International House
I think it's important for teachers to have information about where they can go to develop their skills as teachers and one of those organizations that I personally had the opportunity to study with is International House. For any of you who don't know what International House is, it is a network of language schools. According to their website, they are in approximately 50 countries and have been around for quite a few years now since the 1950s. The schools in the network teach various languages such as English, Spanish, German, French, Italian, Etc. Also according to their website, they also trained about half of the CELTA graduates in the world. International House is affiliated in some sense with Cambridge University and they are able to deliver Cambridge courses to candidates.
I stumbled across International House when I was looking for a certification/ course after I completed my CELTA course. I was looking for something that offered an affordable course and was something that I could do without having to deal with too much transportation. When I found International House’s website, (click here) you can see that they do offer several teacher courses and a variety of subjects. I chose to do the certificate in advanced methodology because I had the qualifications for it after completing my CELTA course and I wasn't quite ready to dive into Delta because. I started the IHCAM only six months after finishing the CELTA course.
One of the things that I found to be really easy about International House was the application process and dealing with the Educational Consultants from the organization. They made the whole process very easy and they were very attentive to messages being sent back and forth which really facilitated the enrollment process for me.
Beyond offering teacher training and language courses, IH is a great reference tool for any teachers who are interested in possibly teaching abroad. They post regularly their job openings and you can have short-term or long-term assignments. I found that their job postings are very clear and very descriptive of the types of teachers that they're looking for and very transparent in terms of responsibilities, pay, and requirements.
Another thing that is really interesting about IH is they have a news and blog section which they keep updated regularly with a lot of interesting articles. So if you're interested in going into that section (click here). You can find a variety of different resources all related to international house and language learning.
All in all, my experience with IH was extremely positive and I would definitely recommend it for anyone else who decided to go on a learning adventure in teaching to check them out and see what they have to offer. For me, it's a great alternative to some of the more traditional courses and traditional organizations that we are used to seeing in the marketplace.