Certificate in One-to-One Language Coaching

3-day intensive course in Barcelona:	Details
Number of hours	20 hours
Schedule:	From Thursday to Saturday inclusive
Price:	450 Euros

October 2nd - 4th 2008 - Filling.

May 28th - 30th 2009 - Open.
October 22nd - 24th 2009 - Open.

Complete the Application Form

'A huge amount of very useful input.' Stefan Gee

'Excellent. This is what a training course should be like!' Tricia Hunter

'What a highly inspiring course, packed with lots of new ideas and approaches. I nearly laughed my head off - However, I wasn´t disoriented. On the contrary, I am extremely motivated now and know new ways to go.' Mark Strupler

'An informative and entertaining course which provides an excellent introduction to the extensive field of coaching, packed to bursting with invaluable, quality Business English materials. Mark is an extremely talented trainer.' Helen Strong, based in Germany

'It does what it says on the can - and then some!' Brian Brennan, based in Spain, co-author of Business: One to One (OUP)

'After having done the CertTEB [with Mark], I came with high expectations.They were more than fulfilled. In a word: inspirational.' Jack Spencer Prince, based in Germany

'Really loved the course, everything about it. Course content GREAT. LOADS of info.' Trish Beatty, based in Spain

Course Overview

Some of the terms and techniques you'll be fully familiar with by the end of this course:

Coaching -Just-in-time Teaching-TPR -Language auditing-NLP-Schemata Storyboarding - Reverse Role Simulation - Counselling-Learning - Suggestology Remote Teaching - Cuisenaire Rods -TA -Framework Materials - Virtual Groupwork - Bio-Graphics - Semi-Scripted Anecdotes - Scaffolding - Dogme - Lexical Mapping - Collaborative Writing -I-Centred Materials - Personal Compass - Silent Way - Auto-Dictation - 3-D Simulations - Lexical Visualisation -Top-Down Processing - Ego States - Modalities - Congruence - Response-ability -End-Product Syllabus Design

The One-to-One Classroom

In the words of one-to-one pioneer, Peter Wilberg, 'One-to-one teaching is different'. Many, perhaps most, of the personal and pedagogical skills we have developed as language teachers relate almost exclusively to working with groups. But the dynamics of managing a community of learners and making generalised assumptions about how people acquire language and communicate bear little resemblance to the focus, pace and style of one-to-one teaching.

One to one is the preferred choice of a lot of English language learners, but for teachers it presents new challenges. Expectations tend to be high, close encounters can be claustrophobic, personalities loom large and much of our previous training fails to help us design effective programmes for the individual learner.

But once we have accepted what can usefully be carried over from group teaching and what can't and have mastered new techniques that we could never attempt with a group, one to one can be one of the most rewarding and 'authentic' forms of teaching.

The Course

The Certificate in One-to-One Language Coaching provides the specialist training practising teachers need to face the unique challenges of working with the individual learner. This highly intensive 20-hour teacher development course is run over three days at Oxford TEFL's comfortable and well-equipped training centre right in the middle of Barcelona. The maximum group size is 16, so you will get plenty of personal attention.

The course caters for teachers of both General and Professional or Business English. Because of the relatively higher cost of one-to-one teaching and the specific work-oriented needs of many individual learners, there is some emphasis on professional and business applications, but many of the techniques explored work equally well with the fast-track executive, the parentally pressured teenager and the casual language learning 'hobbyist'. To quote Wilberg again, 'In one-to-one teaching, however specialised, the technical repertoire of the teacher is more important than the materials repertoire'.

Over the course of the programme participants will try out many practical one-to-one teaching techniques and benefit from theoretical inputs drawn from the diverse fields of coaching, counselling-learning, neuro-linguistic programming, transactional analysis, suggestopedia and silent way language instruction. In addition, they will build up a substantial take-home file of materials they can immediately use in their one-to-one classes. (See detailed programme below.)

The Trainer

The course designer and trainer is Mark Powell. Mark has 20 years' General and Business English teaching experience (much of it in one to one) and is one of the world's leading Business English teacher developers, having trained over 500 teachers for the London Chamber of Commerce & Industry Certificate in Teaching English for Business, LCCI CertTEB (now available here at Oxford TEFL). He is also a regular presenter at international ELT conferences and the author of several bestselling Business English books including In Company, Presenting in English and New Business Matters.

The Programme

On this course you will learn how to:

• recognise the fundamental differences between one-to-one and group teaching
• import transferable techniques from group teaching and modify less transferable ones
• identify ELT resource materials which can be adapted to the one-to-one classroom
• maximise the unique opportunities of one to one, whilst working within its constraints
• change the pace and style of your teaching to suit the one-to-one situation
• go from prescriptive lesson planning to 'prepared responsiveness' or 'response-ability'
• switch from a 'just-in-case' attitude to language input to a 'just-in-time' approach
• alter your mindset from that of language teacher to language coach
• profile the learner in terms of needs, wants, lacks and learning preferences
• conduct a 'language audit' for learners with very specific needs
• acquire the five key skills of coaching: rapport, deep listening, intuition, questioning, feedback
• use models taken from Neuro-Linguistic Programming and Transactional Analysis to build rapport
• design customisable open format and 'framework' materials to draw language out of the learner
• make the most of the learning space by establishing different activity zones
• adopt a product-oriented approach to fluency work through projects, reports and filming
• make use of close-range teaching tools such as cards, post-its, Cuisenaire rods, puzzles
• utilise multi-media to bring third parties and differing opinions into the classroom
• create simple self-disclosure activities around 'I-centred' texts such as quizzes, questionnaires, psychometric tests and behavioural indicators
• take a phased interactive approach to reading skills
• use personal and professional timelines and graphic representations of the learner's goals, values and experiences
• utilise techniques from Counseling-Learning such as spontaneous reformulation, cooperative dialogue-building, incremental recording, reverse role simulation, collaborative writing
• use schema theory to design 'storyboards' for situational dialogues using projected visuals and ambient sound effects to create '3-D Simulations'
• work with teaching aids from the Silent Way such as Cuisenaire rods, rod grids and Fidel charts - limiting lexical load in order to focus on grammatical and phonological form
• teach remotely either by tele-teaching, e-teaching or a combination of the two
• use technology more supportively and seamlessly in the one-to-one classroom - mobiles, dictaphones, MP3 voice recorders, laptops, Skype
• borrow techniques from Suggestopedia for reducing learning stress and working on peripheral or subliminal learning
• draft a learning contract between you and your clients
• market yourself as a one-to-one language coach

Teaching practice is not a stipulated part of the course, though there will be peer teaching during the sessions. Depending on timetabling, we may be able to arrange live lesson observation. If not, one-to-one lesson segments on video will be made available for private study and analysis.

Certification

The Certificate in One-to-One Language Coaching (Cert1:1Coach) is validated by Oxford TEFL, one of Barcelona's most prestigious language teaching and teacher training institutions, a Trinity College London accredited CertTESOL and DipTESOL centre with partner schools in Cadiz and Prague.

To obtain their certificate participants must attend all 20 hours of the course, successfully take part in paired language coaching activities and complete a personal teaching log. The personal teaching log is a 3000-word document describing a one-to-one learner the participant has worked with and outlining techniques and materials included in their learning programme. Upon its completion (there is no fixed time limit) participants will receive their certificate, which may be awarded with credit or distinction.

Applications

Applications are welcomed from suitably qualified and experienced English language teachers. Normally, applicants will be required to fulfil the following criteria:

• be graduates
• hold a recognised teaching qualification at certificate level (eg. Trinity CertTESOL, CELTA, CertTEB) or above
• have at least one year's full-time EFL teaching experience (two years part-time)

For non-native speaker applicants the teaching qualification requirement can be waived for experienced teachers with a first or higher degree in English. As the course is conducted entirely in English, functional fluency in English is essential.

Exceptions can also be made, at the discretion of Oxford TEFL, for native speaker applicants who do not meet ALL these requirements (eg. non-graduates with many years teaching experience, experienced teachers without a formal TEFL qualification or relatively inexperienced teachers with a good degree and a high grade on the CELTA).

So if you are unsure about your eligibility but enthusiastic about doing the course, by all means do apply, but please remember this is not an entry-level teacher training programme (for this, see our page on the Trinity College CertTESOL). You will be expected to be more or less familiar with standard TEFL techniques and terminology. To complete the personal teaching log and be eligible for certification you must also currently be a practising one-to-one teacher.

Complete the Application Form

Fees

The total fee for the Certificate in One-to-One Language Coaching is €450. This covers tuition, all paper-based materials and a complete copy of the course on CD. There is also access to the library, computer room and facilities of Oxford TEFL including, if required, a careers advice service. Mark's own extensive personal library of books relevant to one to one and communication skills coaching will also be made available to course participants.

Dates

Thursday May 8th to Saturday May 10th 2008 inclusive (3 days).

Thursday October 2nd to Saturday 4th 2008 inclusive (3 days).

The course will begin at 9.30 am on the thursday and finish at 5.30 pm on the Saturday.

Accommodation

You can organise this yourself or we can help you arrange it. Barcelona has a wide range of hostels and hotels to suit all budgets.