Celta - some questions

Hi everyone,

I would love some info about Celta from those who "survived";-)

In particular, I would like to know what one is supposed to do on a daily basis (are you given a book and asked to prepare a lesson from there or are you simply given topics? Does this happen today for tomorrow or are you given a few days to prepare?), assignments (I understand, from what I read here and on the official website, that it's 4 of them but it's not clear how the "do it again" thing works. Are you supposed to work on them during the weekend or while you're also preparing classes?)
Do students judge your work or is it only teachers?

Thanks

Take a look at the Cambridge ESL CELTA website:
Cambridge ESOL: Certificate in English Language Teaching to Adults (CELTA)
At the bottom of the page is a pdf of the course syllabus.

Every day, you'll have seminars in the morning. Over the course, you'll cover all the areas on the syllabus in your seminars.

I had 9 teaching practices, each 40 minutes long. Each of us had a TP every other day: in groups of six, three taught on one day, and three the other day. We watched and evaluated each other. (After each TP, you write up your feedback on your teaching then bring it in to discuss in a group the next morning.)

On days when you're not teaching, you're planning lessons. There were 11 people on my CELTA course. Almost every one of us needed a whole evening - and a bit more then next morning - to prepare a single lesson. (Planning gets a lot faster once you're teaching 25 lessons a week in a language school, thankfully!)

On my course, we were given a textbook and told which chapter the group would use. Then, as a group, we had to decide who would teach which material, making sure each of us taught at least one lesson for each of the four skills, plus vocab, grammar, and possibly collocations lessons.

You also observe more experienced teachers several times during the course. There's a task for each observation.

There are four assignments, which will keep you busy during the evenings and weekends that you're not planning lessons or writing feedback. Some of the other CELTA trainees in my group failed an assignment. If I remember rightly, they had one day to bring it up to pass standard (and couldn't get a better mark than a pass on that piece).

Be prepared to drop everything in your life except eating and sleeping a little over the four weeks of the course. I was getting up at 6am and arriving at the school early to do some work before the teaching started - and studying at break and lunch times - and going straight home at the end of each day to work until going to bed at about 1am.

Two guys on the course didn't work that hard, but the other nine did. Of those two, one only avoided failing by doing an extra teaching practice on the last afternoon; and the other had been teaching for four-and-a-half years before doing his CELTA.

As I said, you evaluate yourself, and the other students evaluate you too - but the judgments that go towards your grade come from your CELTA trainers. Basically, they have a big list of competencies they're looking for you to demonstrate, and they tick them off as you go through the course. You have to pass every criterion.

"Do students judge your work or is it only teachers?"

Not sure what you mean here, as there are "students" who you will teach on your course and you will also be a student of sorts (I prefer the term trainee to avoid confusion). You will also be a teacher, so I also prefer the term trainer for the people who teach you.

Your students won't be asked to judge you, although you can always ask them how they thought a lesson went. Your fellow trainees will be asked to give you feedback on your classes in order to help you and to work on their own powers of lesson analysis, but they won't be asked to make an overall judgement on how things went and the trainers will make their judgements on your marks without any influence from the trainees.

i want request letter for salary increment

Hello,

I am half way through the celta
the lesson quality they demand from us has increased. I borderline passed on one of them

When teaching a grammar lesson to upper int- The tutor said I never siad my context right. I did not understand what he was saying even after he explained it to me.

please can someone tell me what a context is and how to set one properly.

thanks

cotext in language classroom refers to the real life situation that is to be created by ELT teacher in order to provide the real experience to learners. In orther words , it's the way the teacher of English leads the learner to area of the teaching world by presentig the intended aspect through very common examples which the learnes have passed through.Therefore,context is the familiar situation to the learner in order to internalise the aspect of learning.
Thank You.

I started my CELTA in June but had to defer it until October as my wife had a baby.

We were given Elementary in weeks 1 and 2 then Intermediate at weeks 3 and 4. I managed to get through four TP sessions (with one more left).

When I return I will do one more TP at elementary level. Then hand in assignment 2 (focus on learner) and then do assignment 3 on the weekend, as well as prepare for teaching intermediate on monday (weeks 3 through till 4).

I found the CELTA to be ridiculously intense with no real emphasis given on that during the application process.

I have two tutors and i find one to be really stuck-up (possibly racist), very critical and not very supportive in general. As a result of this i really struggled with my first two weeks and failed assignment 1. I managed to resubmit it but wont be suprised when i go back if i am told that i failed after resubmission. I am going to hand in assignment 2 when i return but am expecting to fail that as well (despite getting help from people who have the CELTA qualification).

Although I struggle with grammar i feel that support during the CELTA (in particular with my lessons and assignments) was virtually non-existent. I know from friends who have a CELTA that they did not receive such problems as I did (in terms of support).

My advice, try and sit-in on a celta course for a day or two to see what its like. It will give you a chance to speak with students currently on the course and get their opinions (on the centre and the CELTA tutors). Most good centres shouldnt have a problem with this (since their making lots of money from people like you).

I wish i did the CELTA part time, it would have been so much more manageable for me!