Wishing you all the best for a spectacular 2012
filled with joy, laughter, and happiness.

I have helped to recruit teachers for a number of schools and over time have received hundreds of resumés and application letters. This post will deal with some of the most common mistakes I have seen people make.  Some of these mistakes may just be minor inconveniences for the recruiter, but some of them may cause a recruiter to delete your application right away.

Mistake #1:
Using poor English

The spelling and grammar you use in your application tells a recruiter a lot about you.  See my previous post How to NOT get a job as English Teacher for an example of a horribly composed cover letter.  Sure, that cover letter is an extreme example of poor English language skills, but as an English teacher looking for a job, you won’t be given too much room for bad English.  You will be judged by your spelling and grammar more than for most other jobs.  Make sure you double check the language in your resumé and cover letter.

Mistake #2:
Adding too many attachments

The purpose of your initial e-mail or online submission is NOT to get the job. The purpose is to open the doors and get to the second step in the recruitment process: the job interview.

All too often, applicants send e-mails with way too many attachments. I’ve processed application e-mails that had a whopping 20 MB worth of documents attached: in addition to the required resumé, they’ve included copies of their passport and even drivers license as well as all their degrees, diplomas, and certificates. In addition, some of those applicants felt compelled to send numerous photos of themselves in various school settings. Not only do such attachments take valuable disk-space on a recruiter’s computer, they also slow down incoming mail drastically.  Your first e-mail to a recruiter should only contain your resumé with photo and a cover letter. If it is compelling enough, you’ll get to the next step in the hiring process and will be asked to show your qualifying documents.

Mistake #3:
Assuming your e-mail and your resumé will stay together

I have seen many resumés that didn’t include an e-mail address and/or a telephone number. This information was only on the cover letter or in the e-mail body.  I can only assume that the applicant thought that the e-mail and the attached documents would forever stay together. They often don’t. Recruiters often save resumés on their hard drive and either archive or even delete the original e-mail (especially if they are several megabytes in size).  If a recruiter later opens your e-mail and they don’t find your contact information on the resumé, they will either have to look for the original e-mail to contact you — or worse, they simply won’t contact you.  I can’t stress enough how important it is to include your contact details (phone and e-mail) on your resumé.

Mistake #4:
Attaching your resumé in an uncommon format

Do not send your resumé or other attachments in an unusual format, like Open Office’s .odt or Apple’s .pages. Recruiters often aren’t all that computer literate and if they can’t open an attachment, they often ignore your application rather than contacting you to resend it in a format they can open. Also, do not attach your resumé as an image file (jpg, png, gif). Recruiters sometimes copy information from your resumé and paste it into their database. This is not possible with an image file and a recruiter will have type in your information. In such a situation, some will opt to just ignore your application. The best format for your document is PDF, because it’s readable across computer platforms (Windows, Mac OS, and Linux). Alternatively, a Word file (.doc or .docx) will work as well. 

Mistake #5:
Not giving your resumé a meaningful name

The most common file names I see for resumés is either “CV” or “resume”.  Recruiters typically save your document on their computer’s disk and this will require them to spend extra time adding your name to the file. A good way to save your resumé is to put your first and last name in file name of your resumé. For example “JohnSmith_CV” or “Resume_JohnSmith” or any other document name that will include your first and last name..

Mistake #6:
Submitting your application repeatedly

Don’t submit your resumé several times for the same job – it makes you look desperate, impatient, and pushy.  Trust that your submission made it the first time.  If you don’t hear back immediately (or at all), your resumé might not have matched the criteria of the recruiter.  If you do want to send it a second time, wait four or five days and then send it to the recruiter again with a note that you didn’t hear back from them and want to make sure they’ve received your resumé.  If you still don’t hear back from them, it’s safe to assume that they are not interested.

Mistake #7:
Assuming recruiters won’t look at your Facebook profile

Try this experiment: enter your e-mail address on Google as a search term.  You might be surprised at all the results you’re getting. The top links often include a link to your Facebook, Twitter, and Google+ profiles. Now imagine that a recruiter is doing the same thing when they receive your application. Whenever I’m helping out recruiting teachers, I do a quick search for all the candidates that have made it to the short list.  I’ve just recently removed a candidate from the short list and added their resumé to the much larger stack of rejected applications because they listed their languages on Facebook as “English, Drunk, and Gibberish”. This just sends the wrong signal to a recruiter. What may be funny to your friends may be a red flag to a recruiter.

Whenever you are looking for a job, prepare your documents and then step back and look at them through the eyes of a recruiter. Put yourself into their position of having to sift through hundred(s) of applications and do anything you can to simplify things for them while at the same time putting your best foot forward.

Good luck on your search for a suitable home for your teaching talents!

A question I often get when I talk with people interested in teaching English in Thailand is “Do I need to be able to speak Thai to be effective as a teacher?”

My answer to them is a resounding “No.”

When I went through my TEFL training, I was taught to never use the local language in the classroom. I fully agree with this advice.

I’ve discussed this point with many foreign English teachers. Those who speak some Thai and use it in the classroom defend their position by saying: “Using English in the classroom saves a lot of time. How could I possibly explain some of the things in English when the students don’t speak it all that well yet?”  I always wonder if those teacher have considered that they may be teaching above their student’s level?

A poll at Ajarn Forums back in 2005 resulted in 54 % of teachers saying “Yes, it makes a huge differene,”  23 % of teachers saying “It helps, but it’s not a big deal,” and 23 % of teachers saying “No, it makes almost no difference.”

To be clear, I highly recommend learning to speak Thai fluently to anybody who lives in Thailand. I also agree that it will make a huge difference for English teachers to speak the language well. You will not only be able to build better relationships with your Thai colleagues, but also understand what your students are gossiping about…

Nevertheless, I hold on to my opinion that Thai should not be used in the classroom.  Here is why: as I wrote in “Why do kids learn languages so easily?”  research suggests that learning words by inference is more powerful than just being told their meaning. In other words, refraining from speaking Thai in the classroom forces your students to use different muscles in their brain. They will discover the meaning of a word based on your pictures, drawings, realia, gestures, and descriptions.  Sure, it is a bit more work for you, but the results will speak for themselves, and will make you a better teacher in the long run.

Children have an uncanny talent for learning languages.  The younger they are, the faster they seem to acquire a language.  Just by playing around with others, kids add vocabulary at an astonishing rate.  In a 2007 study, which was just made available on the internet, Meredith Brinster found at least part of the answer: Kids figure out words for themselves.

This has the potential to drastically shift how we view language education and our role in the classroom.

Meredith Brinster’s original research suggests that learning words by inference is more powerful than just being told their meaning. Interested in how very young children learn to attach the names of objects to the objects themselves, Brinster designed a study to measure which word-learning strategy was more effective: direct instruction, in which an adult “directly” points to and names an unfamiliar object, or inference, in which kids use reason (such as process of elimination) to mentally “fasten” an unfamiliar word to an unfamiliar object.

Although Brinster’s research was done with 3-year olds, it is most likely true for learners of any age.  What does this mean for English teachers in Thailand? Design activities in which students can discover the meaning of words and immediately use them in context, rather than telling your students the meaning, or worse, give a translation.

Read the full article on the Science Daily website.

Good News for English teachers in Thailand.  Bangkok Post today ran an article about the need for Thai’s to learn languages to keep competitive with other South East Asian nations.

Thai students have been urged to improve their English and also learn a third language so they can compete with people from other Southeast Asian nations when the region becomes a single economic community of more than 600 million people in 2015.

Sakkarin Niyomsilpa, a demographic expert at Mahidol University’s Institute for Population and Social Research (IPSR), said Thailand’s weakness was its language limitations, especially in English. He said Filipino labourers could speak better English than Thais, giving them a much better chance of getting hired in other countries.

It was now time for Thai students to improve their English and learn a third language such as Vietnamese, Bahasa, Japanese or Korean, he added.

Read the full article

Teaching English in Thailand is a uniquely rewarding way for native English speakers to make a living in Thailand. Here are five tips to help you enjoy your job even more and gain respect from your Thai peers and your students:

Understand Thai Culture

This is not just a tip from me, but a requirement by the Teacher’s Council of Thailand for anybody who wants to teach in a Thai school. Thai culture is quite different from Western culture. Knowing a thing or two about Thai culture will not only help you build rapport with your students and Thai colleagues, it will also help you minimize the risk of putting your foot in your mouth. Get informed about the monarchy, religion, customs, and general beliefs. There is a lot of information available online and the mandatory 20-hour Culture course will ensure that you have a basic understanding of Thai culture. My previous post “The Culture of Thailand” may serve as a starting point.

Plan Your Lessons Well

This one is especially important for people without much experience teaching in Thailand yet.  It is recommended to print out a lesson plan, including a board layout for your planned topic, even if you are a seasoned teacher. Your Thai colleagues highly appreciate it because you appear well prepared and they can learn from your lessons at a different level. You also will make it easy for any teacher who may need to substitute for you, since they know exactly what you intended to teach your students. Your lesson plan doesn’t have to be a literary work; a few simple bullet points outlining the topic and aim of your lesson, the new vocabulary taught, and the exercises and games used to reinforce the material will do the trick.

Dress Appropriately

In Thailand, people care a lot about looks and this is especially important for a teacher.  Teachers are held in very high respect and not dressing appropriately will have a negative impact on that perception. I have seen teachers coming to work with old, torn pants, which were held together at the seams with safety pins. No kidding! I have seen female teachers entering a classroom in pink plastic flip-flops as if they were on a vacation. They didn’t look professional and guess what? They had more trouble managing the classroom as their peers who were dressed appropriately.

Have a look at my previous post “Dress Code for Teachers in Thailand“, which describes what is considered appropriate clothing for English teachers in Thailand.

Do Not Speak Thai in the Classroom

Some teachers keep insisting that they need to speak Thai in the classroom to explain some concepts as it would take too long trying to do it without the use of Thai. I respectfully disagree for several reasons:

• Students need to use different muscles in the brain to understand something without translation.
• If you are in the need of explaining something and can’t do it with pictures, drawings, and realia, you most likely are teaching something too complex and above the students’ comprehension level.
• Unless you’re speaking Thai perfectly, you will most likely make a fool of yourself with wrong pronunciation and perhaps even wrong usage of some words. Students will at the least laugh at you (even if just silently) and at worst will be confused about what exactly you are trying to explain to them.

If you struggle with the idea of not using any Thai in the classroom, imagine how you would teach a room full of mixed nationalities. There is no way you could speak all of the languages present and would have to find a way to convey the meaning of words without translation. It may require a bit more planning to prepare flash cards with images and drawings or to find real objects to bring to the classroom, but will be worth the effort. The end result will be a more interesting and entertaining lesson, which will lead to a higher retention of your taught material..

Make it FUN!

This one is a no-brainer. You will capture and keep the attention of your students when you make your lessons fun. It seems very easy to entertain students in a typical Thai classroom. They love the slapstick variety of humor and a few funny gestures and facial expressions will get you a long way. If you use flash cards, put one of them upside down in the stack. To you and me, this may not be all that funny, but watch the reaction of your students when you get to that flash cards. They will laugh, point, and shout at you, prompting you to take a look at your card. It’s all good though, because at that moment, you have the attention of your students and as a result, they usually learn the word on that flash card instantly.

I sponsored a contest with attractive prizes (1,000 baht for the winner, 500 baht as a second, and 250 baht as a third prize) to find the most beautiful Christmas card. We scheduled the award ceremony for today during the morning assembly. Some of the students prepared songs and danced to popular Christmas tunes. Students, teachers, and the principal of the school enjoyed watching the performances and receiving gifts and candy.

Watch the short video to see how we celebrated Christmas early at BP-School:

Since I have just received this e-mail for the n-th time today, I thought I put it up here as an inspiration for English teachers. It does make a fun presentation for your truly advanced English students. Depending on the age of your students, you may want to omit some of the entries. Then, have your students come up with their own list of modified words and their meaning. Laughter in your classroom will be guaranteed!

Here is the full e-mail:

The Washington Post’s Mensa Invitational once again invited readers to take any word from the dictionary, alter it by adding, subtracting, or changing one letter, and supply a new definition.

Here are the winners:

1. Cashtration (n.): The act of buying a house, which renders the subject financially impotent for an indefinite period of time.
2. Ignoranus : A person who’s both stupid and an asshole.
3. Intaxicaton : Euphoria at getting a tax refund, which lasts until you realize it was your money to start with.
4. Reintarnation : Coming back to life as a hillbilly.
5. Bozone ( n.): The substance surrounding stupid people that stops bright ideas from penetrating. The bozone layer, unfortunately, shows little sign of breaking down in the near future.
6. Foreploy : Any misrepresentation about yourself for the purpose of getting laid..
7. Giraffiti : Vandalism spray-painted very, very high
8. Sarchasm : The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn’t get it.
9. Inoculatte : To take coffee intravenously when you are running late.
10. Osteopornosis : A degenerate disease. (This one got extra credit.)
11. Karmageddon : It’s like, when everybody is sending off all these really bad vibes, right? And then, like, the Earth explodes and it’s like, a serious bummer.
12. Decafalon (n.): The grueling event of getting through the day consuming only things that are good for you.
13. Glibido : All talk and no action.
14. Dopeler Effect: The tendency of stupid ideas to seem smarter when they come at you rapidly.
15. Arachnoleptic Fit (n.): The frantic dance performed just after you’ve accidentally walked through a  spider web.
16. Beelzebug (n.): Satan in the form of a mosquito, that gets into your bedroom at three in the morning and cannot be cast out.
17. Caterpallor ( n.): The color you turn after finding half a worm in the fruit you’re eating.

The Washington Post has also published the winning submissions to its yearly contest, in which readers are asked to supply alternate meanings for common words.

And the winners are:

1. Coffee, n. The person upon whom one coughs.
2. Flabbergasted, adj. Appalled by discovering how much weight one has gained.
3. Abdicate, v. To give up all hope of ever having a flat stomach.
4. Esplanade, v. To attempt an explanation while drunk.
5. Willy-nilly, adj. Impotent.
6. Negligent, adj. Absentmindedly answering the door when wearing only a nightgown.
7. Lymph, v. To walk with a lisp.
8. Gargoyle, n. Olive-flavored mouthwash.
9. Flatulence, n. Emergency vehicle that picks up someone who has been run over by a steamroller.
10. Balderdash, n. A rapidly receding hairline.
11. Testicle, n. A humorous question on an exam.
12. Rectitude, n. The formal, dignified bearing adopted by proctologists.
13. Pokemon, n. A Rastafarian proctologist.
14. Oyster, n. A person who sprinkles his conversation with Yiddishisms.
15. Frisbeetarianism, n. The belief that, after death, the soul flies up onto the roof and gets stuck there.
16. Circumvent, n. An opening in the front of boxer shorts worn by Jewish men

December is a month with relatively few classroom activities. There are a holidays to be observed, most notably the King’s birthday on December 5, Constitution day on December 10, and New Year’s eve on December 31. December is also the month in which many schools hold scout camps and their annual Sport Days.

Despite the name, Sport Days in Thailand are not really all about sport. Sure, there are competitions throughout the event and many prizes to be won. The sport disciplines typically include running, football, badminton, takraw, basketball, table tennis, and sometimes even ballroom dancing. The focus, however, seems more on cheering and presenting. There are competitions for cheer leaders, stand cheering, and group cheering. Students also compete for the prize of the best painted cheering stand and there are several parades, each of them with prizes to be won for the best performance. Sport Days in Thailand are lots of fun. Students, teachers, and visitors enjoy the sounds and sights to the fullest and for foreign teachers they are a welcome change from the daily classroom routines.

As a foreign teacher, you will also be asked to participate actively. In the days and weeks leading up to the event, you may be approached to help coaching students in some disciplines. Even if not, take a proactive approach and volunteer to help out in any way you can. Offer to coach the football or basketball teams. It is not only a great way for the students to learn some additional English, it is also a great way for you to show that you are part of the team. During the event, pick a team and join their cheering section. Your students will love you for it!

Some Sport Days even have events for teachers: football matches between the staff and a team of former students are often one of the most watched and cheered activities of the day. Playing on the teacher’s team will not only make your Thai peers happy, it may be a great source of laughter; especially if you play football as badly as I do. Give it a try at your school’s next Sport Day and you may find out just how much out of shape you might be.

To see photos of the Sport Day 2010 at Bangpleeratbamrung School in Samut Prakan, check out the BP School Sport Day 2010 photo gallery.

But how do you motivate your students?  Easy.  Give them a compelling reason why English is useful to them now.  Telling them they’d be able to “get better jobs sometimes in the future” just won’t do the trick. Students are typically not motivated by something way out in the future. They want to get the rewards now.

So how can English be useful to your students now? Easy again. Watch where they are headed after school. Many of your students will undoubtedly march right to the next internet shop to spend some time online. Naturally, they are visiting sites in Thai Language while browsing the web. But that’s only scratching the surface of all the internet fun out there, because the language of the internet is English; at least at this point in time. Chinese has been catching up rapidly, but nevertheless, English will continue to be the dominant language for the hottest and coolest sites.

Again, don’t even try to motivate your students with better job opportunities at some point in the future. Show them where and how English skills can be used right here and now. Show them how much more fun the internet can be when they access and understand sites that may only be available in English. Sites like BigFish Games, GameHouse, and Pogo.

To get started, help them, for example, to create their Facebook profile in English. Even though Facebook is available in the Thai Language, this activity makes an interesting classroom lesson. Download this Facebook Profile Sheet and use it in class to help your students getting started with Facebook in English. If you have an advanced class and want to make it extra interesting, try the Facebook Pirate Profile Sheet.  To switch Facebook’s language to the Pirate version, scroll down all the way to the bottom where you see your current language displayed as a link. Click on it and then click on “English” and select “English (Pirate)”