CIEE TEFL Online 150-Hour TEFL Certificate Course

There is a lot to be learned in CIEE TEFL's course, but it's worth it if you're serious about pursuing a career in teaching English to nonnative speakers. You do need to be very motivated and organized to do well, but I knew that going into an online course. This is NOT a certification class you can take just to receive a piece of paper. The tutors and staff really want you to understand the material and be proud of your work (and there will be a lot of it!). The expectations are high from the get-go, so it's important to hit the ground running.

Small classes, weekly tutorials, discussion boards, and clear learning outcomes are some of the highlights in this course. The online platform is also really easy to use. The 20-hour practice teaching component, in particular, really cements the theory and strategies you're shown in class. I would recommend this course to anyone who is planning on teaching English abroad, or even anyone looking to advance in the field.

I believe that this course was quite helpful. It was a very long course but that also meant that it was all inclusive. My teacher was very good. She always left great comments and was there if we had questions or needed advice. I found some of the material to be very helpful and some of it not so much. The school that I am teaching at is very book focused so it is difficult to use any creativity. However, the course did help with just relating to the kids in general.

Overall, the 150 hour TEFL course was moderately helpful in learning new strategies for teaching English. The best assignments were related to direct application of strategies and techniques whereas the least helpful assignments/lecture had to do with a philosophical exploration of teaching, learning, and cross-culturalism. The course was unduly expensive and requires a lot of time. Now, while abroad I find myself using some techniques and finding even more inapplicable. But, I am glad I took the course, at least to feel better equipped.

Teaching in Thailand is a wonderful opportunity for personal growth and enlightenment! Every day is a grand adventure with the students, faculty and community members. Living in a "compound" with other English teachers from the United States adds so much to the adventure. This gives all of the members an opportunity to have a support system during the school day and outside of the school day as well. Members of the "compound" get to travel together on the weekends and have a built in "family" for holidays and other special events. One year being twelve zones away from home couldn't possibly be better than being in Thailand. Everyone would love to have this marvelous experience of teaching in Thailand!

A bit of background on myself: I am a 23-year-old graduate of UW-Madison and I took the 150 hour CIEE TEFL course in preparation for my CIEE Teach Abroad Program in Chile. I have had quite a few hours of classroom facilitation but no experience teaching English, though I am well versed in the language.
The cons: An online course of how to run a classroom, in my mind, seems bound to fail, so perhaps this review is unfair. What I mostly gained from the coursework was what to specifically google the things I need to know as a future teacher. Exams were super easy to skate through, and I didn't really have to read all of the slides to do well on the tests. I wish the course would have focused more on lesson planning and less on how to adapt to a new culture and educational theories that I will probably rarely consider day-to-day. I also hated the pseudo class discussions online where posting is mandatory and you have to reflect on classmates' comments. Certain types of media were really difficult to upload and I had some technical issues.
The pros: The course has a mostly-intuitive layout. It provides you with a ton of resources at the end of every module which was one of the few things I knew I would return to. I did gain a better understanding of how to plan lessons which is key. Classroom videos and critiques of live teachers did help, but those only came near the end of the course. My tutor was awesome and easy to get a hold of. I also really enjoyed the practicum component of the course.

After a reasonable fee of $1000, and 11 weeks of power points, discussion posts, quizzes, and useful weekly assignments (including the production of lesson plans for the future), you gain access to the world! I am now eligible to teach in South Korea, and I feel well-equipped to do so! A lot of valuable information is given in this course, and whatever is not explicitly written you can find on your own using the provided links to legitimate educational resources.

You do have to find an institution and/or people to tutor for Practicum hours on your own, but CIEE provides advice and a tutor--a real person to communicate with via video calling. CIEE also provided me with a letter as proof of enrollment during my application process for teaching abroad. All you have to do is email these people and they'll get right back to you.

The tech stuff is easy to figure out if you've been around computers, the coursework isn't at all over the head of anyone who has successfully done at least some college units, and if you're a slow reader, I'd carve 20 hours per week out of your schedule to complete the work. Through CIEE, it's not at all a grueling process to earn your TEFL certificate. :)

The lesson planning portion of the course was really helpful! It enables me to discover all the option I have for creating fun and effective lessons. Now that I'm teaching, I am avle to use the resources I practiced in my TEFL course!

During this 10 week TEFL course I developed my awareness of the field and practices of TEFL and gained a deeper understanding of the components of the English language applicable to teaching EFL. I’ve also developed appropriate lesson plans for a variety of learners to aid both their receptive and productive skills and their use of English. This course has given me the confidence to step into my classroom in Thailand. The practicum gave me first-hand experience with teaching so I could better understand what was to come.

Now I'm in Thailand teaching English to 6th grade students and I use the skills I learned from my course every day. I have an awareness of how to build my lessons in a way that brings the learners along with me to eventually create projects using the English skills I taught them. I know many games and have access to many resources to keep English learning exciting. I'm able to blend together my new learnings from the teachers here in Thailand with my understanding of TEFL theory I learned in the course. Currently, I am having a nostalgically joyous time teaching Christmas to the children in my classrooms.

The CIEE TEFL program really helped me become a successful teacher equipping me with the skills and confidence to kickstart teaching English to Thai students. I would recommend the CIEE TEFL course to anyone who is going to teach overseas.