I originally decided to take the CELTA certification course to render myself more employable. Last year, because of my wife’s work, we could have been transferred to any part of Italy and I felt I needed to have a wider skill base than what I had at the moment. I figured that if I would have difficulty finding work in a small town at least I could teach English. She ended up being assigned to Busto Arsizio so we actually didn’t move to far.
The day was structured in two parts: Input Sessions and Teaching Practice. During the morning input sessions we learned all about the CELTA method for teaching and all of us learned a lot about the English language as a whole. In the afternoon Teaching Practices we were able to apply what we had learned along the way with students of different levels.
There were nine other candidates taking the course with me and we each taught 10 lessons of varying time length. The first being only 25 minutes and the last being 60 minutes. We were divided up into two groups and my group started out teaching the “Pre-Intermediate” level students. During the second half of the course we taught “Upper-Intermediate” level students. After each lesson we taught we had a group critique and received a written evaluation from our tutors.
What had started out as something to do out of necessity ended up rekindling my desire to return to the classroom and teach. I did not realize how much I missed teaching and interacting with students.