TEACHING ESL IN CHINA

To paraphrase a quote from Mao Tse Tung, “If you want to know the taste of a pear, you must change the pear by eating it yourself. If you want to know the structure of the classroom in China, you must take part in teaching ESL in China. All genuine knowledge originates in direct experience.”

True, however for those who have never visited China and/or are just beginning their teaching experience, advice from our predecessors is calming because we will have some idea of what to expect and how to start before we are metaphorically dropped into the lion's den.

No matter how prepared you are it will always be "an experience".

I have taught classes with 60 raging wild kids and classes of 4 dedicated students. All challenging in their own way and never the same.

I don't disagree with trying to find out as much as you can before you get here, but don't be surprised if it is NOTHING like what you heard about when you do arrive.... :)

Don't be scared or intimidated though. A lions den it may be, but once you learn what the lions like you may just find the kitty cats underneath. :)

No matter how prepared you are it will always be "an experience".

I have taught classes with 60 raging wild kids and classes of 4 dedicated students. All challenging in their own way and never the same.

I don't disagree with trying to find out as much as you can before you get here, but don't be surprised if it is NOTHING like what you heard about when you do arrive.... :)

Don't be scared or intimidated though. A lions den it may be, but once you learn what the lions like you may just find the kitty cats underneath. :)

Is there anything that new teachers going into china should know? Not only about the schools and teaching but general taboo's and hints for living there?

Well,

After all the time I have been here, I could go on and on, but I am going to try to give the most important 2 pieces of advice they don't seem to tell you online or in the TESOL schools.

#1 - First and foremost! Try VERY hard NOT to be one of those people that comes to China (or wherever) expecting it to be the same as back home!!! Now, that said, China is also NOT the place many people expect, based on VERY outdated opinions of our parents (many still basing their views on the anti-commie propaganda of years gone by..) China is no longer a developing country, it is a leader in world economies and technology. BUT (and it is a big but!) it IS a different culture!!! People WILL act and do things differently here! The most miserable sour puss foreigners I have EVER known were those who constantly compared China to their own homes (Bathrooms back home AREN'T like THAT!!! NOBODY does THAT back home!!!! etc)

Those people, bar none, are the ones who cast a miserable and bleak outcome on life in China. However, those like myself, who choose to concentrate on the wonderful and exciting aspects of life here find new reasons to smile everyday and become a part of the culture we are sharing in, as opposed to a critic of it.

So really, DON'T be a sour puss and see all the differences in a negative way, or you WILL have a negative experience!


#2 - Drink the water!!!!!! Ok, WAIT!!! Stop, let me explain....

When I first came to China I was VERY nervous about sanitation and especially the water. Thinking it to be on par with Africa and Mexico. That is simply not the case except for the smallest of cities and rural villages. However, of course you need not drink the local water supply, even the locals drink bottled water (easily available and cheap) but I used to be extremely paranoid.

I would only brush my teeth with bottled water. Only boil bottled water for coffee and tea and never drink soup or tea outside my home because it would be made with local tap water.

What a mistake!!! I know many folks like this. And like myself at that time, they get sick ALOT!!! There are different bugs and creepy crawlies here than back home, but they are not all lethal or even bad, just different. Once I started drinking the local restaurants teas and soups, brushing normally like I did back home (with tap water) and not worrying so much, i did NOT get sick anymore......

Why? Because if you go out of your way to avoid the potential little bugs in the water (which boiling more than kills anyways) your stomach won't get used to it. When you go out of your way to avoid them, then every time you do get a little taste, you will get sick. By integrating into the food culture here, your stomach becomes more like the locals. Therefore you don't get sick so much. These days I can happily eat in little street corner restaurants and barbecues and don't second guess the soups or teas offered, and I never get sick. Yet my crazy friends who only touch bottled water to their lips and eat McDonalds and KFC for every meal are sick more often than anyone I know.

SO long story short, don't drink the tap water directly, but don't be afraid to boil it or even just rinse your mouth out with it and you will have a much more pleasant China experience.

Where are the best places to teach/live (cities, schools, locations)?

What is the best grade to teach? (if you cant decide give us the good and bad for each)

What is the average living cost in China? (if you could split it up into cost of water, food and rent it would be appreciated)

finally is it true one must pay 2 months advance for a apartment in China?

Hi Meagan,

Wow, thats a tough bunch of questions..... Alot REALLY depends on what you are looking for personally.

Best Grade - In my opinion, Primary School is the most fun and rewarding because you see the kids grow in class and you get to play a lot of games and use a lot of humor. That said, it also takes a lot more energy and preparation to be a good teacher. Adults in general are excellent workers, but poor students, as work, family and life take much more priority than going to classes and doing home work. Progress is typically very slow and attendance always a problem. However, you can use much more sophisticated material and sit ALL class, therefore requiring the least amount of energy. Babies and kindergarten is just babysitting with songs and simple games, VERY high energy, but typically very low hours for decent money. HIgh school can go either way. You may get a good class, but typically it will be huge. For every amazing English student you have, you will have 5-10 kids only interested in sports, fashion or the latest trends.... Tough to teach the kids who have no interest.

Best place to live? Once again, too subjective. I Love Shenzhen because it is close to Hong Kong, making shopping for those few things you can't find on the mainland easy and super cheap travel deals to pretty much everywhere in the world! Shenzhen is also a very new city, so therefore ultra modern with more parks and green space than you could imagine. Add to that beaches and mountains and it is a truly wonderful place. However, it also has 17 million people, including 7000+ foreigners. The job market here is up and down. You can either work every evening and weekend in a training center 30-40 hours a week, for 8000 a month in one of the most expensive cities in China, or you can earn half of that in a smaller more remote city which is much more charming and in touch with Chinese culture. 4000 a month in a smaller city is a fortune where as 8000 in a big city (Shenzhen, Shanghai, Beijing) is scraping by. Still better cost of living than anything back home, but just depends if you want busy crowded cities with modern amenities and high prices or more laid back smaller cities where you can see more of the older China.

Schools work like this:

Training Centers - English Meat Markets. Heavy class loads evenings and weekends. Popular with nightlife seeking folks, due to the fact you don't start work till 5-6 o'clock most days, and work 4 hours tops. However, its the weekends that kill you! You can easily work 8-12 hours a day actual teaching time on weekends as that is when the most people are free. So if you dont mind Mondays and maybe Tuesdays off then it is not a bad choice. personally I am a family man and would rather have weekends and evenings off. 30-40 hours a week typical, often only 24 teaching hours. Accommodation, food and bills all up to you. 10-20 students typical. Salary can be anywhere from 6000 -10000 per month, depending on location.

Primary/Middle School / University - These jobs vary a lot depending on the location. Typically you are given several classes to teach through the day, going from class to class.
These schools however do not typically follow regular school hours, so you could very well have morning, afternoon and evening classes, but weekends off. Usually teaching hours are less, 10-20 max and you are given an apartment, meals and all bills paid. Salary is typically lower, 4000-8000(maybe) but no overhead. Classes however in regular schools will be huge. Could be anywhere from 20-80, my last school job had 60 kids per class. Very challenging and you often end up concentrating your efforts on the 10% who try and just try to amuse the other 90%. Harder to find these jobs in the big centers, most common in the smaller cities.

Kindergarten: Often the highest paying of English positions, only because so few people want to do it. You HAVE to love kids!!! Classes are all over the place, based on size and age. Could be 20 - 3 year olds or 50 - 4 year olds, or simply a mix of how many kids they can stuff in a classroom. Teaching is very basic, but also very light. A typical Kindergarten ESL teacher does 2 X 30 minute classes in the morning, then 3 hour lunch, then 2 X30 minutes in the afternoon. Work is Monday to Friday 8 - 5, weekends off. Because kindy is SOOOOOOo expensive here and teachers all want either jobs they can sleep in for or don't need to babysit, the salary can be very good. In Shenzhen now the average starting salary is 10-12Krmb, depending on experience.

That brings us to cost of living.
Cheap!!! Cheap, Cheap, Cheap, Cheap!!!
Many Teachers are disheartened when they see 4000rmb online then convert it to local currency. It just doesn't seem like enough, especially if you have bills owing back home. However, in the big picture, 4000 a month is more than most university graduates here make for the first 5 years of work. Doctors and lawyers included.

Food is easily the cheapest thing here. Fresh food is the key as 90% of Chinese people (and me) buy their meat, veg and fruits daily, and it is pennies on the pound compared to back home. As China is in a tropical region (at least part of it) there is an abundance and huge variety of fresh foods. Eating in small local restaurants is also very cheap, only getting on par with food back home when you start eating in fancy hotels and foreign food restaurants (which still often taste nothing like the real foreign food it is imitating anyways.)

Utilities are also cheap, depending on the time of year. Water for us, a family of 3, is about 3 bucks a month in a very expensive city. Drinking water runs us around 10. Gas is also very cheap, as especially in the south, it is not used for heating, only cooking and heating water for showers. Also maybe 2-3 dollars a month. Electricity is the big one, especially if you live south. I have gotten very acclimatized to the 40+ heat in South China, so I don't use Air Conditioning much, pretty much only at night to sleep, and I set my thermostat to 26 degrees. In the summer the bill is about 500rmb (80 bucks) a month if you use it all the time, I typically pay half that. Most foreigners here though are spoiled brats and run theirs 245 hours a day at the coldest setting (you can see your breath!) and they pay over 100 a month easy. Summer for us lasts 4-5 months typically, otherwise the AC is off and the bills becomes 100-150rmb (20 bucks) a month.

Rent is also dependent on a lot of things. First off, yes, it is common practice in China to require not only the first months rent in advance (rent is paid at the beginning of the month, not the end) but you do also need to put down 2 months deposit. Our apartment for example is 3000rmb per month. So prior to moving in we had to pay 9000rmb. The lowest rents I have seen in the big cities is around 1300 RMB, but that is always in the oldest neighborhoods where the buildings are literally a honeycomb of buildings so close together you can shake hands with you neighbor out the window and not need to reach out more than up to your elbow. You can see your neighbors HEAR your neighbors, and sadly even smell them.... And no elevators!!! Actually it is a law in China, any building under 8 stories will not have an elevator, unless a commercial building. From there the prices go up. 2000 - 4000 for a more modern neighborhood, but still not fancy, all the way up to multi-level luxury apartments in the trendy parts of ton which could be 20,000+ per month. Another factor is management fees. As 99% of the rental units are apartments, one must pay management fees. The first place I lived, we had a great landlord. It was old and not fancy, but rent was 2000 per month for 5 years and management fee was 50rmb, due to no elevator. Now we live in a high rise with a stellar view, 3200rmb per month and 320rmb management fees. So substantially more, but I love my apartment and neighborhood, so I don't mind.
In smaller cities those prices go WAY WAY WAY down!!
A decent large apartment will go for 400-500rmb a month and the smaller older ones as little as 100-200!!!! They wont be as fancy and nice, but much cheaper.

Also worth noting, 90% of rental apartments in China are furnished, including TV, kitchen stuff, and standard furniture. Sometimes it is well kept, other times not. When hunting it is best to look at many places and find one not only convenient for work and shopping, but ya may get lucky and find a decently furnished one too.

There ya go, China in a nutshell.

Please pardon the mis-spelling of your name... No edit feature.

不好意思

I didn't even notice until you pointed it out. Thank you for your answers its very hard to find good information about China.

In smaller cities do utilities cost less?

When a school says we will pay for your rent what does that mean? I know that they mean that you must still pay utilities but do they pay the management fee? or the 2 month deposit?

How hard or easy is it to find an apartment in China?

I'm a heavier person will there be any challenges I would face?

Thank you so much for taking the time to answer my questions I really appreciate it!