The Benefits of Teaching English Online

Why Teach English Online? 

 November 20, 2014
British Columbia, Canada
Whiteswan Lake, Canada

After teaching English for almost 5 years, I have made many friends that also teach English. However, I am the only one that teaches online. Many of my friends are happy with their jobs, working 20-30 hours per week, they don’t want to teach online or they have private students on top of their regular teaching job and don’t want to spend any more of their free time teaching. If you can find the right company one of the best things about teaching online is that you can do it between classes. Right now I am only teaching online in the afternoon from 12-5pm. Every morning I teach business English outside my house in downtown Buenos Aires. Teaching online allows me to work at a time when it can be hard to find classes, those who work at a traditional school probably don’t have this problem, but for many English teachers it can be hard to find work in the afternoon. Most students want to study either first thing in the morning or at night after work. Teaching online has solved this problem for me and now I am teaching close to 40 hours per week (including two nights).

 

Another problem that I had in years past was what to do in the summer. From December to February in Argentina, the whole country is in summer mode and it is very hard to find any work outside of private lessons. This summer I plan on increasing the amount of time I spend teaching online. Problem solved. Many of my teacher friends will spend summer in their houses or traveling. I am also planning on traveling this summer, but I can continue to work. I will be back in Canada for 3 weeks around Christmas and New Years, but I have the option to work on the days in between. I won’t work every day, because I want to snowboard, but at least I can do a few classes and make a few bucks.

So, this leads right into the biggest benefit of teaching online: work and travel. It is possible to live wherever you like and continue making money. So if you want to spend some months renting an apartment in Barcelona and continue making money it is possible or you can crash on your friends couch in Whistler and not miss a day of work. In my mind this is the biggest benefit. However, it should be noted that it is not really possible to backpack and teach online, because a good internet connection is almost always required and by good internet connection I mean one that can support Skype calls without problems.

Some people might say that meeting new students online from around the world is the biggest benefit, but for me it has to be the fact that you can work and travel. Teaching online provides the freedom that most jobs lack. If you can combine it with a local job it’s even better for your wallet. I won’t say that teaching online is better than face to face lessons, because I don’t believe it is, but it is more convenient and for many people it is the best way they can balance their busy lives and the want to learn English. These are the benefits of teaching English online. It is only going to get more popular, maybe now is the right time for you to start and get some experience.

 

6 Comments

  • Kursus bahasa online

    It is already 2018 and how do you fare?

    Seeing the trend as of now, currently teaching something either it’s a language or a skill, changing slowly to online class.

    At least this is what happened in my country? Anyone has any thought about this? I don’t think

  • regina rezende

    You are really kind to share all this wonderful information with us.
    It will make a great difference in my life.
    I also love wondering around the world, and this is a great job for me.
    Thank very much!!!!

  • Sonita

    Hello Andrew:
    Thanks for sharing!
    I am a certified Systematic Synthetic Phonics Tutor and would be interested in teaching reading online. Do you think that there is scope for teaching reading online.
    Can you send me the referral link, please?

  • Sam

    Hello from Vancouver,
    Thank you for providing a very informative website.
    I have done a year of teaching in Hanoi several years ago. Seems like online teaching may be the way for me to get back to teaching.
    “Glass door” has few reviews of ESL online teaching sites.
    Maybe you can add a rating of your own to the numerous ESL teaching online sites. That would be my suggestion.

    cheers
    Sam

    • mikedveenstra@gmail.com

      Hey Sam from Vancouver, thanks for the advice, a rating system would be great. I just don’t know all the companies here that well, just a couple. Anyway let us know if you get a job with one these companies!

    • Dandan Pan

      Please check out: ALO7.com http://www.aizhuanjiao.com/ALO7_recruitment

      About us and FAQ has more details.

      In case you have more questions about our Alo7, here is the brief summary:

      ALO7.com was founded by Pengkai Pan, who holds a PHD from Media Lab of MIT. Its initial angel investors include digital pioneer Professor Nicholas Negroponte, who is MIT Media Lab Founder, and several international venture capital companies, including Fortunate 500 companies, Qualcomm Inc.

      https://www.altassets.net/private-equity-news/by-news-type/deal-news/qualcomm-ventures-leads-10m-series-c-for-chinas-alo7.html

      ALO7 is the largest digital ELT (English Language Teaching) product and solutions provider in China with more than 10M registered users and more than 5,000 partner schools over 200 cities. We are revolutionizing the way English is learned and taught throughout China, from how schools are managed to how schools and homes are connected in the mobile Internet age.

      Alo7 aims to be the largest online education platform in 2018 as large educational institutions in China are all Alo7’s partners. Currently these partner schools are using Alo7’s digital curriculum in the classroom setting and they start to offer Alo7’s online tutoring services to their existing student bases with an aggregated number of easily exceeding one million.

      With Alo7, you will enjoy a flow of steady classes that fit into your availability.

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