TEFL Prague and Abroad

The Language House TEFL has a lot of great graduates living and teaching all over the world Read up on some of our graduate blogs and learn from their experience and adventures living in exotic locations. You can view some of the blogs here -  Language House Graduate Blogs Cheers, Chris

We have a few spaces left on our January 6 and February 10 TEFL certification course in Prague and are offering discounts. Please reference this blog in your application. If you have ever thought about teaching abroad, this is a great opportunity. Find out more about our course and sign up here  The Language House . Get into teaching! Chris Westergaard The Language House TEFL

As the title suggests... If you are thinking of signing up with The Language House TEFL and are unsure of the steps, application procedure or post course procedures, click on the link below. We've listed them all out for you. Language House TEFL Application Procedures Cheers, Chris

Here's a new lesson that deals with a review of family members, personal history, interrogation language, and more complex personal description language. It can probably be used for any level from pre-intermediate, but will shine best with higher levels. For lower levels, you'll have to limit the amount of language. For higher levels it will serve more as a language review with new new language added of course for the activation. At the activation of the lesson, students take either the role of a captured spy or an interrogator. Spies are briefly given fake family trees and description of family members that they have to memorise and answer questions correctly about from the interrogators. Introduction (just a minute or so) Walk in with a long coat and sunglasses and start questioning your class in a stern manner. Ask the class various questions about their life/background: where they work, about their family, where they live... etc.  Do this for a few students and the...

Take a look at some pics from our September TEFL certificate course in Prague. If you are interested in teaching abroad, sign up for classes on our website The Language House TEFL www.thelanguagehouse.net

What a long summer it was. Great courses and more students than The Language House TEFL has ever had. Time to get back to work. What can you expect in the next month? More free lesson plans, demo videos and brand new METHODOLOGY videos. Stay tuned. Cheers, Chris

 Most TEFL Teachers in Prague make about 20k-25k a month. That's in CZK not dollars! Here are my tips to get past 30k and even up to 40k a month. 1. Get Good: Being a good teacher is the first thing you need to do. The better you get in the classroom, the more likely schools are going to give you more classes, pay you more and give you better clients. Students will recommend you more and approach you more for private lessons for themselves or for their friends/company. Try to improve on your skills daily. If you reach a wall, ask someone to observe you or video your lesson and review it. Also, ask to observe some good teachers and learn from them. 2. Ask for a Raise: Czech's hate giving out more money. That's just the way they are. No one is going to give you a raise, you'll have to ask for it. If your students are happy and your classes are filling up, ask for a raise after about 4 months of teaching. 3. Get on a Good Schedule: Traveling all over the city fo...

  Interested in making a difference in the world and having an experience that few people can match?  Graduate of The Language House TEFL, John Stanlake, works as a field director for WorldTeach and has asked me to share this video. If you are interested in WorldTeach you can contact John directly on his email here John Stanlake <jestanlake@gmail.com>

The Globe is one of the oldest English bookstores and coffee shops in Prague. It's also a great place to get brunch on the weekends and a drink before going out. We are happy to announce that The Language House TEFL has partnered up with them and now all Language House TEFL graduates will receive a 10 percent discount at the Globe. Hurray!

  The Language House is only as strong as our graduates!   Add your email on the right to subscribe to the blog.    Want to get certified to teach abroad?    Check out our courses in Prague here - The Language House TEFL

David Christof, graduate of The Language House TEFL course, is an amazing runner and human being, who has dedicated his life to providing safe drinking water to all. Read more about his story and watch his video below.     In the summer of 2012, I ran 1314km/821mile from Prague to London to raise awareness about the safe drinking water crisis. Starting at the German School Prague, I ran 5 weeks and in the process raised over $12,000 which provides safer drinking water for over 400 people. In cooperation with the Blue Planet Network and Drink Local Drink Tap non-profits, this money will provide safe drinking water to the St. Bonaventure school in Mulajji village, Uganda. In 2013, my next adventure is- Prague to Africa: 1000km RUN, 2000km BIKE, 3000 CHILDREN INSPIRED along the way. Combining runing and biking, I will travel from Prague to Morocco, stopping at 30 schools along the way, educating children about the world water crisis and inspiring them to be more ...

Teaching is hard and teaching language is harder. You have to have both knowledge of your subject matter and a technical, skill-based knowledge, to pull it off. If I were to list the top 7 mistakes that new teachers make in the classroom, they would be the following. 1. Teacher Talking Time (TTT) This is all of the output that teachers make while in the classroom. I'll include here Graded Language, Running Commentary, Speed, Tone, Question Stacking, Confusing Directions...etc. The trick to get your students speaking is to speak less and to speak clearly. Don't explain what you're going to do, just do it. Don't use confusing or complicated language, speak directly and clearly. If you can limit your output to the essentials, you'll improve your pace, student comprehension and student output. 2. Lack of Language Awareness. Know your grammar. You shouldn't be lecturing your students on grammatical points, but you should be aware of the mistakes that they are...

 Life in Prague from Language House graduates past and present. Check out the video and thanks to everyone for their contributions.                      

Looking to get TEFL/TESOL certified? Of course you are! The Language House TEFL in Prague just added our 2014 course dates (the Mayans were so wrong) and we are offering a 100 Euro discount on all of our courses from March 9 - April 9. Signing up just takes 5 minutes to get started. You can view all of the course dates for 2014 here http://www.thelanguagehouse.net/tefl-certificate-course/dates-and-prices/ Cheers, Chris The Language House TEFL

If you want to view all of my teaching videos, an easy way is to just check out my Youtube channel. I try to add new content weekly, so there's always going to be something new. Click the link and subscribe to my channel. Also, add your email on the right and you'll get new posts automatically. Youtube Channel: TEFL Teaching and Course Videos Subscribe! Thanks everyone! Chris

Here's a video of demo of an Introduction and Lead In with a focus on error correction. When students are in groups, notice how I'm constantly trying to interact with them and improve their language by eliciting the correct words and responses. The key to correcting students is to do it fast and relatively often without breaking too much fluency. If you actively error correct group work, you'll find a noticeable improvement in their ability even over the course of only a few lessons.

 Here's a video of some basic eliciting in the classroom.

Here's a lesson that you can do with intermediates and up. I just shot the video for it (coming soon) so make sure to take a look at it. The lesson primarily deals with lexis, with the topic of words associated with appearance. At the end of the lesson, students become sketch artists for the police and have to ask questions to a witness about a crime.  The lesson I did took right around 60 minutes but can be lengthened or shortened if needed. Materials needed: Pictures of people (about 10 or so depending on size) Warmer: (I had students ask each other about their weekends) Intro: (just a couple of minutes) Change something about your appearance and ask students to tell you what's changed about you. Elicit the concept of appearance. Lead In: (5-10 minutes) Have these questions pre-boarded. Demo the questions out with the students and then put them in groups. 1. What things about your appearance stand out about you? (you probably have to pre-teach stand out) ...

Skip Potts does a demo to a group of intermediate Czech students. The first activity is a Find Someone Who Bingo icebreaker. The second activity is a guess who am I game. The length of the actual activities were about 15-20 minutes. The video has been edited to around 6 minutes. Here's the video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Li2WeZlHaL0

 Here's the video of the lesson I just created and was able to teach recently 'Worst Matchmaker Ever'. You can find the lesson for this here Lesson Plan . It was a new class, so I started of with quick icebreaker (not shown in the video). If you are interested in teaching abroad, check out our TEFL certificate in Prague The Langauge House. Here's the video

  Graduate Spotlights are stories from graduates from The Language House TEFL in Prague. This is one is from John Stanlake, graduate of The Language House TEFL. Language House TEFL graduate John Stanlake John graduated from the Language House in March 2009. He has since taught in the UK, Rwanda, and Bangladesh and he speaks here about how and why he got into teaching, why he chose the Language House, and about WorldTeach, the volunteer teaching organisation he volunteered with in Rwanda. How did you get into teaching? In all honesty I had never really planned to be a teacher. It just kind of happened due to circumstances and because of some choices which inadvertently led me onto that path! I studied Politics and International Relations at university and directly after this I worked in local government for a while. For a number of reasons I decided I needed a change, so I applied to volunteer with WorldTeach. Looking back now I am certain I made the rig...

Love is in the air with Valentine's Day approaching. Here's a listening lesson that deals with these themes.  Just off of the top of my head, I can think of a dozen of different variations of this, so play around with it if you want to. If you want a lesson created for you, just give me any grammar, language point or topic and I'll get one to you. Topic: Dating.  Students listen to Frank Sinatra's 'How about You' (lyrics below). Students then create ' the worst dating agency in the world ' where they pair up the most unlikely of people. Materials needed: Frank Sinatra's 'How about You', Audio (speakers), pictures of different celebrities and horrifically ugly people. You're going to want about 10 or more photos total.  Introduction: about 3 minutes. Enter into the class looking depressed. When the students ask you what's wrong, tell them that you're lonely in the city and want to meet someone. Try to elicit how you cou...

Last week, The Language House TEFL in Prague, graduated 18 great new TEFL teachers on the course. You all did a tremendous job and it was a pleasure to work with you all. We are currently offering deals on our March, April and May courses of 125 Euros off. Sign up while the deal last www.thelanguagehouse.net Grads of the January 2013 course in Prague

7 New ESL Lessons. One a day. Starting tomorrow. All original and all highly interactive. Let's do this!