Teaching internship & TEFL Certification (Thailand, Vietnam, Europe, China, India)

I loved the week-long trip to Yangshuo! I really enjoyed preparing the class for the end-of-year performance. It has made me a lot more confident and has allowed me to be put outside of my comfort zone. The best thing about the experience was making new friends along the way. I now have new friends both in China and in the UK. Meeting some great friends and getting to visit Asia for the 1st time. I met and the different groups of children I had the pleasure of teaching. All of the Chinese teachers were so interesting and helped me learn lots about Chinese culture. The children were active and enthusiastic in all the lessons, and it was very rewarding watching their English improve over the course of the summer school. It has given me confidence in moving abroad and working in Asia.

Being able to travel around at the weekends were a highlight, and I also loved getting to know my class. By the end of my trip, we had visited the attractions multiple times, and so the novelty of them had worn off. This was perhaps something I would change. We were taken around the outdoor activities and told to listen to the narration given by the guides, so that we could speak to the children about the attractions. We couldn't understand the speaker, so when we went round the places with the students, we weren't able to discuss it with them. Visiting China was amazing, and I would absolutely love to go back. The experience give fascinating insight into Chinese culture which, and the experience of teaching was also very enjoyable. Yangshou was a stunning place to live and was probably the highlight of my placement. I have never been somewhere so beautiful, and being able to spend time there and get to know the city was amazing.

My favorite memory of my trip was when my host family brought me to a small village outside of town. We climbed a mountain before dawn in order to watch the sunrise. It was truly spectacular to see the sun rise over the rugged terrain. My favorite memory of my trip was when my host family brought me to a small village outside of town. We climbed a mountain before dawn in order to watch the sunrise. It was truly spectacular to see the sun rise over the rugged terrain. I think the experience made me a much more worldly person and truly opened me up to traveling more places. The idea of going to China by myself was initially daunting, but now I don't feel intimidated by traveling to far away places on my own. The best thing was the relationships I made with the people there. I am excited to stay in touch with them and hope to travel back and visit again.

My school had a few excursions (such as a museum and the cinema) and a water fight, which proved fun as you could bond with the children without having to stress over improvements to your lesson (it mainly involved me playing with them and therefore acting like a child). The first proper day in Yangshuo was nice as it involved everyone on the programme doing the same activities together (visiting a cave and mud-bath, swimming in an outdoor pool, and bathing in a hot spring, where in my school we were split into groups who couldn't see each other often. For me the main highlight was the water fight, as I could fight back against the kids without having to worry about hurting them. Every kid I taught, aimed (successfully) to get me, and I initially got them when they were filling up their pistols to begin. Another was during a day where the kids visited a farm near the outskirts of Guangzhou, in the afternoon while watching some of the class to climb a ladder, some of the kids taught me a little bit of Mandarin (it helped their English as they had to explain what the word meant) and were excited when I wrote the character correctly. It definitely helped me to adapt and use my initiative, as we were given a timetable with vague headings that we were supposed to plan (including resources) and create lessons out of. In the beginning, we had to plan a lot and our plans would not cover the entire lesson, so we would have to think of activities for the children to do during the lesson, in case our lessons were too short. Another thing is confidence as we were supposed to behave in a certain way to maintain the kids? attention, so initially we had to front confidence, which grew throughout time. I found that the ?culture shock? had no negative impact on me, in fact the opposite. Every day, I spent there I felt that I was learning something, not only about teaching, but the way that the culture works: such as the good restaurants are the small ones that I would avoid in England, and that you don?t have to be fluent in a language to survive in that nation (though I would advise learning it) that I couldn't learn in the UK, so that I can apply these lessons in the future and further understand other cultures.

Before this trip, I had been dealing with a long bout of depression and this trip really helped me out of it. My kids, the people I met and the love I got from all of them is the dearest thing from the trip. Just the enthusiasm of the children to learn from somebody who didn't even speak their language was heartening. The overall experience reminded me that the world is too big for my worries to not get lost in. All the wonderful people I had the chance of meeting. Personally I found the most enjoyable part of this experience was to see how quickly I made friends, grew new habits, and actually ended up feeling like home in Quanzhou. I had expected a big culture shock, but it was quite the opposite for me: I made several good Chinese friends, loved the food, and even found a good coffee shop - the only Western thing I can't give up on!

The students were really kind and funny and I enjoyed feeling independent and adventurous. I saw really interesting sights that were very different from my home. My best experience was renting a moped in Yangshuo and driving around the countryside and seeing Waterbuffalo. My school did not have a lot of organized activities and had no excursions or outdoor activities. There seemed to be poor organization. They mostly left me to myself. The best activity was a Chinese cooking lesson. It improved my confidence and perspective as well as gave me experience travelling abroad on my own. It improved my maturity and ability to command a room and instruct students. Helped me to navigate travelling on my own and dealing with unfamiliar situations. The overall uniqueness and adventure of the experience pushed me out of my comfort zone and forced me to challenge myself, I saw how people live outside the US and it gave me a better understanding of how things work beyond my small realm of past experiences. As well as the friendliness of the Chinese people and that you never knew what each day could hold.

I think the satisfaction of seeing the kids achieve things they were afraid to do and building their confidence over the week was something really enjoyable. Being able to take part in these activities with them and participating in their fun, whilst also seeing them learn and grow was something amazing.

For me personally, the friendships I made have been really memorable and spending time in a place where camp culture is really strong was a very enjoyable experience. At Camp Greenwoods it was mainly outdoor activities - seeing the kids confidence grow just in the short space of a week was amazing.

It was also really fun to be able to participate in all the activities that we don't really have the opportunity to do at home. I think that this whole experience has helped me grow as a person. I've learnt to become more patient, and I feel as though my confidence grew over the 4 weeks as well. By the end of it I was leading a couple of activities and was really able to connect with the kids, which I think is what helped my confidence. Working with kids of a different cultural background has also helped me become more understanding as you begin to learn to appreciate the different ways in which people react to things and the different ways in which they learn. The best thing was definitely the people. Both the staff, foreign and Chinese, as well as the kids, made this experience one of my most memorable. The directors of the camp were very welcoming and open, and the staff all became really good friends. It made for a very fun environment to work in and a place that really helped you grow as a person.

The teachers took us on days out each week and showed us the most amazing places that we wouldn't have known to explore otherwise. However, the highlight was travelling to Yanshuo after the teaching was finished. Getting to know the children and what they enjoyed meant that the lessons became more and more fun each time, as I knew exactly how to keep their interest. To begin with, my classes changed each week which made it hard to connect with my students, but once I was given a permanent class the whole experience became much more enjoyable. It has helped me to gain the confidence to teach and travel to other countries across the world, and through it I have made lifelong friends both in China and back home in England. Travelling to Yangshuo at the end and exploring it on motorbikes.