Cactus Language Training Blog
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Cactus and The Independent celebrate Spanish podcast success
- Tuesday, 12th January, 2010
12 January 2010: Cactus, the world’s leading language training specialist, today announced that downloads of its new Spanish learning podcasts - ‘Language Minis’ – distributed through the Independent newspaper’s online presence at independent.co.uk have exceeded 300,000 copies. The specially designed language packages have proved so popular for Independent readers and iTunes users that Cactus is now looking at developing a follow-up series of French podcasts to be rolled-out later in the year.
Cactus’ team of language experts created the podcasts for Spanish learners of all abilities, from beginners through to advanced Spanish speakers. Each level contains 10 lessons with audio, dialogue and vocabulary tracks, as well as a PDF-format workbook with vocabulary lists, grammar points and quizzes.
The podcasts are designed to complement Cactus’ five and ten-week evening courses, available across the UK and in the US and Canada, as well as its international Spanish language holidays. They feature a mix of Spanish and South American Spanish, avoiding regional forms of speech, enabling users to apply what they learn anywhere in the Spanish-speaking world.
Jimmy Leach, editorial director for digital at The Independent said: “This is shaping up to be our most successful podcast series ever. Cactus’ approach to language learning is to equip people for independent travel, a notion which has been the hallmark of our own approach to travel writing for many years. We’re very pleased with the outstanding success of this project - the quality of the podcasts, the numbers of downloads and the way it complements our own editorial approach.”
“The phenomenal popularity of the podcasts confirms just how many people want to get to grips with another language”, comments Richard Bradford, managing director of Cactus in the UK. “At Cactus we believe that the best way to learn a language is through a blended approach, so we’re delighted to be adding podcasts to our extensive range of language learning options, offering language learners even more flexibility.”
Cactus teaches over 30 languages in 60 countries and at 500 locations around the world. For further information, please visit http://www.cactuslanguagetraining.com/en or call 0845 130 4775.
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AARP The Magazine
- Monday, 7th December, 2009
This article, written by Laura Daily, suggests various creative and inspiring vacation ideas for those bored with the recent trend for staycations. The full article, which features Cactus Language Training’s language immersion vacations, can be read here.
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Cactus launches new evening courses in Greenwich
- Monday, 7th December, 2009
The school, a well-established English language and teacher training centre, enjoys a very accessible location on Greenwich High Road and offers a comfortable and effective learning environment.
Low-level courses (beginner and elementary) will be offered in Chinese (Mandarin), French, German, Italian and Spanish, with courses commencing on 19th January, 20th April and 20th July 2010.
Prices start at £179, although Early Bird discounts are available for anyone who books 30 days before the start of the course.
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Suzanne Furstner Foundation Scholarship 2009: Shortlist Announced
- Monday, 23rd November, 2009
The entries were assessed by a panel of three judges against the following criteria: content and structure, originality, language and accuracy, relevance to the scholarship theme and overall impression. All of those shortlisted have won a Cactus Online TEFL Course.
You can read an anonymous entry in full below. To read the winning and other shortlisted entries please click here.
Six weeks in Italy
They say that the best things in life are free, and ambitious graduate Hayley Pearce is hoping to uncover the truth in this old saying by winning the Suzanne Furstner 2009 Scholarship. It will allow her to begin the career of her dreams and the most exciting adventure imaginable.
The scholarship, if awarded to her, will give her the opportunity to complete a four week TEFL course and a two week Italian language course. And where better to do this than Italy itself? It-magazine goes to catch up with the aspirational young would-be teacher in Vespa, a bar located in South Manchester which would scarcely raise an eyebrow if it was plucked out of the ground, transported over Europe and placed somewhere in the middle of Naples.
When we find Hayley, she is sipping an espresso and watching the world go by, seemingly deep in thought. No doubt day dreaming that she is sitting somewhere in Italy drinking espresso with fellow TEFL course students and about to go to a lesson…
As soon as she sees us she greets us with an enthusiastic ‘ciao!’, giving us a friendly smile and standing up to shake our hand and kiss us on each cheek. That’s the Italian way. Clearly she is adopting little snippets of the culture already and she doesn’t even live there. Yet.
But she has set her sights and pinned her hopes on her aspirations to move there. She knows it won’t be all fun and games but that it will be an amazing experience all the same.
‘Often the things you learn the most from aren’t enjoyable from start to finish. I know there’ll be some stressful times but I’ve got the gumption to see it through.’
The TEFL course makes for an intense and challenging four weeks but she knows she’s got what it takes to soar to success. ‘I won’t stop until I achieve what I want’, she tells us, looking us in the eye so we can sense her strikingly determined and clear-headed attitude. ‘I know I need to remain focussed and if it ever emotionally or physically tires me out I’ll just keep thinking about why I want to do it.’
So why does she want to do it?
‘Teaching’s my chosen career path; it’s my ideal job. I am a great communicator and a confident and enthusiastic person. I love helping people. Using my skills and qualities in order to do so gives me great pleasure. To be able to do this as a job would be absolutely phenomenal. Having completed a degree in English Language, I have an excellent command of English grammar and written and verbal communication and I would like to use my skills and knowledge in this area to teach others. Living and teaching abroad appeals to me because the idea of taking on the challenge of teaching English to non-native speakers is extremely exciting and I know it will be highly rewarding. It will be an invaluable experience, both personally and professionally. Also I’m young and adventurous and have no intentions of settling down just yet!
And what’s her big plan?
‘After I have finished my course, I would like to stay in Italy to teach for a while. Then in the long-term I can see myself living in Spain or Germany, and I would also love to teach in South America or South East Asia. That’s the beauty of TEFL courses like CELTA and CertTESOL. They are recognised internationally. Once you’ve passed, you can place yourself anywhere in the world and apply your enthusiasm and skills to teaching different people in different countries. When I am travelling I’m at my most free and able to think the most positively. I’m happy, productive and full of life. Not that I’m not all those things at home of course, but I thrive in unfamiliar environments. I want to stand on my own two feet in a new country.’
We know she is more than capable of standing on her own two feet. This young woman, despite having her sights set so high, has them firmly placed on the ground. She explains how she is fully aware of how hard she has to work to get there, and how she intends to apply all of her strength, ambition and drive both during the course, and beyond it.
We asked her why the course would be beneficial to her.
‘Are you joking? It would be so much more than beneficial. The prospect of being able to combine living in Italy for six weeks with the opportunity to develop teaching skills is so exciting. It would be an absolute dream. The course would mark the beginning of what will hopefully become a very long and fruitful career in teaching. With the knowledge of the Italian language under my belt coupled with the skills and qualities gained and enhanced during the TEFL course, I will be well equipped to begin teaching English in Italy. This experience would then pave the way for me to teach English in other countries, applying what I have learnt to classrooms in other parts of the world. Later in life, if and when I want to return to England, I would like to continue to work in TEFL, perhaps a more ‘behind the scenes’ job, but not before I have lived and worked in every continent. I have very big ambitions.’
You don’t say! We then started talking about Italy and why she was so excited to be beginning her TEFL journey there.
‘Italy has so much to offer. It is historically fascinating and is such an important and influential country, especially in the domains of fashion, fine art and food. I am also eager to improve my Italian, and Italy would obviously be the most perfect setting for Italian language lessons. TEFL is currently on the rise in Italy and many schools are looking to recruit even fairly inexperienced teachers. Therefore, I feel it would be an ideal place to be when I am looking for my first job. The scholarship would open up such an amazing opportunity for so many reasons.
‘Immersing myself in other cultures has always been a wonderful and enlightening experience for me, and I see this as a chance to both gain new skills and experience in TEFL and to absorb as much about the Italian way of life, its culture and its people as is humanly possible!’
When in Rome…
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Suzanne Furstner Foundation Scholarship 2009: Shortlist Announced
- Monday, 23rd November, 2009
The entries were assessed by a panel of three judges against the following criteria: content and structure, originality, language and accuracy, relevance to the scholarship theme and overall impression. All of those shortlisted have won a Cactus Online TEFL Course.
You can read Sara’s entry in full below. To read the winning and other shortlisted entries please click here.
Sara Harllee
Six weeks in Italy
As I look out over my balcony at this magnificent country, I reflect of the magic that has been the past six weeks. I reflect over my many experiences here, my new compendium of teaching knowledge and wisdom, the wonderful people I have met, and my new language, Italian. I have fit in seamlessly here in Italy, the native language flowing off my tongue, and I cannot envision a better journey. Even my CELTA teaching sessions, which I approached with great trepidation, went fantastically and formed the perfect foundation for my future classes. Words simply do not do justice to beauty, passion, and perfection I have known here in Italy.
My eyes come back to focus as I am now choking with laughter. The lack of sleep and general state of brewing expectation has, once again, produced mental sappiness of a horrifying degree. After completing my voodoo dance of normalcy, and laughing until my stomach hurts, I grab my mug of tea, stare past my bedroom curtain, which bravely tries to pretend it is a door, and try to focus my mind again. However, I am distracted by the hysterical realities that I have a curtain masquerading as a door, my salvaged computer desk would cramp a midget, my bed creaks like a dying duck, and my computer screen is out of focus…again.
I sit here and wonder if I have lost my mind. I comfort myself with the encouraging thought that I won’t know it if I really have. Please do not ask why this is comforting. Comfort is just something one has to take as it comes. Shifting from the non-profit arts industry to teaching is enough to make my head spin. It is a good thing I like carnival rides, or life might not seem like so much fun. I think of my linguistics, articulation, and speech classes in college and the sorrow I felt when I could not find a plausible excuse to explain why I wanted to major in linguistics. I think of the elementary teaching classes I have taken, which brings up dreadful memories that are best left in the past. I think most importantly about how much I love people, languages, different cultures, and different places, and how, for the first time, I have found a place where these loves make sense and are celebrated. Well, they are at least tolerated and laughed about with good humor, which is almost as good. I would much rather laugh than make sense anyways.
Language is a door to other worlds, places and people. It is also a door that can stub your toe or slam in your face when used incorrectly, so please open with care and be sure not to smack anyone on the other side. Teaching English as a second language thrills me to a level so deep I begin to doubt my sanity. The prospect of learning the nitty-gritty of pronouns and gerunds, the ins and outs of how my deliciously botched native language is learned, and why so many people hate grammar is exhilarating. Of course, I must first deflate my dreamy bubble of ecstasy and find a real way to make this happen. I have thought out a plan and decided that maybe, given the current economy, saving for thirty years in order to afford a quality TEFL education program is not too much to bear. By that point, I will be so old perhaps a CELTA program will give me a senior’s discount. Another option is to sell off the belongings I have left, given that I have already sold much in an attempt to get myself closer to TEFL certification and free myself from unnecessary items that would burden travel. Of course, when I consider the chances that anyone would want what I have left, I think I would have a better chance of sailing the Atlantic on a goat. But, like the crazy life paths that brought me to the TEFL industry in the first place, an equally crazy path brought me to the Cactus TEFL website, and so, in a mad dash of hope, my mind turns to Italy.
Italy. It is the country that now holds my glimmer of possibility and potential, adventurous confetti burst in the future. It could also be the best behind kicking of a lifetime, but those things often are the same and I have found both equally enjoyable. Of course, the first things that come to mind are the Rick Steves films I have drooled over, pizza made with whole fish slapped onto giant pieces of bread, crazed students mumbling teaching techniques, nights of frantic lesson planning, and bedrooms with real doors. I am excited by the mere fact that Italian is similar enough to Spanish that I know when someone is saying they are in love. Of course, unless someone pledges his or her undying love to me or I am asked to be a new TV Love Doctor sensation, this will not come in very handy. At times my mind turns to imagining the different ways I can get lost walking from my lodgings to the learning center, of which I have counted twenty so far, how long I can go without sleep, and if I can make as many fantastic language blunders as I did with Spanish, some of which would either make your toes curl or come in handy in a brothel. I think of the amazing people I would be bound to meet, the stories to last a lifetime, and the tools to teach someone right; I think of all the crazy, wonderful, and embarrassment inducing things that make life’s journeys worth the while. Lastly, I think of my life, curtain and all, and the career path I am fighting to make a reality. And I hope that, maybe, through some weird twist of fate, Italy will get me there.
Once again, my out of focus computer screen brings me back home. Staring with blurry eyes down the hall, I realize I do not know how the future will play itself out, if I will ever see Italy, or if my backside will ever cease being numb after the hours in my highly un-ergonomic chair. I also realize, in a moment of frightening clarity, that drinking too much tea has a rather undeniable effect, which is something I think is most handy to remember in a classroom situation. However, I know that regardless of what it takes, whether a thirty-year wait or on the back of a goat, I will find my way to teach English as a second language, legally of course. And hopefully, in the end, I will find that somewhere along this journey there is some magic left for me.
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Suzanne Furstner Foundation Scholarship 2009: Shortlist Announced
- Monday, 23rd November, 2009
The entries were assessed by a panel of three judges against the following criteria: content and structure, originality, language and accuracy, relevance to the scholarship theme and overall impression. All of those shortlisted have won a Cactus Online TEFL Course.
You can read Rosette’s entry in full below. To read the winning and other shortlisted entries please click here.
Rosette Nagimesi
Six weeks in Italy
The strange thing about language is that you can never fully understand it unless you totally immerse yourself in the culture from which it sprung. Some aspects are just impossible to describe in a text book; like the hand gestures that give significance to certain words, or the way in which the same phrase can be intoned differently to mean different things, or even the small sounds that seem innocuous but carry a wealth of meaning. This realization hit me during my first week in Florence, Italy.
As part of a TEFL scholarship I’d won, I was here for six weeks, two of which would be spent learning Italian. The opportunity meant so much that for the first time in a long while, I could say the words, ‘carpe diem’ with as much conviction as they required.
Pulling my gaze away from the window, I donned my jacket and headed for the door. My lessons began in an hour and I was actually looking forward to them. Class here was nothing like anything I had ever experienced before; it had very little to do with speculation and everything to do with practice.
I stepped onto the cobbled street and breathed in the cool morning air, all the while marvelling at the power of fate. Only a month ago, my days had basically entailed filing and typing. Of course the thought of doing that for the rest of my life terrified me but I had absolutely no clue how to go about changing my life. How I went from an uneventful existence to one fuelled by a passion for language, one that let me earn my living doing something I love, totally eluded me.
The situation really had seemed hopeless; I had no savings and the nearest TEFL centre was a country away. God only knew how long it would take for me to get a certificate. Defeat was a thought away when I came across the Suzanne Furstner Foundation Annual scholarship with its unbelievably generous offer. Quickly, I’d fulfilled the requirements, submitted them and waited with bated breath. A month later, here I was.
I stopped by a café for some stuffed croissants and coffee. From where I sat, I could see the city come alive; people in sober clothes rushing to work, tourists in whatever they pleased, taking pictures of everything, and students like me, walking and talking amongst themselves. Sounds of conversation and laughter filled the air and even the waiters smiled whenever they caught my eye. Clearly, the ‘Fiorentini’ were a cheerful lot. I wondered if Italians in other parts were equally jovial. The first rays of sun bathed everything in yellow, making me loath to leave, but I had to get to class.
Ours was a group of six; Alain, Sebastian, Marian, Isaac, Clara and I. We came from different continents, had different backgrounds and varying levels of experience. Our only bond was a shared aspiration to become English teachers. This was enough to render all else inconsequential. At first, the notion that we needed to be taught how to teach English had seemed hilarious; each one of us had spoken it all our lives, how difficult could it be?
As time went on, we saw just how complex it could get when dealing with people who had had little to no previous exposure to the language. In any case, by the end of the first week, no one was laughing.
The morning was spent learning everything, from black board usage, to grammar and pronunciation. To help things sink in better, each lesson ended in an assignment. These were to be demonstrated in front of the class the next day just so we’d ensure that what seemed to work in theory, could actually work in practice.
After class, Marian, Sebastian and I made our way to the cafeteria. The three of us had made a pact to practice our Italian right from the start, so each day after class, we switched language, unashamed to make mistakes and determined to keep practicing until the number of times we looked into our phrase books reduced significantly.
We sat, placed our orders and looked through the lesson plans we’d prepared for our afternoon classes. At some point, Marian began to worry that she’d prepared too many lessons. We quickly laid her fears to rest by reminding her that she didn’t have to rush through all of them at once. After all, it was better to be over prepared than under prepared. While we ate, we swapped stories of home and family and after lunch, we headed for our respective classes.
My class was made up of six intermediate students. I’d been teaching them for three days and things were going well. I remembered my first day as a teacher. Naturally, I’d been nervous but the fact that my previous days had been spent preparing for that moment fortified me. I knew that these students were here because they loved English and that compelled me to make sure that they had an enjoyable learning experience.
That afternoon, after the self introductions, I began the class by teaching them a song. We got off to a shaky start but by the fifth attempt, every one was singing boisterously and those who couldn’t compete, compensated by thumping their desks heartily. When order finally returned, we went through the song slowly, pronouncing everything and translating new words. By the end of the class, though I’d only managed to teach one lesson and introduce a second, I was confident in the knowledge that now, the students would be more receptive to my teaching and also trust me enough to let me know what they needed from me.
For four weeks, I spent my mornings learning and my afternoons, teaching. The cyclic relay of information allowed me to channel the tactics that helped me understand my lessons, and use them to teach my students in a way that they would understand theirs. I endeavoured to use taught and self invented methods to make sure that neither I nor my students walked away from our respective classes empty handed. With each passing day, my confidence grew and so did my conviction that I would be a great TEFL trainer.
On the last day of my teaching practice, the students surprised me with an invitation to a farewell drink. The best-spoken of them, Giovanni, made a speech that made my eyes tear. At the end, under the influence of many sweet drinks, we all hugged each other and promised to keep in touch. It pleased me that a language had been taught, a gap bridged, and perhaps, most importantly, friends made.
The next couple of weeks were spent learning Italian. I didn’t have much of a problem with this because I’d been practicing for a while. Better yet, my knowledge of French helped me make sense of the language rules that might have confused a novice. To give us a more in depth learning experience, our instructor, Ms. De Luca, did not restrict us to the classroom. She took us on trips almost every afternoon.
We visited the country side along the river Arno and struck up conversations with the locals. It excited us to think that what had seemed so incomprehensible on day one made so much sense now. Our major triumph, though, came from realizing that the words we spoke made sense to the natives and prompted proper responses. At the Galleria degli Uffizi, we had a lovely time commenting on the art pieces in Italian. We sat in the street side cafés and placed our orders, relying on each other, rather than our phrase books, for correction. At every turn, we found something to comment on or someone to speak to, ensuring that our practice was endless. This helped us learn a lot in the short time that we had left.
At the end of our six weeks, the entire class, together with Mr. Robins and Ms. De Luca, had a farewell dinner at which everyone made a speech. Some opted to write theirs down in simple but perfect Italian while the bolder, more spontaneous ones chose to speak off the cuff. The latter group’s speeches were peppered with numerous English interjections and these, when coupled with Ms. De Luca’s comically pained expressions, kept us bent over with laughter. The night ended in lots of dancing and when it was all over, we bundled into a taxi and went home.
As I sat in my room, on my last night in that beautiful city, it occurred to me that I already missed it. Staying was not an option though; there was still too much to experience and plenty more students to teach. More than an English teacher, I was an emissary and it was my duty to unite the people everywhere using the tool I wielded best. That tool was language.
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