I teach English online, AMA

[17111180a]

Inspired by a thread about the difficulties of finding work from home jobs. No one on the thread mentioned online teaching! BJT is 8 hours ahead of the UK so I teach mornings in the UK. Happy to answer any questions.

How old are you and what sort of accent do you have? What is your teaching 'uniform' and are you fully made up with styled hair or do you have more of a 'natural' look.

Obviously this has nothing to do with your teaching ability but I get the impression from what you say that appearances are not only really important but that the parents are looking for a certain style?

I’m 43 and got offered a job with iTutor. I haven’t taken it up as I needed to buy a ed branded T-shirt and some sort of red screen for behind me. As well as a halo light.

I felt like anyone with an ounce of confidence and some semblance of teaching simple language concepts would have been offered the job.

I haven’t taken it up yet.

I’m Scottish and sound Scottish.

Sorry if you've already answered this.. What are the hours like? Do you have to work at say 2am to meet international hours?

Please ignore my post. I see you said you teach mornings.

I'm in my 30s and yes, we're expected to wear makeup :) For many American teachers, the time is 6am and it's necessary to hide that fact somehow! I have a fairly neutral British accent (deconstructed during TESOL training!) but there are plenty of Irish and Australian teachers around. I don't know how they feel about Scottish accents. I've seen a company specify 'No Midland accents' but it would take a discerning parent to notice. Many Chinese parents prefer an American accent so we're at a disadvantage that way.

No matter how you look, if you're working for a tough academic company, poor evaluations will come back to haunt you. Looking presentable and attractive is an advantage but the teaching has to be of a high quality to get into companies where the pay is better.

Atalune itutorgroup is often seen as a 'second' company - the hours are more flexible and spontaneous, the pay is lower and its useful to fill slots that are unfilled elsewhere. It's a good bridge to a better company and many people love it because it's big and not difficult to get into. It is standard to need good lighting (haven't heard of anyone demanding a halo though) and a decent background. Whales doesn't require a specific colour of top but most companies do. The great advantage is being able to wear pj bottoms though :) Some companies ask you to buy a certain top and compensation is included in your first paycheck.

Someone on here on a 'how much do you earn thread' recommended iTutorgroup (she was earning £30 per hour) and I looked up a few demo videos. Despite the claim of only native English speaking teachers there was one who most definitely was not and made very basic grammatical mistakes. The children she was trying to teach seemed not to understand a single word either, it seemed so tiring. It really put me off them. I'm gutted about the makeup rule!

housing The makeup think is an expectation rather than a black and white rule. No one has said 'you must wear makeup'. We're just encouraged to look 'well' and there's a tutorial on how to do that (involving makeup).

I'd be amazed if anyone is giving too many £30 an hour lessons at itutor. Good for her.

The lessons do look like a tiring curfuffle from the outside. However as a teacher you can see what growth is slowing taking place. Teaching in the target language is a bit like raising a toddler. You know what they understand but can't replicate yet, and what would represent growth for that student, eg, better pronunciation of a tricky sound, ability to blend two sounds, use a more complex sentence frame, different tense, new vocabulary word, slightly more fluency in sight words, sudden ability to formulate a simple question, first use of a sentence to formulate a original idea. If you're looking in as a native speaker, you would just see lots of attempts to elicit and some mistakes. The teacher is listening to what is improving which makes it much more meaningful. It's quite technical too, which isn't obvious.

@17111180a sorry that this is a few months later, but just trying to find out, what would I do do you think in the school holidays etc when I can't teach during the day due to having my children around? We may both lose our jobs, but if DH's goes back to normal hours one day (in a few years), he'll be gone around 4 - 5 days in a row and I won't have childcare for the school holidays for those days. Do you think it would be possible to still teach online somehow with longer days "off" during summertime etc?

What are your working hours? And what days do you do?

Have you found any discrimination if you are not white? I have previously applied to teach English abroad at a well known organisation and was asked how would I deal with comments from students that I was not white. I have spoken to Chinese families who say they prefer a white tutor as they feel that they are more authentic when learning English which has always put me off (and I am born and bred in England and have an English degree!)