Best TEFL course for South Korea?

5 min readMay 30, 2018

What’s the best TEFL course for South Korea? That would be the one that actually prepares you to do your job in Korea.

You have a specific need and that is for a TEFL course that will prepare you to teach English in Korea.

Is there a TEFL/TESOL certification course out there like that? There is that I will tell you about later.

But most TEFL courses are just general courses for teaching abroad. They are not specifically focused on teaching in Korea or teaching kids.

Most courses out there focus on teaching adults because that is the CELTA model and as I see it most courses try to copy and look like CELTA at least on the surface.

Most of the jobs in Korea are for teaching kids.

The best course will teach you to teach that age group, unless you are adamant about teaching adults. But most jobs are for that age group.

And kids can be tough, but don’t take my word for it take Ben’s.

“It takes a lot more skill to teach children well in my opinion…”
“Children, on the other hand, have no intrinsic reason to be there so you have to make the lessons fun and interesting. You also have to deal with their uncontrolled emotions and lack of social skills. Teaching young learners requires a huge range of skills and knowledge.” — sendaiben

So do you want to take a general course or one specifically focused on what and who you are going to be teaching?

I took 2 courses TESOL & TEFL (one cheapo online and one partly in a class) and both included plenty of theory, lots of boring black and white text to read, grammar study, lots of jargon and other things that went in one ear and out the other.

YOU NEED VISUALS TO LEARN HOW TO TEACH

“…unless our words, concepts, ideas are hooked onto an image, they will go in one ear, sail through the brain, and go out the other ear. Words are processed by our short-term memory where we can only retain about seven bits of information (plus or minus 2) […]. Images, on the other hand, go directly into long-term memory where they are indelibly etched.” — Dr. Lynell Burmark

I don’t remember anything practical from the online course I took in 2016. I wasn’t taken that because I really wanted to learn which makes sense because you probably won’t learn much in a course like that.

I was taking it to see what I would get for $39 and compare it to the courses that I have created.

In the in-class course in 2004 I took I remember two activities that were somewhat useful that I later turned into how-to videos along with another 100 videos shot in classrooms in both public schools and hagwons in Korea.

I’d say the best course for you is the one that will best prepare you for your job or if you are already teaching then the best would be the one that would improve your situation.

That might be a TEFL course in Korea, but if you are not there yet or can’t find one near you then taking one online is an option.

Do you need to take an in-class (onsite) course or is an online TEFL course o.k?

The bottom line is that it depends on the school, but in Korea pretty much anywhere will accept an online TEFL except in ‘Busan with the EPIK program’.

So does that mean that if you take an in-class course that you will get more or better jobs?

No.

The better jobs go to teachers with experience (with years of experience). An in-class TEFL may only give you an advantage in Busan with the EPIK program if you don’t have experience or a teaching license.

EPIK usually accepts online courses.

Hagwons are not part of a program. They are private institutes and can have their own preferences and online courses are usually fine and not necessarily required.

But again every school is different just like every job in your country has certain preferences.

Here is a course that was created in Korea.

This course is a visually orientated course focused on doing and not theory, grammar or jargon.

It includes many video tutorials that were filmed in both public schools and hagwons (private institutes) in Korea. This is important because the best way to learn is by watching other teachers.

That’s why many people recommend in-class courses, but you can do that with this course online.

Ask someone who is a fan of CELTA, “what is the most important part of CELTA?”

And they will likely say: observation and feedback.

You can get those both in this online course.

You’ll see right into the classrooms of Korea.

This course focuses more on teaching children, but you will see ages ranging from kindergarten students to adults.

Are you going to be teaching mostly children?

Probably.

The majority of jobs in Korea are for teaching children. It’s possible to teach adults, but unless you are determined to teach adults you will probably end up teaching children.

You need the best course for the job.

Most TEFL/TESOL/CELTA certification courses also focus on teaching adults since most of them are trying — at least on the surface to look like a CELTA course.

Even if you don’t take this course I highly recommend taking one for teaching children if that is who you are going to teach.

My first year in Taiwan was really difficult because I didn’t know what I was doing really and I didn’t learn much from that course.

So if I was to do it again I would take a course designed to teach kids.

Related to TEFL courses (here on Medium):

Best TEFL course for South Korea?

YOU NEED VISUALS TO LEARN HOW TO TEACH

Related:

Related to TEFL courses (here on Medium):

Related Youtube videos (playlist):

Written by Ian@ESLinsider

No responses yet