Experiences of a tesol qualification

Hi all,

I want to study for a TESOL qualification in the near future as I plan to travel Europe and would like to earn money as I go doing a job I think I'd really love to do. I have looked into the full time courses but have heard they are very intensive, Monday to Friday with 3 hours extra study each day and study throughout weekends. I wouldn't mind this but I don't know whether I'd struggle to complete the course within a very short time frame (of course I'd give it a good go though) and I would have to give up my current job which isn't really an option at the moment so from experience just how intensive is the intensive course?

For this reason I have looked into part time TESOL courses which take 3 months rather than 4 weeks to complete which might be better suited to me as hopefully it would give me more time to prepare lesson plans and I might be able to work alongside it (although obviously I'd study just as much as the intensive course). The only downside is the price as most websites state it is more complex logistically. If anyone has any experiences of the part time course and would recommend it, let me know.

Finally those of you that have completed either the part time or full time course where has it taken you?

Well I am not sure which ones you are looking at but make sure it is a 'Trinity TESOL' course. The other alternative is the Cambridge CELTA course. Both are possible to do part time and full time courses.
I say this because I work in Portugal at the moment and these are basically the only 2 courses which are accepted. We have 9 teachers at my school, 8 did the CELTA course and one did the Trinity TESOL. They sound much the same.

I wouldn't worry about the amount of planning by the way. Remember you only have to plan for part of one lesson; from 20 mins to an hour. While in a QTS/PGCE teaching practise trainees must plan for 4 x 50mins lessons. So at least 4 times more planning a day. You do 5 times more watching of other teachers than actual teaching yourself.
There are also essays but they aren't long and all the seminars in the afternoons prepare for them well.

Final thing is when you 'near future', how near is 'near', but most schools in Europe offer contracts of Sept/Oct to May/June. So if you want to try from 2015-2016, you might be pushing it for this year with a part time course. Seeing how they start interviewing in July and joining a course takes longer than you would expect.

Thanks for the reply Yeah it is a Trinity TESOL course, looked into CELTA but think the TESOL one is better suited to me, might look into it again though as there is a CELTA course that is run at a college near me. Only thing is I'd like to teach both children and adults but I've heard the CELTA courses are specifically aimed at teaching adults, do you know if that's true? I know CELTA appears to be more popular though.

By near I mean within the next year or two, most likely the end of next year. I heard that the contracts for European schools were around that time of year so will probably look into doing a course at the beginning of next year to give me enough time to apply for jobs etc. What's the interview process like, hope it's not too scary haha

Portugal sounds great, bet you're loving it out there. Does the course prepare you well for the job or is it like starting fresh again? (I'm assuming you did the CELTA course, correct me if I'm wrong, I know the courses are similar in certain ways a