Online TEFL - I'm qualified!

I just completed my online TEFL course with i-to-i TEFL, and I thought I'd give a quick run down of it in case anyone's thinking of taking the plunge themselves.

I went all in and booked the full 125 hour course, which is the most you can do online. It broke down as follows:

60 hour basic online TEFL course
20 hour grammar awareness course
20 hour video practice course
5 x 5 hour specialist modules - large classes, limited resources, one on one, young learners, business English

I work full time, so TEFLed in the evening, and at weekends. I completed the whole course in 80 days (ten short of the 90 you're given to do so, although you can extends that if you need more time) and I could have finished it a lot quicker if I'd needed to, as some days I didn't work on the course at all.

I found the whole course really interesting and useful (although the grammar did fry my brain a little!) and would definitely recommend it. Depending on why you're TEFLing, you may decide to go for a shorter course than the full 120 hours. For instance, the 60 hour online course if a great, broad look at TEFL and would be a fab footing for someone planning on volunteer teaching, or wanting to dip their toe in the TEFL water. It covers everything from student motivation to classroom management  from vocabulary and pronunciation to mistake correction and more. You can always go back to it and add the extra hours at a later date if you want to as well. Now that I'm 125 hour qualified, I'm confident I could pick up paid teaching work overseas - especially with the help of the i-to-i TEFL Jobs Board.

Having volunteered overeseas previously, I really wish I'd done the TEFL before I headed off to my first placement. It would have enabled me to feel more confident to hit the ground running straight away and arrive with some lessons and activities planned which I knew would be a success. The course comes with lots of great resources to download and keep too, which will be invaluable the next time I do some volunteer teaching/community work.

Me with student Sangheeta, volunteering in India. 

I'm feeling really proud of myself for completing the course (it was a new year's resolution!) and also really inspired to head off and put what I've learned into action! Roll on Autumn, and my next adventures...