The English Teachers

EA: Well, my mom is a teacher and she loves her profession so much. She’s a university teacher and she’s always said that it’s the best profession you can possibly have because you don’t have to sit in an office. You get to work with people. I like that and I think she feels the same as I do, that our profession is really, really rewarding, because not only do you get to learn about people, you get to make friendships and acquaintances. It’s also very rewarding in terms of making people’s lives better. The other part of my family wanted me to go into medicine, but I don’t think it’s for me. I still love knowing that I’m actually doing something to make people’s lives better. So, I think that was the main reason.

RFDG: You grew up here. Is that the only reason you decided to work specifically in Moscow?

EA: No. Until last year I haven’t been able to really leave Moscow. I have my whole family here and even though they actually wanted me to go and study somewhere and were ready to give me the money to do it, my grandfather had cancer, so I didn’t want to go anywhere.

Now the situation, unfortunately, has changed and I’m free to go wherever I want.

RFDG: If you could go anywhere, where would you like to go?

EA: I love Europe. Maybe it’s because I’m very into art. I’m specifically into European art – a boring person! Many people say, “Oh, Europe – every city, every town is absolutely no different from every other one. It’s all the same. Blah, blah, blah.” I’ve heard my friends saying that.

But every single little town, village and city I’ve been to in Europe is so different. And I love it. I love the differences. I love the cultural differences. If you go to Asia, of course there is a bigger difference. But I still love Europe. I’d love to go to England again. I was there three times when I was in school, but I don’t really remember much. I do remember it, of course, but I’ve never really got to explore it, to experience it.

RFDG: Does anything stop you from going there?

EA: No, not really, apart from the financial question because it is very, very expensive. So, right now that’s why I’m trying to get the teaching scholarship. But I have a job and I think I could get a visa. Then again, you need a lot of time to actually explore the UK, so I think I can only do it in the summer.

*

Felipe Fülber (FF)

Setting the scene: Like many interviewees, Felipe puts a great deal of thought into what he says. Unlike many interviewees, he often makes puns and sly asides. This takes the edge off the wisdom and thoughtfulness that comes through while we sit in somewhat uncomfortable desk chairs in one of the smaller classrooms of a teacher training centre.

FF: I went to university in Brazil to get a degree in English, so I did some studying of English literature and pedagogy. I worked as an English teacher while I was at university. I started when I was 18. I worked for two and a half years in a school that was mostly audio-lingual, so there was a lot of drilling.

When I finished I got a job at a school which did CLT and that’s where I stayed for the next six years. Then I did my CELTA in 2014 and I went to Barcelona and started my DELTA before going back to Brazil to do Module 1. Once that was over I started looking for jobs elsewhere and then I came here.

RFDG: Why did you choose teaching?

FF: To be honest, I didn’t know what else to do with my life. In Brazil, when you finish secondary school you have to decide what course you want to do and you have to do a university entrance exam, which is quite hard. It can be a big waste of time if you decide to do a course and give up halfway through. Since I couldn’t decide what I wanted to do I decided to go with what I was good at which was English. It honestly wasn’t the hardest one to get into. Midway through I needed some money, so I thought I might as well start teaching. I taught university students and enjoyed it.

RFDG: Brazil and Spain are quite hot, so why Moscow?

He laughs in anticipation of his answer.

FF: Because it was cold. Actually, after I was done in Barcelona and started looking for jobs, I was more interested in going to Colombia or Argentina because I was more interested in practising my Spanish more than anything. Of all the schools I sent my CV to, BKC was the nicest one. It was a similar situation to when I was looking for a place to do my DELTA. I sent my application to IH Vancouver, Barcelona and London. Barcelona was the nicest. They replied the quickest and gave me as much information as I wanted. How receptive the company was, for me, important.

RFDG: So, it’s not so much the country as the school or the company?

FF: Yeah, it was mostly about the company because I really wanted to further my career and become a CELTA trainer. That’s my immediate goal and I thought I’d have a better chance of doing it here. In my interview, my interviewer mentioned all the seminars and workshops. So far I’m the only person who seems to be excited about seminars.

RFDG: If you hadn’t become an English teacher what would you have been?

FF (deadpan): Homeless?

I can’t help but laugh and join in the fun.

FF: Seriously, I honestly don’t know. I feel many English teachers are failed artists of some kind. I did some writing at university and I record music from time to time, so I’d like to be involved in something like that. But I don’t think I’d be making as much money as an English teacher which is not that much to begin with, so that’s quite discouraging. I guess some sort of boring administrative job somewhere.

RFDG: Is that observation of English teachers being failed artists based solely on your life or encounters with others?

FF: Encounters with others for sure. Including one famous one. If you look up Jeremy Harmer’s name on Google, you’ll find two blocks. One devoted to ELT, the other to his not so well known music career. So, I’m in good company.

RFDG: Is it beneficial for teachers to have an artistic flair?

FF: It means you’re more willing to make a fool of yourself, or that you are more comfortable in public and being the centre of attention… and maybe you want to be the centre of attention. So that helps. Sometimes you find teachers who get anxious easily and don’t know how to do it very easily, so perhaps that is somehow connected.

*

Frances (F)

Setting the scene: It’s getting dark outside. Moscow has yet to emerge from winter and the sun still moves across the sky at a faster pace than the moon. It will be soon be sub-zero outside at the end of a day of many classes and interviews. My final interviewee is Frances. This is not her real name, but she prefers not to be cast in the limelight with her actual name.

Perhaps this is just as well since the office we sit in – shared with several others – is somewhat messy so giving away the location may annoy some others. Then again, this seems to be hallmark of many teacher trainers working together in one office. Though I cannot describe her appearance much, Frances speaks with an even tone that marks out her years of experience. Occasionally, though, some mischief and sarcasm creeps in.

F: I was born and brought up in the north east of England. I studied Applied Language Studies in London. Since then I have been teaching. The first 23 years in a German context, then here in Moscow. I’m in teacher training and teaching.

RFDG: Why did you pick teaching as a career?

F: I didn’t. Well, OK, let’s go back. I studied Applied Language Studies and originally wanted to train as an interpreter, but at that time in the UK there were only three places you could do that. One was a poly in London and you had to be either rich and African or very, very good to get in. Another was in Bath, which was just very, very boring.

The final one was in Bradford. I went all the way to Bradford to the university and did the try out test. It was translation and interpretation and all six of us there got through the translation for both languages. We all got through the interpreting for French, but we all failed the interpreting for German. Basically, the message was, “Go to Germany and come back when you can actually speak the language.”

So, I went to Germany and did teaching.

RFDG: So, why didn’t you go back to being an interpreter? Why did you stay being a teacher?

F: I don’t know. I just never got around to it.

She laughs.

RFDG: And then you came here. Why did you pick Moscow?

F: Because I wanted to do DELTA – God knows why – but I wanted to do it here because in Germany at that time, at the end of the 1990s and 2000s, CELTA was virtually unknown. DELTA was problematic. There was no DELTA school in Germany. I was working in a university context and if you’re not an academic on an academic track in the university context in Germany, they don’t care what you do as long as your students don’t complain. There is no in-service training. There’s nothing.

So, I had to leave the country and I went to IH because that’s where I did my initial training. IH means something. I interviewed for Prague and for Moscow, and I had students who were here in Moscow that year, so I came to Moscow.

RFDG: That was the only thing that influenced your decision to choose here and not Prague?

F: Well, that and the fact you got much better pay here in Moscow. Well, it was then and in fairness it still is. It’s better than most of Europe. Let’s be honest about this.

RFDG: But you stayed.

F: Yeah.

RFDG: Why?

F: Haven’t got around to leaving yet?