You don’t need a teaching qualification to be an English Teacher to work in Korea. Not even in the universities! Just go on to daveseslcafe.com and check out the Korean jobs board. For a university job, you’ll need an MA and some experience but no teaching qualification. This never fails to surprise me. This country is full of enlightened amateurs who are crystallised in their common sense approach to teaching with no real idea what they are doing.

The enlightened amateurs are an interesting breed. Some of them are good teachers by intuition, sensitivity and self-analysis. The fact is though that the audience i.e. Korean students, their parents, school managers/owners are so uncritical and essentially undemanding that I find it difficult to see any hope of professional development here. That really is the key. In the EFL world, where the terms and conditions of the job are so poor, I’d argue that professional development is one of the few things to protect your own self-respect!

Become a blogger, read new books, talk to your friends about teaching issues, observe other teachers, volunteer to be observed. All these things you can do.

But do us all a favour and get yourself a decent qualification with observed teaching practice…