Eggs. Fry up some ground beef to start off with and then put it aside. Cut up some bell peppers and cheese if you have them. Next, open several eggs into a bowl, add a bit of milk and whisk them. Add in the cheese, bell peppers and ground beef to the bowl then put it all in a skillet and start cooking it up. Delicious.

There you go, three easy dinners.

I am right now trying to come up with some TEFL activities for kids. I am trying to figure out some games with them to teach them vocabulary. I think I have a a few together so I will post couple of the ideas I have and after I try them out with my students, then I can post the feedback here.

1) Word Bingo. I have made up some bingo cards with pictures on them. I will be calling out the words and the students have to find the picture. The first one to get bingo wins!

2) Tic Tac Phrases. Kids have to guess letters in order to guess a phrase. If their team gets it right, then they get an X or O on the board.

One of the scourges of working in the TEFL industry is the bad schools. They sure make it hard to be a good teacher. These schools put draconian work provisions on teachers. They pay their salary late. They make things tough for teachers. They put stupid educational requirements in place. They are lead by people who are interested in money and not education.

The only way to deal with these type of schools is with a blacklist. TEFLWatch TEFL Blacklist is just one site that deals with all of the BS surrounding these schools. I don’t know if these kind of sites are enough to do justice for teachers, but it’s a start. We need to start highlighting the bad schools and start putting them in a TEFL blacklist on sites like TEFLWatch in order to warn teachers off of bad schools, language institutes and recruiters.