Category: Professional Development

Would you like to get feedback on your teaching?

Do you teach English to adults online and feel that you would benefit from talking to someone about what happens in your classes? If you are looking for a practical way to develop as a teacher, I’d like to offer you an opportunity to have your lessons observed and receive feedback on your teaching.

Would you like to get feedback on your teaching?

What is this all about?
I recently became a freelancer with the idea of getting involved in new projects. In addition to my work for International House and my own private classes, I’d like to dedicate a couple of hours per week to something else. I love talking to ELT professionals, and that’s why I decided to offer my services to English teachers from around the world.

Why is feedback on teaching important?
I believe that it is crucial to keep developing as a teacher if you wish to make progress in your ELT career. Doing so by yourself isn’t easy, though. It’s quite tricky to self-evaluate your performance while you are teaching a lesson, so asking someone to observe you can be very useful. As your observer, I will give you personalised advice and help you address your weaknesses.

Why should you choose me?
Since getting my CELTA at the beginning of my TEFL career, I have shown a lot of interest in professional development. I finished my Delta last year, and I also hold the Cambridge Train the Trainer certificate. I have received feedback on my teaching from experienced teacher trainers and I think I have picked up a few useful ideas along the way. You are welcome to read my posts on this blog to find out what my views on teaching are.

Who is this for?
There are two main groups of teachers this offer is aimed at:

● newly-qualified teachers with little experience
● those with a couple of years’ experience who would like to take their teaching to a higher level

CELTA and CertTESOL holders are more than welcome to participate.

Who is not a suitable candidate?
Teachers with a Delta, DipTESOL, and other advanced qualifications. It would be more beneficial for you to be observed by a more experienced teacher trainer.

Does your location matter?
Not really. I’ll be happy to work with teachers from any part of the world. Just bear in mind that I live in the Bogotá time zone (UTC−05:00), so we’ll need to plan the online meeting for a time that suits both of us.

How does it work?
The whole process comprises four stages:

  1. Short Zoom meeting to get to know each other and talk about your expectations.
  2. Pre-lesson Zoom meeting to discuss your lesson plan.
  3. Lesson observation, which can be done live (I join your online meeting) or you can record the meeting and send me the video.
  4. Post-lesson Zoom meeting to talk about the lesson. You are also going to receive written feedback.

What about in-person lessons?
I’d prefer to observe online lessons at the moment. However, if you have the means to make a high-quality recording of your in-class lessons, then we can talk about that as well.

What else has to be done?
It is necessary that all your students give you permission to record the meeting or allow me to join the live session. You can always rely on my professionalism and confidentiality; you won’t see me post any screenshots from Zoom meetings on social media.

What if you teach children?
I’d like to keep it simple and observe only classes involving adults. Your students may be fine with being observed and recorded, but their parents may see things differently, so you would need to get their permission as well.

How much does it cost?
I don’t plan to get rich out of this. In fact, I’ll probably have time for just one or two observations per week. The fee is different for each teacher and depends on your location and the length of the observed lesson, and I hope that you will find my proposal reasonable. The funds received from these observations will help me cover the running costs of this website (domain + WordPress site plan).

How can you arrange an observation with me?
You can get in touch through LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, or this contact form. Please tell me about your motivation for being observed and attach your CV or another document showing your qualifications and experience. I will then get back to you with further information.

Blog anniversary

The TEFL in Colombia blog was launched exactly a year ago when I published the post Everybody wants to live in Medellín and shared the link on my social media profiles. Let’s take a look at what has happened since then.

Blog anniversary

Well, the most important thing I have learned is that I love blogging. You are reading the 49th article on this website, which is considerably more than I expected to write. I guess my background in journalism comes in handy, but it remains to be seen whether I can keep publishing new posts almost every week. In addition to writing articles, I think one of the most enjoyable aspects of blogging is interacting with other ELT professionals on social media because there is an amazing online community of people with plenty of inspirational ideas. I also follow a lot of blogs, which motivates me to write my own posts.

I originally planned to write mainly about Colombia and my experiences here, but most of my posts have been about my professional development. I finally became a Delta-qualified teacher last month, and I also took the Train the Trainer course. It was all quite demanding, so I think it’s time to take a break from studying, which means that my posts are going to deal with slightly different topics in the near future.

How many views does the blog receive? Some days are more successful than others. While the highest number of views has been 195, on other occasions the blog is lucky to get viewed 20 times a day. I occasionally share a link to one of my posts in some Facebook groups for teachers, which leads to a significant increase in views, but I still don’t feel fully comfortable with this form of self-promotion. I prefer seeing my posts shared by other people because it means I have written a text someone else considers useful. Thank you to everybody who has done that!

Five most viewed posts:
• The importance of going beyond CELTA
• Tips for passing Delta Module Two
• Six ELT blogs worth following
• ELT Concourse is a priceless resource
• No Spanish in the classroom?

If you are a new reader, I invite you to go through the blog’s archives and see if you find something interesting there. You can access all articles from the main menu, which comprises the following post categories: Colombia, Teaching, Professional development, Interviews, Visa.

An interesting effect of having a blog is getting opportunities to express your opinions on other platforms. I delivered a webinar about blogging and social media at an online conference, and that’s something I probably need to start doing more frequently. I was also approached by Silvina Mascitti to talk about my TEFL experience for her magazine article featuring several teachers living abroad. Sandy Millin asked me to join in with the Delta conversations series on her blog, which made me very happy because I count her website as one of the original inspirations for starting my own blog.

What plans do I have for my second year of blogging? I actually have a few concrete ideas about what I would like to achieve in ELT. It will probably take a couple of years for me to reach the goals, but I’m now pretty sure that I can have a long-term career in this industry. I will continue documenting my journey here, and I hope that some teachers find the content helpful. In addition, I plan to publish more interviews with professionals working in a variety of teaching contexts so that this blog offers more than just my perspective.

At the end of this post I’d like to say that I really appreciate your interest in reading my thoughts. As always, if you have any comments or suggestions, feel free to get in touch.