23 Jun From YL to Delta 1 and Beyond into Academic Management: The Most Comprehensive Portfolio of Online Courses for Busy High-flying Language Teachers

Author: Ilinca Stroe

A teacher who wants to keep developing needs to keep on learning – it’s common knowledge. Only by continuing to learn can we keep abreast of the latest developments in our field, avoid getting complacent and stagnating in an uninspiring comfort zone, keep alive our curiosity, creativity and enthusiasm for the job and for our students.

But balancing full-time teaching and studying can be quite tricky. Will your work timetable allow you to attend a training programme, too? Will you have enough energy left, after a day’s teaching, to focus on performing learning tasks? Will your commitment to your teaching job make room for extra commitment to a professional development project? No matter how badly you need continued development (and perhaps those additional teaching qualifications too), these are serious questions to ask yourself before embarking on a further learning venture.

Well, International House World Organisation, one of the most reputable language education providers globally, might just have the right answer to some of those questions. One of the few teaching networks that set up an Online Teacher Training Institute (OTTI), IH World runs online courses for which

ü you do not have to attend live classes,

ü you do not have to study at fixed hours,

ü you do not have to block a certain time slot for study every single day.

That’s because all the OTTI courses are asynchronous, meaning you design your own study schedule daily, accessing the input material at a time of your choice, and choosing to perform the tasks given in the order you find convenient, whether it’s a 10-minute contribution to a forum discussion or a two-hour written assignment. Besides, the OTTI courses cover a remarkable range of training topics and are suitable for teachers of English and other languages at various points in their career and with various career goals and interests.

1) Courses for (prospective) teachers of young learners.

• IH Certificate in Teaching Very Young Learners gets you ready in 10 weeks to work with learners of English aged 3 to 5, using approaches that include storytelling, songs and games, and equipping you with solid classroom management techniques.
• IH Online Course in Teaching Young Learners and Teenagers trains you for 8 weeks in how to give online classes to young learners aged 6-17, how to teach the four skills effectively, how to correct mistakes, how to prepare exciting tasks and materials, etc.

2) Courses for teachers seeking specialisation.

• How to Teach IELTS shows you in just 4 weeks how to help your students be successful in the exam’s 4 papers. You will get not just exam teaching skills, but also more than 30 ideas of activities and techniques to best prepare your students for IELTS.
• Introduction to Teaching CLIL lasts 4 weeks and trains you to teach maths, science, geography or another school subject in English, as part of Content and Language Integrated Learning.
• IH Teaching One-to-One prepares you in 4 weeks to teach great face-to-face and online individual classes. You will learn about the dynamics of this type of class, how to maintain motivation, how to select/create engaging materials, what online tools to use.
• IH Certificate in Online Tutoring helps you become the teacher/teacher trainer working with learners from wherever in the world in Virtual Learning Environments. You will learn about the best apps to be used for both synchronous and asynchronous teaching.
• IH Certificate in Teaching Business English equips you over 14 weeks with key business knowledge and the best methodologies to teach professional business topics. You will learn to conduct needs analysis, to teach language via charts and graphs, etc.
• IH Certificate in Advanced Methodology is a 15-week Cambridge-moderated post-CELTA and pre-DELTA teaching awareness booster which strongly enhances your theoretical knowledge, your practical teaching ability and your self-analysis skills.
• Delta 1 Exam Technique Preparation Course takes two months to fully prepare you to successfully pass the Delta Module 1 examination. You will get familiar with each exam task, revise key terminology and get advice as to how to give the best answers.

3) Courses for more experienced teachers seeking promotion.

• IH Director of Studies Course familiarises you in 13 weeks with a DoS’s job responsibilities, from recruitment to conducting observations and appraisals, so that you can feel confident, competent and in control acting as an academic manager.
• IH Teacher Trainer Certificate spans 12 weeks during which you acquire the basics of teacher training and key corresponding techniques, learn how to develop training sessions, and find out about the most relevant technologies in the training world.

4)  Courses for managers in an academic context.

There are 7 such courses available at OTTI, each lasting 6 weeks and covering one of the following management topics:

• Teams and Communication
• Customer Service
• Observation and Giving Feedback
• Business Management
• Performance Management
• Managing Change
• Managing a Young Learner Centre

The participants who successfully complete a total of 5 such courses are awarded an IHWO Diploma in Academic Management.

Add to these qualification courses for (prospective) teachers of English, German or French as a secondary language, which initiate you in the most efficient methodologies for teaching those languages, and a 6-week Action Research Course which teaches you how to carry out research on language-related topics – all, available on request.

Which item of this very generous offer suits you best? Choose based on what you aim to accomplish next in your teaching career. And if you want more support, advice and even encouragement for your continued professional development through the OTTI, please do not hesitate to get in touch with us: +40 751 130 096 / celta@ih.ro. We look forward to assisting you!

International House Bucharest runs regular online and face-to-face IHCYLT, CELTA and DELTA courses for teachers of English at its Teacher Training Centre, as well as training events online, onsite or at partner locations. To sign up for a course or event, contact celta@ih.ro.