Teaching English in Thailand

If you have reached the point where you are giving serious consideration to teaching English in Thailand I don’t need to spend a lot of your valuable time telling you what a wonderful place Thailand is to visit or explain the warm, welcoming nature of Thai people. You already know all of that or you wouldn’t be considering a stay of several months to multiple years in Thailand.

Thailand is the most popular tourist destination in South East Asia. Its export and tourism markets are major factor fueling its economy. The ability to communicate in English is becoming a necessity to the people of Thailand.

While English is the language of international commerce and trade it is not spoken widely in Thailand. It is spoken as a first language by more than 300 million people and countless others have the ability to speak enough English to be able to communicate and make themselves understood. English is the language of the Internet with more than eighty percent of the available content being in English. These facts are becoming apparent to Thais.

The need to be fluent in English has lead to an ever growing demand for native English speakers to teach English in Thailand. There are more jobs teaching English than there are qualified people to fill them with the result that there are many people who are not qualified teaching English and doing a poor job of it.

The days when all you needed to do to get a job teaching abroad in Thailand was to be a native English speaker are rapidly coming to an end. The government of Thailand is trying to weed out those who don’t have the necessary qualification and who can’t do an effective job of teaching. To work in a government school you now must have the required qualifications.

If you want to teach English in Thailand you need a TEFL (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) certificate and you need the specialized instruction that will prepare you to do the all important job of teaching English.

Jobs teaching English are easy to find and can pay any where from five thousand Baht a month for teaching in an after school program to seventy thousand Baht a month teaching English in an international school in Bangkok. The crying need for English teachers is nation wide so you can chose where you want to live and teach.

If your are into teaching for the love of teaching and providing much needed help to poor children who desperately need a leg up in the world there are many volunteer programs you can work with and make a real and lasting difference in peoples lives.

There are many ways that you can get the training and certification necessary to get a job teaching English in Thailand. There are online schools that offer classes and award a TEFL certificate but these are not generally regarded as having much merit when it comes to getting hired in one of the better, well paying teaching positions.

There are many schools throughout Thailand that offer TEFL training. They run the course from little mom and pop shops to some fine and well regarded programs. They all claim that the certificate they award is accredited by someone but have a tendency to get a bit vague when you want to discuss the accreditation. The value of the certificates they award you becomes apparent when you are out there trying to get the job you want.

If you want to teach English in Thailand there is only one best choice to get the training you need. The Chiang Mai University Language Institute’s 120-Hour TEFL Certificate Course is regarded as the best there is in Thailand. It is the only university accredited TEFL training course in Thailand.

With over 36,000 enrolled students, Chiang Mai University is one of the largest and most well-regarded universities in the South East Asian region. A degree, diploma, or certificate from Chiang Mai University is recognized has been recognized for almost 50 years globally by employers. Currently Chiang Mai University TEFL graduates are working all over South East Asia, China, Korea, Japan, Europe, the US, and Australia. A CMU TEFL Certificate enjoys particularly high recognition within Thailand.

Chiang Mai University's 120-hour TEFL Certificate Program allows you access and assistance from Chiang Mai University's TEFL Job Database that offers jobs from around the world, but particularly SEA, China, Korea, and Japan.

If you decide to enroll in Chiang Mai University’s 120-hour TEFL Certificate Program, you will also receive, 20 hours of beginner’s Thai instruction, visa assistance, housing assistance, and full CMU university student privileges including the swimming pool, libraries, gym, etc.

The classes for the 120-hour TEFL Certificate Program are conducted at the Chiang Mai University’s Language Institute, which is the largest ESL/EFL teaching complex of its type in South East Asia.

It is unusual for graduates to take longer than three weeks to find a suitable teaching position. Graduates from Chiang Mai University's TEFL program are highly regarded by employers and are in great demand. This high regard makes the program very popular, so if you decide to do the 120-hour program please make sure that you enroll as soon as is convenient as the classes fill quickly.