So this could get ranty just to let ya know.
And please forgive the typos. I'm a professional Grammar Nazi - I don't do it in my free time.
I had an interview today, well a third stage of an interview process of which no one else was going for the job. Yeah I had to jump through a few hoops.
The job was to be an English teacher for a small company that offers English classes to children, teens, and adults. I thought, 'you know what, I'm more than qualified for what they're asking. I've got international teaching experience, I have my qualifications and I'm confident. I'll go for it, it's some more money in the bank to help my other work.'
So after being bombarded with emails in barely legible English (Should've been the first sign that something wasn't quite right), I went to meet the company owner. I arrived 10 minutes early, and was told that the owners weren't there and that my interview would be with 2 people - one of whom didn't speak English.
I thought it went really well, they sent me a list of classes that they would like me to take over and asked if the schedule was ok for me adda adda - AWESOME, it's in the bag.
And then I got a message saying this: 'By the way, could you come and do a demo class for us? Just 20-25 minutes'.
Not a problem, that's fairly normal, they just want to check what my teaching style is like and whether or not I can actually tach. Fair enough. I ask a few questions - what do you want me to cover, is this a new class or am I jumping in on one that's already been together for awhile, what age group, how many people, what skill level are they at? Pay attention to that last one, that's important. You can't just walk into a class of children, teens, or even adults and expect to get good response from them when you have no idea what level they're at language wise.
So the day arrives, I'm happy with my prep and what I'm going to do. I was asked to prepare a speaking activity with no notebook/writing exercises. fantastic, speaking and listening, I base my style off of that, if a student is confident in their knowledge on a subject then they're more likely to want to talk about it a little bit.
I'm sat on a a tram, half an hour into my 45 minute trip to the company and I get a text - "We want you to come later on in the day if that's ok?"
I'm not really in a position to say no am I, I haven't formally got the job and yeah, it's a pain but ok, I can wait around before going in. So I go to a cafe, grab a coffee and get on with some work before going into the office where they're based. I finally get to meet the owner and their spoken English is (thankfully) better than their written. I'm a little bit nervous, but hey, it's an interview of a sort and I'm meeting a new class.
I was told that the kids I'd be working with today were aged 10-12, fine I've worked with that age range before. Green light. They're level B1/B2 - oookaaay, those are fairly different levels, but this could still work. "By the way they are my kids".
Huh.
So my interview is teaching your children. While you are in the room. As an interview.
It really shouldn't make a difference, but if you know a parent is watching then the pressure really goes up to make sure that they're happy with what you are doing and that they're liking what you're doing. Add to that that this is still an interview, and Lil' Tom is getting a wee bit nervous.
And I quickly figure out another reason why alarm bells had started to ring - the kids are NOT nearly close to the level of English that I was told to prepare a class for. All of my activities go right out the window, which ironically enough is one of the few words that they recognise. Time for improv!
Half an hour later I release the class, 4 kids who'd had their whole afternoon of their summer holiday taken from them to sit in a room and do school work - yeah they were really happy to be there. I can't blame them though, you have to put up with kids in a bad mood sometimes, it happens.
I could carry on explaining how this was even more of a train wreck, but I've moaned on enough and this rant is going on a bit much even for me.
To end all of this, I got an email this evening saying how they were looking for an experienced teacher and not one who would need extensive training, they went on to recommend that I take a TEFL (which I already had previous to teaching internationally for 12 months). And they way they worded it I can only hope was due to their lack of English skills (they do execute Children as young as kindergarten according to one of their emails), rather than casual bitchiness.
I probably could've been more prepared of that sort of out come, maybe I should've listened to the alarm bells sooner, but I still feel like that really screwed me over for something that wasn't really my fault.
Ah well - time to write a suitably subtle bitchy email back.