CELTA experience

Hello everybody! I can finally give meaning to my blog by telling you about my CELTA intensive course experience!
I have recently decided to take the course in order for me to continue the ESL teacher career path. The reasons I took this were:

• I want to improve myself as an English teacher
• I want to gain more observed practice experience 
• I need an internationally recognized teacher diploma to work in other countries
• I want to travel to the Middle East to find a job as an ESL teacher
• I needed a new challenge in my life and this is definitely the one!

For those who do not know what CELTA is here is the website for the clarification. Basically it represents the minimum requirement all language academies, private and certain public schools ask for when they are seeking a new English teacher. There is another Cambridge title all professors might want to get their hands on, it is called DELTA. Unfortunately, one need to complete a two year teaching practice and have Celta in order to be qualified for the Delta. 

Basically, my course started today and it is going to finish on the 26th of September. 

I have done a lot of research before paying for the course, because let me tell you, it is not cheap! I paid 1450 euros for mine but you can find cheaper ones or even more expensive ones depending on the country you choose to take it in. I am taking mine in Valencia, Spain, the same city I have completed my Master's Degree in Computational Linguistics. The academy I am with is named Campbell College and the two guide teachers and amazingly professional. 

Till now so far so good! I have been warned that lesson preparations and homework would take me up all night, but hey! it is 12 a.m. and I have just finished two lps and a some language analysis exercise...

Yes, it is tiring and overwhelming but it is so worth it! 

We are 12 students-teachers in the class and we were divided into two groups in order to have our teacher practice more organized and maybe because the classes are so small we wouldn't have fit all in one room :) Imagine 12 teachers in the same tighten place with another 8 students...funny. Actually I have no idea why they split us like that but I guess they have a good reason for it. 

On the first day, which is today, the guide teachers gave us working material like white board markers, post-its, correction tape, clips, some elastics, some white cards, glue and some other sticking material THAT I sincerely do not comprehend its usage,but I will shortly find out. We have also received a very thick portfolio with blank pages for us to fill in. The portfolio is divided into these chapters: ADMINISTRATION, INPUT METHODOLOGY, TEACHING PRACTICE, LESSON PLANS, LESSON EVALUATION, WRITTEN ASSIGNMENTS, OBSERVATION TASKS OBSERVATION OF EXPERIENCED TEACHERS. So there you have it, more or less you got a hint of what I will go through during the following 4 weeks. The word for it is INTENSE.

I will call it a night, even though I wished to have written more about this amazing first day but hopefully I will get back to you in the following days!