What courses to take at college?

I’ve decided that I wish to TEFL in Taiwan, I’m 16 and from the UK and I don’t have long to choose what I want to do in college. I’m going to take 4 subjects for two years to full a-levels and then study for a BA in uni and then I’m going to get my TEFL certificate. Well that’s the plan. Is that enough? What type of BA is suitable? What type of subjects should I be looking at to take in college? My local college doesn’t offer Mandarin Chinese, is this necessary? Sorry If I’m asking lots of questions, I’m a complete newbie to it all.

Wow! Usually people end up in TEFL. It’s quite surprising to see someone so young who actually plans on TEFL as a career. Any bachelor’s degree will be enough to get you a teaching job in Taiwan. However, if you’re really sure that TEFL is what you want to do, perhaps you should look into Applied Linguistics when you apply for universities in a couple of years.

I’d say, languages and linguistics can never be wrong for someone who is aiming for TEFL. :wink:
This also paves the way for a parallel career as translator, interpreter, etc.

Yeah it opens up options for translating and other various positions. Most people would call me crazy for going into this business but honestly, I want to move out of this country and start a new, independent adventure, if you will, to walk out of this life and change the courses that I’ve already applied for. I’m not sure what my parents will make of it but its my life. I think I need that culture shock.

I’ve got down English Language and English Literature so far so that’s 2/4. I had a look at a few BA’s related to English and of course they required English lang or lit or combined at a certain grade with other a-levels at a certain grade. So I guess two other interesting subjects that relate will suffice.

:slight_smile:

Oh. good… i’d recommend Mandarin on top of that - if you can speak a language that your future students speak, you’ll understand the related TEFL stuff much better, aside from having more more fun when you are here. If you can’t get a course in Mandarin at this time, i’d say take any other foreign language - knowing more than one language is pretty well a must for TESL/TEFL work. :slight_smile:

I recommend some languages, the more the better. The best language teachers are ones who are interested in learning languages themselves. And some public speaking, world history, culture studies and dramatic arts would be good for you too.

I’ll add Spanish to my list then, I’ve been studying it for 5 years already and I really enjoy it. I’ve also found a BA that offers joint honours in Chinese which is for beginners in the language and I can select 2 other languages/humanities subject to go with it and drop one after the first year :slight_smile: I still plan to learn a few words of Mandarin a day though.

Aim high; specialize. You can fall back on TEFL. TEFL can be a more than adequate occupation; it can also be limiting. You’re not going to be of the same mind for long: don’t unnecessarily restrict your options +10 years down the road because of where you’d like to be over the next 2 or 3 years.

If I could go back and do it again, I would have made sure I got my state teaching certificate. It opens up so many doors here to teaching jobs I simply am not qualified for without it.

[quote=“Puppet”]If I could go back and do it again,
I would have made sure I got my state teaching certificate
. It opens up so many doors here to teaching jobs I simply am not qualified for without it.[/quote]

This should really be everyone’s first advice. If you want to teach anything other buxiban type TEFL then you’ll be way ahead with a teaching degree. And then after that you should have some sort of plan for earning Master’s (the lingiustics rec here?). Languages are of course a good idea.

But TEFL itself is a big field. Knowing who and what you want to teach will help you pick courses?