I've been an English teacher for three years; before that I subbed for seven; and I've taught an essay course for community college. I've read that most TEFL-type degrees are redundant if you're a full-time English teacher. Any truth to that rumor? --Oh, and I have a Master's in English!

Plus: Are there any lit courses available for us native English speakers to teach over there? Now THAT'd be cool.

Thanks for any info-- it's all helpful!

rycal@hotmail.com

Even though you can benefit from doing a search of other threads on this board specifically answering this question, I will tell you that No (rycal) you specifically do not.

This is not to say that some people will not benefit from taking some sort of teacher training such as the TEFL certificate or CELTA certificate gives you.

If you have no clue or are inexperienced TEFL / CELTA or other teacher training can help to inform and prepare you so that you can decide if you want to even do the teaching thing or not and either way help prepare you to give better thought out and organized lessons that can make actually doing it easier and more enjoyable.
Also. In other less desirable places to be than Spain it can be required to get some of the better teaching jobs making it worthwhile.

Now for everyone out there thinking about coming to Spain to do the teaching thing to survive (usually because there are no other real job options for native English speakers especially the ones living here illegaly).

Quote, frame, highlight, and dig on the following:
No. You will not need TEFL / CELTA etc. if you plan to only live and work in Madrid.

If you have experience, courage or even just a clue as to how to tutor or teach and are coming to Madrid to see what happes and live an adventure then you do not need any kind of TEFL / CELTA or other type of special training or certification to find English teaching or babysitting / aupair type jobs in Madrid.

You will be able to find both private lessons through the local papers and notice boards and you will even be hiried illegaly or not by some academies who will send you out to businesses and such to teach English.

The pay is crap 9 euros to 18 euros and hour but you will be in Spain. You would be sacrificing the higher pay of all the other less desirable places in order to be in this more desirable one.

The English teaching job market has its ups and downs here but you can just keep moving forward replacing your bad hours with better ones and keep adding on more new ones as you roll along.

At times it will seem as if the jobs are not coming in and that you do not have enough offers / hours at any given time, but with patience and persistance and constantly reminding people that you are here and available for work you will survive well enough.

Great post, Rocco, but next time, can you please put spaces between your paragraphs?

Thanks,

Shawn

Second everything Rocco says. I'm not as qualified as you, Rycal, but I have 5 years experience as a teacher, none specifically in English, and have had no problem finding teaching hours. It took me about 8 months to work up enough hours to live on, but it happened. For you it will probably be even easier. Come on in, the water's fine!

hey rycal, as Rocco works with many TEFL programs here, he is the authority so i will leave you in his able hands RE his post above.

try some SEARCHES on "TEFL" and similiar terms, you will find A TON of threads on the topic.

read them all carefully and you will get a lot out of them.

saludos,
jer...

hey rocco is right on. tefl is pretty useless if you are already a qualified teacher. only folks who don't have a grasp of english grammar nor have ever taught before really need it. that said, i learned on the job and i am pretty sure my command of the past perfect continuous and how to teach it is as solid as any tefl-er.

as for teaching english lit, Saint Louis University here in Madrid has a MA in English lit, so they might have job openings for teachers. Go to their website and check it out. the main school is in missouri. the guy that heads up the madrid-based program is american and very nice, though i can't remember his name.

good luck,
C

ryan, you wrote...

quote:

Plus: Are there any lit courses available for us native English speakers to teach over there? Now THAT'd be cool.

nbot sure what level of schooling you have but you will need a docotorate to get a lit teaching gig at slu (or any other american university here.

they may accept masters plus a ton of credits (on way to a doctorate) but not likely.

saludos,
jer...