This x100000
Plus there are teachers that think they are hot shit and the managers love them because these teachers play games and don’t actually teach lmao
Playing games is a very good way of teaching children. I actively discourage my staff from the didactic chalk and talk approach. I want to see children learn through playing.
I have students message me on Facebook to tell me they still remember the games we played.
I was fortunate enough to read the actual syllabus for a cram school that was designed in the 90s. It was a proper syllabus and very very thorough. It explained the reasoning behind the structure of the series of books to be taught including the interchangeability within sentence patterns and structures with material that had already been taught.
So I used this method, along with my excellent co-teacher that taught the other half of the time, and watched how the kids were able to really move forward very very quickly to reading level capability. Once at reading level it becomes a much easier task to teach English because they’re learning it quite naturally. The hard part is teaching them how to speak it. The linguistics of it. And with face masks that has become even harder because with making new sounds you need to show how the mouth and teeth and tongue and used to create those sounds and then combine them into an understandable grunt.
My co-teacher at that point had never met anyone that bothered to read the syllabus. Upon seeing how it worked she continued teaching the way I showed her during our classes and is now a very well paid ESL teacher that can pick and choose the students she teaches.
Although the locals might like to say cram school teachers came to Taiwan because they failed everywhere else not one has ever accepted my challenge to teach one of my classes. That attitude, and it really is a kind of xenophobic racism, can be found most places in Taiwan. But then you’ll meet an 80 year old painter who speaks excellent English that never went to school last year 6.
Best thing to do is smile, nod your head like you agree with them, and slowly walk away. I mean in regards to your fellow employee claiming westerners with bachelors degrees aren’t real teachers, not the 80 year old artist that enjoys chatting with you when you cross paths on the way home.
Yep. But I started there 11 years ago; more lenient times. I guess my interview was mildly impressive, too.
I also had experience with minor lecturing positions where I studied for my degree.
Yeah, that I can understand. Definitely different times back then; more fun too. In another 5 years, I don’t even think unis will be be hiring without PhDs.
Also true, but I’m thinking the mid and lower tier ones. The collapse in the birth-rate around 20 years ago has decimated enrollment. I think the axe would’ve come down sooner, but the COVID pandemic with its tight borders keeping out potential competition has delayed this reckoning a bit. But once things fully open up again, all the unis will be cutting their smaller departments, part-timers, contract lecturers, and trying to lure PhD holders in order to stay relevant or at least survive another academic year.
English teachers could survive longer as unis desperately keep them as a marketing tool. Alternatively, they could go first if the Taiwanese teachers gain priority due to cultural reasons.
It’ll be interesting to see how things play out. Smaller private unis like mine will feel it first. I’ll report back.
I think it’s as you said to me a while ago; mid-tier unis will try to hire PhD holders, but when none bite (I assume most people who have endured the better part of a decade pursuing a doctorate would rather apply at top unis such as NTU) they’ll fall back on us lowly Master’s grads as Plan B.
Yep, this is my situation too. I swear things were about to go pear shaped in early 2020 and then COVID distracted everyone. I don’t know, but all talk about cuts ceased at my uni around 2 years ago. Doubt it’s a coincidence
What an ass. Teaching is a calling, you can’t teach someone to care about their students.
The first year of my PhD I knew two people excited to teach their first courses, in a BEd program. That’s right, people who had never actually taught can teach courses on teacher training programs at universities. I wasn’t qualified to teach in the province and this was an excuse I was given as to why I couldn’t teach in the program (later, I learned that professor had lied to me).
Most professors have no qualifications to teach, this is true for professors of education. Your colleague is a fool who doesn’t know what they’re talking about.
Sure, there will be a lot of terrible cram school teachers, because they are willing to hire unqualified people and treat them like garbage. There are also going to be some amazing cram school teachers who are self-taught through the Internet and their own experience, and they will be able to put some certified teachers to shame. Some certified teachers are going to be absolutely terrible.