Face-to-face or online?

You will need to consider carefully which type of course is the most appropriate for your needs.  And you will especially need to take care in deciding between an online course and a face-to-face course.

We believe in training for excellence in English language teaching and we are justifiably proud of our whole range of courses. We do, however, recommend that if it is at all possible you attend one of our face-to-face courses. There can be no substitute for the learning and practical skills which you will gain through the experience of supervised teaching. The face-to-face courses give you the opportunity to put into practice, in a guided situation, the approaches which you are learning about theoretically. This experience, together with the advice and feedback which you will receive from your tutor, will enable you to make sure progress in mastering teaching techniques. You will also be able to observe classes taught by experienced language teachers.

Click on the appropriate link for information about the general content of the different  online and face-to-face courses.  Read below for advice about which course(s) could be suitable for you:

a) Face to face courses
b) Online courses
c) Courses step by step

Face to face courses

We run the following face-to-face courses in Bournemouth, UK (with occasional 5-week Trinity courses run in Poland and Kazakhstan):

5-week face-to-face Trinity College, London, Level 4 Certificate in TESOL
This is the intensive training course which International Training Network has successfully run since 1995 and which provides comprehensive, in-depth training and an internationally recognised accreditation. It includes 6 hours of supervised teaching practice.

This course will be of special interest to the following people:
• short-term or long-term workers who have opportunities to teach  English in a formal or informal classroom setting
• those who wish to teach English in conversation classes, English clubs or similar settings
• those who wish to teach English in a one-to-one situation
• language assistants
• gap year students
• those who need an internationally recognised teaching qualification. (Many language schools will ask for such certification. The Trinity College TESOL certificate and the equivalent Cambridge CELTA certificate are the most well known)

1-week face-to-face Introductory course
This course includes opportunities for supervised teaching practice and will be of special interest to the following people:
• those who would like to experience an introductory 'taster' course
• volunteers teaching English on summer camps or other short-term equivalents
• volunteers helping with English conversation groups

Teaching Practice – The Classroom Experience
This course includes opportunities for supervised teaching practice and will be of special interest to the following people:
• Trainees who have taken the 1-week Introductory course and who wish to have some additional hours of teaching practice.
• Trainees who have completed online courses and who wish to supplement these with observed classroom teaching practice.
• Teachers who have already completed a Trinity College or CELTA course but who wish to refresh their skills through observed teaching practice.

Online courses

TESOL Practical Toolkit  course
This course will be of special interest to the following people:

• short-term or long-term workers who have opportunities to teach English in an informal situation and who do not require the in-depth development of practical teaching skills or international certification which the 5-week face-to-face course provides.
• those who wish to teach English in conversation classes, English clubs, summer camps or similar settings
• those who wish to teach English in a one-to-one situation
• language assistants
• gap year students
• non-native English teachers who wish to develop their skills in communicative language teaching
• holders of a TESOL  teaching certificate (eg Trinity College or CELTA) who have not used their teaching skills for some time and would like to use this as a refresher course.

Please note that as there is no extended face-to-face teaching practice component, this course alone is not sufficient for those who are or will be teaching English as their main occupation in a formal classroom context.

Courses step by step

You may wish to take a 1-week face-to-face course or an online course and supplement it in the future.

For example, after participating in an online course you could build on this at a later date by attending a face-to-face course: either the 1-week 'Teaching Practice – The Classroom Experience' or the full 5-week intensive Trinity Course.

All our courses, whether online or face to face provide a valuable preparation for the 5-week intensive Trinity course.