I am getting so excited about my CELTA course. I'll be leaving California for Colorado in a week and I can't wait to start and meet a bunch of new people. The class will only have 18 students in it, so I hope that they're great since it will be such a small, intense experience.
California wildfires continue to rage. I am a little worried that I will not have a home to come back to (there are currently over 800 state wide [the seasonal average is 70], though none close enough that we have to evacuate... yet)! Smoke has blanketed lots of Central California for the past three days--a couple mornings ago I woke up, confused that the sun was blotted out by what appeared to be thick fog. I'm just grateful that there are firefighters willing to come from lots of other states to help our firefighters. It's too much to handle alone...
On a more exciting note, I keep meeting people who have connections with Turkey! I was at a used bookstore in town today, searching for various ESL (English as a Second Language) books to use as resources for teaching, and I asked the clerk if there was any chance he might have a Turkish dictionary. "You're studying Turkish?" Yeah, I responded. "My daughter is in Turkey." Oh really? What's she doing? "Teaching English." I suspect the world may be a little smaller than I think. We hit it off marvelously and he reassured me that it's going to be an amazing experience.
His daughter is young and single like me, and she is doing just fine over there in sprawling, exciting İstanbul. I got her email address so I can fire some questions at her. What a surprise in tiny Nevada County! It's proof that my L&C alumni friends' advice is true: Network shamelessly.
Thursday, June 26, 2008
Tuesday, June 3, 2008
Accepted to the Denver, CO CELTA Program!
Since graduation on May 11th, life has been a hectic whirlwind of activity. I moved back to California to live with the folks, leaving Portland behind indefinitely. A couple weeks ago I realized that my parasitic existence in my parents house should have an end date. I started getting my act together to find a program where I could get my CELTA (Certificate of English Language Teaching to Adults) certificate. Originally I planned to go abroad to take the course--they're offered in most countries. However, after further consideration, it seemed counterproductive to complicate the already-difficult course with the host of travel troubles (jet lag, language barriers, unfamiliar neighborhoods, cultural confusion, transportation mayhem).
I recently found a company called Bridge LinguaTec (I would never have named it that but whatever!) that offers the CELTA course in Denver, Colorado, and I submitted the first part of the application--a grammar test! I hauled out a reference book on grammar and muddled my way through the questions. (Funny how even as a college graduate, I didn't know the answers to half the topics. Thankfully linguists have explained a method to our madness and I was rather surprised to discover through the examples in the book that we do, in fact, use language in a predictable way. Maybe I should be embarrassed to admit that...)
My ego has been pretty fragile since being rejected from Teach For America and the Turkish university program that would have paid for my CELTA certification and given me an amazing employment package. Therefore, I wasn't sure that I would get into this CELTA course offered in the States, but I figured that I had a good chance. If I passed the grammar task, I could then get a phone interview--the phone interview happened this afternoon and after lots of questions, I was accepted to the program!
Starting July 7th I will eat, sleep and breathe CELTA. It runs for 4 weeks and is reputed to be a rigorous experience. Classes run from 9-6 five days a week and then there's homework and lesson planning at nights. I figure that I'm at my academic prime right now, so it can't be that horrible. I'm fresh out of college (not burned out!), still sharp with my study skills, and raring to go.
One of the great things about Bridge LinguaTec is that they have contacts worldwide and can assist with job placement. I continue to be infatuated with the idea of living in Turkey. Apparently year-long contracts begin to be offered around September, since that's when the academic year starts. While it's all a terrifying experience and I wonder if I am dangerously naive, there are also some built-in safety nets. I am pretty excited about the whole thing... So stay tuned!
I recently found a company called Bridge LinguaTec (I would never have named it that but whatever!) that offers the CELTA course in Denver, Colorado, and I submitted the first part of the application--a grammar test! I hauled out a reference book on grammar and muddled my way through the questions. (Funny how even as a college graduate, I didn't know the answers to half the topics. Thankfully linguists have explained a method to our madness and I was rather surprised to discover through the examples in the book that we do, in fact, use language in a predictable way. Maybe I should be embarrassed to admit that...)
My ego has been pretty fragile since being rejected from Teach For America and the Turkish university program that would have paid for my CELTA certification and given me an amazing employment package. Therefore, I wasn't sure that I would get into this CELTA course offered in the States, but I figured that I had a good chance. If I passed the grammar task, I could then get a phone interview--the phone interview happened this afternoon and after lots of questions, I was accepted to the program!
Starting July 7th I will eat, sleep and breathe CELTA. It runs for 4 weeks and is reputed to be a rigorous experience. Classes run from 9-6 five days a week and then there's homework and lesson planning at nights. I figure that I'm at my academic prime right now, so it can't be that horrible. I'm fresh out of college (not burned out!), still sharp with my study skills, and raring to go.
One of the great things about Bridge LinguaTec is that they have contacts worldwide and can assist with job placement. I continue to be infatuated with the idea of living in Turkey. Apparently year-long contracts begin to be offered around September, since that's when the academic year starts. While it's all a terrifying experience and I wonder if I am dangerously naive, there are also some built-in safety nets. I am pretty excited about the whole thing... So stay tuned!
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