How To Choose The Best Online TEFL Course

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When you Google "best online TEFL courses" approximately 1,070,000 results populate! Searching for the best online TEFL course can be a daunting task. How do you select the best one? Here are five tips to help you with your search:

1. Destination

Where do you want to teach? If you want to travel abroad, the best online TEFL course should prepare you to teach at your destination. For example, I love Spain! If I want to teach English as a foreign language in Spain, the minimum requirement is an accredited TEFL certificate. In comparison, if I want to teach English as a foreign language in Canada, the minimum requirement is a degree (BA/BS) and an accredited TEFL certificate.

2. Method

Which method of teaching do you prefer? Do you want to teach in person, or do you want to teach online? Closures of in-classroom schools due to the pandemic have increased the demand for online TEFL teachers. The best online TEFL course should prepare you to instruct students in both environments.

3. Accreditation

As mentioned earlier, when you Google "best online TEFL courses" you'll find many options to choose from. Unfortunately, not every course has accreditation. What's accreditation and why is it important? Accreditation is "the act of granting credit or recognition, especially to an educational institution that maintains suitable standards. Accreditation is necessary to any person or institution in education that needs to prove that they meet a general standard of quality." (vocabulary.com, 2021) Choosing an accredited course is important because it means that the content and strategies you're about to learn have been carefully reviewed by an independent third-party and meet the general standard of quality for TEFL. The best online TEFL course will have accreditation from independent third parties. The following are examples of these third parties:

Canada:

TESL Canada

United Kingdom:

Ofqual awarded by Qualifi

United States:

4. Flexibility

The fact that you're searching for an online TEFL course mostly likely means that you need a course that offers flexibility around your schedule. Online TEFL courses inherently provide this! When choosing the best online TEFL course, I recommend selecting a course that allows you to extend the duration in case of any unforeseen circumstances.

5. Job Placement

When choosing the best online TEFL course, choose one that offers job placement assistance, internships, and recruitment services. Many recruiting firms will hire new graduates with no prior teaching experience which is a great place to start in your TEFL career.

Now that you know how to choose the best online TEFL course, check out Canada's leading online level 5 TEFL course!