What do you think an English Language Teacher does? Who is he?

It could be almost anyone. A friend’s daughter is going from her stint in the Peace Corps to being an ELT overseas.

It all depends on where you teach English and the rules of the organization that hired you.

In the public school system in California if you teach in elementary school, you must have a multi-subject credential which entails a BS or BA plus an additional year of pedagogy and the proven ability to teach the subjects, by testing and student teaching. In the classroom you are teaching reading, writing, spelling, grammar, punctuation and to ELL’s actual spoken English.

In secondary school you have to have a single subject credential in English which requires a BA in English. Before you can enroll in the pedagogy course required for the credential you must prove your knowledge of the secondary curriculum with specific courses and testing. Then you complete your pedigogical year which includes a semester teaching under the guidance of 1 or 2 master teachers.

If you teach in a private school you may not be required to have the state issued credential but generally the best schools do.

From my experience many secondary teachers have received or are pursuing a Masters.

That speaks to about 95% of teachers in my state.

A home schooling parent is not required to have any formal education whatsoever but the state is trying to impose benchmarks that the student must achieve.

Other instances might be people who are tutoring in community based programs like after school program, adult programs for immigrants or teaching in preschools. Usually there are no criteria other than the ability to speak English. However those programs often aren’t about literature or essay writing but rather basic spoken language.

Outside of the United States it would depend on what the level of English is required. If your job in the Peace Corp is to teach English in a govt sponsored school, I woud expect they would require a college degree plus some Peace Corp training. If the job has another focus with less formal teaching then maybe a degree is not required.

And finally, anyone can put up a flyer in the laundromat or tack it to a pole offering to teach English and it’s up to the consumer.

Sure I know. I teach.

What would you like to know specifically? Where and what I’ve studied? How I plan lessons? There is so much information I could write… but a lot of it is private in the not-for-internet sense – I’d rather not reveal everything about myself here. Hope you take this the right way.

PM me if it really interests you.

:-)

ZEN OUT