Experiences of an English Language Teacher
Well, I don’t know about anyone else but this year has flown by, and it reached the end of the year before I knew it. Therefore, I’ve written this article sharing twenty practical and personal tips that you could consider (or not) with your teaching. I hope this gives you some inspiration into how one could approach their teaching as well as their lessons.
In my previous post, I looked at what I had achieved over 2025. It was a rather long read, but in this post I am sharing five personal aims for the New Year. Obviously, most people tend to share the usual resolutions: stop smoking, improve their health, change their career. However, I am keeping my resolutions more grounded, but let’s start now.
Continue reading
As it edges towards the end of another year here in South Korea, it is always a good opportunity to review 2025. As with everybody I suppose, much has happened this year personally and I have really not blogged as much as I had wanted. However, one thing that I have been working on busily is planning, filming, and editing video content for my YouTube Channel. So apologies if this website has been rather quiet of late.
Anyhow, let’s start at the beginning of the year.
Continue reading
One of the courses that I teach in South Korea is a writing course to international students. Essentially, it is with this course students learn the fundamentals of planning, structuring, and writing an essay so they acquire the necessary skills to complete any future essay in their other courses. However, after delivering a course a few years ago, students were offered unfettered access to AI tools such as ChatGPT or Google Gemini, and I noticed an increase detection of AI usage with Turnitin. This obviously posed a range of challenges for educators and professors, regardless their specialism, to assess
After a few years of attempting to curtail student AI reliance or misuse, I am no where closer to where I was a few years ago, let alone establish any clear and detailed criteria to grade student written work, but I have experimented with and without the inclusion of AI. I am sharing what I have been able to establish over the past few years in relation to student writing and AI and I hope this helps anyone else that is in the same position.
Continue reading
Recently, I was thinking about ways to use newspaper articles in the language classroom and it reminded me of suggestions that I came across during the period of my MA studies many years ago. With the growing reliance on digital articles and webpages, it is sometimes nice to go back to basics without any smartphones, automatic translation, or AI summarising tools.
In this post, I share five ways to use newspapers in the English language classroom and how best to make such heavy reading accessible for language learners. It is notoriously challenging for learners to become accustomed to reading newspaper articles in English, let alone their first language. When I speak to my students, few of them get their news from printed articles with more reliance on short form content such as Instagram, YouTube or TikTok. Anyhow, with such ideas, hopefully it offers improved accessibility towards newspaper articles for English students.
You can watch the YouTube video above where I detail all five ways to incorporate newspaper articles in the the classroom and Channel Members will be able to access a free lesson.
Continue reading
In our previous post, we looked at how best to create an online teacher introduction video but the next step to potentially getting students is to prepare and deliver a quality trial lesson. It is important for potential learners to get a taste of your online teaching. In this post, I will share how to prepare a 25 minute online demo lesson to students.
You may also want to watch the following video where I share the process of preparing updated demo lesson slides for use during the initial lesson with such potential students.
For YouTube Channel members, you can access a copy of the slides that I have created for trial lessons of 25 minutes.
Continue reading
For anyone who is wanting to teach English online, whether you are going to be teaching independently or for a platform, you will be required to create an introduction video. It can sometimes be a little overwhelming if you are unsure how best to create one, but in this post I will share the ultimate guide to creating an online teacher introduction video.
By following these steps in this post, you will learn how to plan, record, edit and create a professional and polished looking introduction video. I documented my process with the video above when I had to update my Preply introduction video.
Continue reading
Teaching English can be a thoroughly rewarding experience, which is why I have been involved in this profession for quite a while now. It obviously becomes natural for any professional educators to share websites that have guided their teaching and as I approach my 20th anniversary teaching English to international students, it seems fitting to share twenty influential English teacher websites to access in 2025.
Let me know which of the following English teaching websites that you consider crucial for newly certified English language teachers and any that you have discovered from this post.
Continue reading
The COVID-19 pandemic suddenly changed the teaching landscape, with many educators being forced to deliver lessons and courses online. To be honest, I cannot believe it was over five years ago since the pandemic. As many educators were forced to become accustomed to online teaching, despite their lack of experience, remote online education has gained recognition as a credible and respected alternative to face-to-face teaching.
Therefore, it is vital these days to have a reliable and professional setup for your online teaching needs regardless whether you are delivering hybrid classes, individual lessons or teaching solely online. In this guide, we will look at the tools and tech that are essential for online teachers which can help you teach more effectively and connect with students.
Continue reading
When I first started teaching English in South Korea, back in 2005, I was unaware of teaching material. It was during a period when teaching in South Korea required the use of an undergraduate degree in any subject, a passport from a choice of English speaking countries (dictated no less by the Ministry of Education and the Korean authorities), and a passion to educate.
At no time did I consider getting any books to help with my language teaching – I earned my stripes learning what worked or what hadn’t with my students. I sincerely apologise all my Korean students from my ineptness as I experimented, failed (more often than not), and persevered. However, one advice that I have for anyone wanting to consider English Language Teaching, either online or face-to-face, is to invest in a small collection of books. It would certainly help in developing greater confidence within the teaching industry.
In this blog post, I share ten essential books all new English teachers need to succeed in the life of us such educators, and I still use them to this day. These books are not in any particular order, and would recommend them all if you can get them. Feel free to share what books should make the list in the comments, either in the video below or within this blog post.
© 2026 ELT Experiences
Theme by Anders Norén — Up ↑
[…] my previous post, I looked at what I had achieved over 2025. It was a rather long read, but…
[…] more information about what you could use to help record your video. I did write up a guide about…
[…] our previous post, we looked at how best to create an online teacher introduction video but the next step…
Great suggestions Sketch, and thanks for the mention! I’d add Adri’s EAL blog which she still updates now and then:…
This is a great list. Thanks for including my blog on it :) I'd definitely add Jason Anderson https://jasonanderson.blog/ and…