Right now, we are feeling pretty darn blessed!

by daniels911

Leading a vocabulary game!Well… after numerous sleepless nights, several really bad lessons, a few tears here and there, one stomach flu, a “gazillion” laughs, and about two dozen smiling, warm, loving, and most importantly – forgiving – Vietnamese students, JOE AND I PASSED OUR CELTA COURSE! We now hold a “Certificate in English Language Teaching for Adults” and are free to befuddle and perplex even the most talented Vietnamese student.

We took the CELTA course at Apollo Education and Training Center in central Hanoi- just steps away from our apartment, and now the location of our new jobs! We had three amazing EFL teachers as our trainers – Nick, Simon, and Claire (all Brits, but we don’t hold that against them …too much). They suffered through a month of ill-conceived, poorly delivered, and sometimes just plain incorrect English lessons, and still managed to be supportive, positive, and encouraging (most of the time). We trained with seven other students who were our constant companions and friends during the month long training course – not to mention our source of support and advice, collegial critique, and lots of laughs! Our class was a mixture of Americans and Brits – which provided the fuel for Nancy plays a sentence game with the elementary CELTA class. This was “Team Obama” (their name, not mine) consisting of (from left to right) Quang Anh, Linh Nham and Binh! a great nationalistic rivalry – with a Phillipino and a Belarusian thrown in for good measure.

We were split into two teaching groups. In my group, there was Malcolm – a 42 year old Brit who lives in Japan and has been teaching English for 15+ years; Brian – a 26 year old young man from L.A. who probably needed to take the CELTA course to rescue himself from a 5 month drinking binge in Nha Trang, Vietnam; Ashley – a 28 year old IT graduate from London who has been traveling around the world for several years and most recently served as a volunteer English teacher in Siem Riep, Cambodia; and Tim – a 26 year old young man from Belarus who I found endearing (in a strange sort of way) but who everyone else loved to hate because he was somewhat of a loose cannon.

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