TEFL

Name: Shelly Whelan

Age: 28

Primary degree: BA Geography with Media and Communications, UL (2004)

Postgraduate degrees: Postgraduate Diploma in Public Relations and Event Management, the Fitzwilliam Institute, Dublin (2005); TEFL, i-to-i (2005); Postgraduate Diploma in Education, University College Cork (2007)

I spent the third year of my BA overseas at Loyola University in Chicago and loved it. The experience whetted my appetite for living and working abroad, so after I completed my postgraduate course at the Fitzwilliam Institute I felt the time was right to go overseas once more before settling into a permanent job.

I liked the idea of working abroad because I wanted to travel and needed to be able to support myself financially while I was away. A friend of mine had recently done a TEFL course with i-to-i and really enjoyed it. I thought that this might be a good option for me and decided to give it a go. I sent off a CV and covering letter, and once I'd been accepted, I embarked on 80 hours of training (which was the maximum you could do at the time). Most of this was done online but the course also included a 20-hour classroom-based weekend session. The training was comprehensive and covered lesson planning, grammar, games and classroom management as well as teaching practice.

I wanted to go to Asia, so once I'd successfully acquired my TEFL qualification i-to-i forwarded my details onto a Thai in-country agent who approached schools on my behalf. It wasn't long before I was offered a position in Pranarai High School, Lopburi, about an hour and a half north east of Bangkok. I was thrilled to accept.

I'd never been to a Thai restaurant before, let alone Asia, and when I first landed in Bangkok I was hit by a wall of heat and culture shock. But I was met by a friendly i-to-i representative at the airport who collected me and took me straight to Lopburi, which was incredibly reassuring.

I started work the day after I arrived, which was a little daunting initially, especially as I was the only Western teacher at the school. But I was well looked after by both my colleagues and the i-to-i representative, and once I was introduced to the English dept and shown the ropes I quickly settled in. For my first few lessons a teacher sat in on my classes for support. I also had an i-to-i coordinator who I spoke to every week or two to let him know how I was getting on. Over the next few months more TEFL teachers began to arrive in Lopburi and we quickly built up a little community, and also befriended the locals.

Bringing language to life

My school was fairly sizable, with around 800 children aged between 12 and 17 years old. My job as a TEFL teacher was to teach a general programme of English, maths and science that brought the English language to life. The students also had these subjects in Thai, but my responsibility was to coach them in English. In fact I wasn't allowed to speak in any other language in classes. I tried to make the lessons as interactive as possible and often I'd theme them, by clothes and colours for example, and then try and link the lessons together. Fun and creativity was an integral part of my lesson plans.

I spent six months teaching in Lopburi in total and I absolutely loved my time there. In fact I loved it so much that I decided to forget about my plans for a career in PR in favour of becoming a professional teacher back in Ireland, and before I left Thailand I applied to do a postgraduate diploma in education at University College Cork. It was a complete change from my original plans, but I knew I was doing the right thing – my experience as a TEFL teacher opened up a real passion for teaching, and I have never looked back.

Back in Ireland I taught in the mornings at a secondary school in Midleton while I completed my postgraduate diploma in 2007. I'm currently a secondary school teacher at a school in Cork where I teach geography, religious studies and drama. For me it's a great mix of subjects.

I would recommend TEFL teaching to anyone who is interested in combining work and travel and who's got the slightest interest in teaching. It's a wonderful way to experience another country, and it just might turn into the beginnings of a great career.