Opening Doors

I chose International TEFL Academy because I was already in the Heredia area and wanted to find a way to stay there. I decided that English teaching sounded like a good option, so I did a quick google search and realized that the best school in Costa Rica was a 10 minute bus ride away from my house! I signed up for the next available class online in just a few minutes, and waited for the date to roll around.

The class was much harder than I expected it to be, but it was worth it. The schedule was intense, but the pressure created a family environment with my fellow students and our teachers. We saw each other every day, lesson planned, ate lunch, went to festival, and taught together for four weeks. I still talk to two of my classmates regularly, and have the others on Facebook. I know that the others keep in contact as well, because I can see their Facebook interactions! hah!
Aside from making great friends, I learned a lot in this course. It was literally a crash course in TEFL for me, as I decided to take it on a whim. However, I felt completely prepared to teach English by the end of the four weeks. We focused a lot on the grammar concepts, which I really liked. As native speakers, we don't realize why we say things the way we do, so it was nice to have a review. This made it easier to teach the material to my students. We also focused on real-world teaching experience, which I loved. I was super nervous before every class, but once class started I sailed through it. The variety of ages and levels presented in our student demographics helped me to learn which group I prefer to teach.

I'm now in Granda, Nicaragua, working as a TEFL teacher with over 250 kids in two different schools. I have twenty classes a week, and it's a bit like living in a tornado -- you never know what will come flying at you next. My coworkers have taken other TEFL courses, but none of them felt as prepared as I did to teach in the especially challenging Latin American public school system. I'm thankful that I happened to be in the right place at the right time and received a wonderful TEFL education.