Who teaches Cactus’ part-time evening courses?
Tuesday, 9th March 2010
It's fair to say that the majority of Cactus' teachers are quite different from the foreign language teachers that most people were taught by at secondary school.
The main difference is that the vast majority are native speakers of the language that they teach. They are ambassadors not only for their language but also for their culture, and will relish the chance to educate you about both in lessons.
In addition, all Cactus teachers have specialist qualifications and experience in Teaching a Foreign Language to Adults. Some of our trainers are leaders in their field with extensive business experience, PhDs or MBAs, and others have very interesting pastimes, hobbies or even second jobs, which make them veritable hives of information!
One of these such teachers is German trainer Gerhard Gall. Originally from Coburg, in Bavaria, he is a keen opera singer and, in fact, also works as a German language coach for operatic singers who need help with their German repertoire (Mozart, Beethoven, Wagner, Strauss, Bach).
He has lived in the UK for the last 4 years, but prior to that was a primary school teacher in Germany. He has been teaching for Cactus for 3 years, and has also represented the company in a live TV interview, which was a particular highlight for him!
Natalia Nin is another teacher who has been working for Cactus for 3 years. She is originally from Barcelona, but has lived in London for 5 years and and Sydney for 4. She was teaching in both cities, which makes her teaching experience to date span 9 years in total.
She enjoys teaching a lot and describes it as fun and interesting - she says that it enables her to meet a lot of people and means that she can learn about other cultures.
Although she teaches a lot of classes for Cactus in the evening, during the day time she also teaches workers in City-based companies, and children in a variety of schools throughout London. It keeps her very busy - she says she’d be lost without her moped to get her from A to B!
In any free time that she has, she enjoys travelling, swiming, dancing, going out and going to the beach… a little easier in Sydney than London, admittedly!
Another of Cactus’ Spanish trainers is Olga Ferriz, who originates from Zaragoza. She has lived in London on-and-off for 5 years, where she has worked not only as a teacher for Cactus, but also as a secondary school teacher and on an examination board.
In 2006, she packed everything up and went to live in Osaka, Japan, where she also got a full-time job as a Spanish teacher.
Like Natalia, Olga says that she enjoys teaching because of the contact and interaction with people that it allows. She says that she learns a lot from her students, and that classes, for her, are an exchange of information, of cultural aspects and of life experiences too.
More on Cactus’ evening courses
Tags: language, tailor-made, part-time evening course, italian, german, culture, french, spanish, english
Posted by Laura Harrison 2010-03 under Teaching Languages,
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