Work / Would previous experience be necessary to teach english in poznan [22]


Why not look for a TEFL course in Poland over Summer? that way you get to 'try before you buy'. Some of them are pretty good.

Otherwise, you may well find that teaching qualifications are not that necessary to get a basic job in a private school or even to find private lessons to tide you over - You can probably scoop up 2000 zloty a month on cash in hand privates and yuo can get by on that.

The better teaching jobs will go to people with experience and qualifications, agreed, but this is more because they have shown they are safe employment bets rather than that they are good at their jobs. Teaching in Poland is a price led market, not the qualiity-led market it should be.

Good luck!

PS All those schools sound pikey - I don't know anything about them but the names are just so .... pikey

Work / Would previous experience be necessary to teach english in poznan [22]


It could be. Let's see what's on the net

eslbase.com/courses/poland/

I see it costs about 800 pounds to do your CELTA at IH Krakow. Nice city and you'd be able to work on your Polish while you're over there. I don't gno if that covers acommodation but it shouldn't be that bad if you share with someone else for the month. Food's cheap

Unfortunately there are no links for Poznan courses from the page but maybe try IH Poznan?

Yeah sorry - when I said 'try before you buy' I meant you can get a feel for the job and the lifestyle before you enter fully into the white slave trade. You'll be able to get some pointers on what to look for and what to be careful of when signing up with a school. That kind of stuff!


And working as a teacher in Poland is probably not the best way to go about this...


Please...... don't. These courses are pretty much worthless from what I've heard. Some only allow you to teach the other course candidates in make believe lessons. NOTHING can prepare you for the terror of your first couple of weeks in the job better than getting your arm right up the didactic u-bend on a proper course full of real, clueless students. Don't touch the internet. you're throwing money away if you do.

Language / Word order and swearing in Polish [44]


Well now you mention it, it could also be emphasis ie "What are you doing"? Rather than someone else"

Food / What is your favorite Polish Vodka? [653]

Should one drink vodka at room temperature, 'frozen' at -20 or chilled at +4 ?

btw, for me - absolvent, luksusowa and of course zubrowka

Life / Polish Organizational Skills [83]


I can only speak with authority about teachers but they are generally pretty dreadful

Why?

1) Apathy - Nothing we do makes a difference so why bother
2) Resentment - I don't get rewarded so why should I make an effort
3) Lack of time - Paradoxically, they do not have time to sit down and organise themselves
4) Ignorance - They have never been taught to organise themselves. the results of a crap education system that is perpetuated by teachers like themselves.

Food / What is your favorite Polish Vodka? [653]


A lot of friends say that but I find it kills the flavour. I prefer +4

Life / Polish Organizational Skills [83]

What about the school managers / coordinators?

Life / Polish Organizational Skills [83]


Well.... I'm sure your school are OK but I've been working in a university in the UK for a couple of Summers and the level of organisation is far higher over there than in the schools in Poland. It really isn't comparable - Everything from the organisation of the timetable to the management of the teaching staff is done on time and with no cockups.

Uni courses in Poland consist of a semester based on a coursebok that has more often than not been given as a set of free copies to the department. The content of the book is divided into 15 weeks. that is the upper limit of Polish educational management.

I've worked in Uni departments in Poland where the staff design end-of-semester speaking tests 10 mins before the exam by photocopying pages from Proficiency books. While they are assessing the speaking, they mark the written tests to save time. The marks themselves are arbitrary - "What do you think of this one?" "Hmmm better than the last one but she never speaks in my grammar lessons" "Three then?" "Three and a half" ... and so on.

Truely, every day I wake up in the morning believing I've seen the lowest standards, the most slapdash work practices and the greatest contempt for any kind of professional behaviour and every day, I am pleasantly surprised as, once more, my expectations for the following day are lowered further.

Life / Polish Organizational Skills [83]

Feel free man - it's a discussion forum :)

Life / Polish Organizational Skills [83]


Oh, yeah - I was working for place who used to do that kind of thing regularly. The owner apologised to us for not paying but he 'didn't have the moeny because he took his wife to Paris for the weekend'.

It's a shame that teaching has become so price led. The problem was all the horrid pikey schools offering the low quality rubbish served up in state schools at bargain bucket knock down prices. Most students go for this because they don't know any better (and most of them don't really want to learn anyway). If the prices were higher, the would be more pressure on the teachers and schools to perform and they would have to be more organised and efficient.

I know what you mean about the teachers working long hours though. One of the problems at my school is that the director has to run the school AND teach a full timetable. What nonsense is this?

News / Poland Should Beef Up Military [286]


I hate to tell you this but getting your arse handed to you on a plate over and over again doesn't qualify you as being a warrior nation.

News / Poland Should Beef Up Military [286]


No, common knowledge actually. Even tribesmen in the Amazon rainforest know about Poland's track record. I suggest you do a project on it when you get to high school LOL

News / Poland Should Beef Up Military [286]


??????


I hate to break this to you Lotnik, but Poland's army hasn't done squat for Poland for the last century. they got their arese handed to them on a plate by the Russians. the Germans and the Austrians. During Communism, the armed forces enabled the government to enforce their control over the people.

No, what got rid of communism and ensured Polish independence was not the glorious armed forces. It wasn't even Pope John Paul. It was the market forces sounding last orders for the Soviet empire and the dogged will of the people who stood up for themselves and unionised against the government. History will show that a few thousand priests and Solidarity members did far more for Poland than all the hundreds of thousands of servicemen who died to keep rich men happy.

But that doesn't make good cinema does it?

News / Poland Should Beef Up Military [286]


So your point here is that the Army saved Poland? No, Celinski, as you say, the army was massacred and Poland was occupied. Poland's liberation came not at the hands of the military but decades later at the hands of the free market and the hands of the common people.


Why should I do that? The military watched the borders. The military provided backup when the police couldn't do their job. The military effectively ran the country during martial law.

Armies enforce the will of whoever's in power - they don't save people.

Life / What can citizens do to make Poland a better place to live? [125]

If you use public transport :

- Take a bath or a shower every day
- Wash your clothes - if you can afford a packet of cigarettes, you can afford washing powder
- Wait until people get off before you push your way on
- Don't bring your pram on the tram at rush hour
- Don't stand with your head in front of the ticket canceller thing
- Don't sit with your legs open at a 45 degree angle

Basically, try to treat your fellow passengers with a little consideration.


My neighbours dump all sorts of trash in the segregation bins. Complete waste of time trying to educate these people.

Life / Polish Organizational Skills [83]


It's cheap, and commitments prevent me from leaving.

Life / Polish Organizational Skills [83]


Wow. That sounds like it would make a fascinating film. Please go on.

Life / Polish Organizational Skills [83]


If that's teh polish primary education syllabus, I can well understand the problems this country is in. Why don't children learn something useful?

Love / English Men vs Polish Men [207]


Exactly - some of the most romantic words in the polish language come from English: Sex shop, Video cabinet, sex film, hamburger, live sex chat...

Ah! chansons d'amour eh?

Life / Polish Organizational Skills [83]


Point taken but I'd say this is more a symptom of the complete lack of consideration the vast majority of Poles have for their fellow citizens - in this case other drivers. They simply don't think to themselves that they might hit and kill someone when they drive fast, it only matters that they get whee they want to go as quickly as they can.

Language / Is rosetta stone any good for learning Polish? [51]

Just out of interest, how much would a Pole in the UK charge per hour for Polish lessons? You could buy a coursebook and work through it together - most younger Polish emigrees will have had language lessons at some point and they'd have an idea what the score is.

If it's only 10 pounds an hour, for the cost of Rosetta stone you could get 14 hours of lessons with a native speaker...

Life / Polish Organizational Skills [83]


Don't sweat it. Some people here don't understand the term discussion forum..

Life / Polish Organizational Skills [83]


You have a point there. Poland is the beating heart of cosmopolitan Europe and thus full of Muslims. I should look more carefully next time a car accident occurs near my house (tomorrow probably). Suffice it to say that there's a safe chance I'm correct about it being a Pole.


Sorry but I've yet to find a Pole who could even organise anything more complicated than a day's shopping. That's just the way it is.

Life / Do you think that Polish people are rude? [951]


What did they do? Most customs staff are jumped up little losers with tiny dicks (the women too) - what did Warsaw do that was so bad?

Life / Polish Organizational Skills [83]


Do you work for a Polish employer? Get your own examples. In the meantime, think to yourself why so many individual foreigners believe that Poland is so disorganised.

Life / What can citizens do to make Poland a better place to live? [125]


Well, in Poland maybe. They've long been loathed in Greece and Spain as beery troublemakers. Possibly up until now most English coming to Poland were expat children or middle class academic types hoping to learn the language or break new ground in 'Eastern Europe'. Cheap travel really brought the worst side of the UK to Poland.

Life / Why are Poles always so miserable? Why do they never smile? [512]

There is a statistic I once read in a sociological journal that the average Pole smiles 3.5 times in their life.

Life / Why are Poles always so miserable? Why do they never smile? [512]


Well, they're just unfriendly really. And gloomy. Every Pole has the potential to turn a light meal in a nice friendly restaurant into a group of condemned men eating their last meal. Especially when they eat soup. They hunch over the bowl, silently dragging their spoon through their tomato soup, pausing now and again to stare out of the window or to slowly look round the room. I've seen more animation in the zoo when tortoises eat their lettuce.

Life / Why are Poles always so miserable? Why do they never smile? [512]


In many ways, Justysia, eating tomato soup is like making love to a beautiful woman. First make sure the dish is suitably warmed up. Perhaps give it a quick blow if it;s too hot. Some people like their soup spicy, in which case they can look in a magazine for some ideas to suit their taste. Finally, gently dip your spoon into the soup, stir it gently and then enjoy your meal. Don't get any of it down your front. I like to add some cheese to mine.

Generaly though, I approach my soup with an upbeat manner and an open mind, not a feeling that eating soup is a duty one must perform to stay alive.

Life / Why are Poles always so miserable? Why do they never smile? [512]


You're just jealous cos you've never had good soup. :)


I dig where you're coming from but try smilng to show you enjoy it now and again