Learn more about the English Opens Doors Program here
Thursday, January 24, 2013
Intro
Hello!
I am creating this blog to share my experiences in Chile with friends and family back home. I graduated from college a month ago and wanted to go away and do something different for a while before I decide what I want to do next. So I will be living with a host family in Chile as a volunteer for the English Opens Doors Program! This program, run by the Chilean Ministry of Education with the goal of bringing English into every classroom, will have me working full time in a public school, side-by-side with the Chilean English teachers. The idea is that the students can learn grammar and reading from their English teachers (who may not be native speakers) but need to interact with a native speaker (that's me!) in order to learn conversation, as anyone who has learned a foreign language can attest.
I still have a little over a month before I leave for Chile, but I wanted to get this blog up and running so I can get the hang of posting now. Unfortunately, I won't know my exact placement (city, school, and host family) until orientation in Santiago, but two weeks out I will learn which region I will be in (so that I can pack). As I've been eagerly explaining to friends and family at home, Chile is a very unique country with great climate diversity. In the north we have the Atacama Desert, the driest place on earth. The central region is where most Chileans live; all three of Chile's largest cities (Santiago, Concepcion, and Valparaiso) are located here, and this region has a Mediterranean climate. Southern Chile is renowned for its beauty and extreme terrain (especially Torres del Paine and Patagonia) but it is much colder here. In my application, I ranked a large or mid-sized city in the central region as my first location preference, but I'm not guaranteed an assignment there. Fingers crossed!
Since I don't know yet where I'll be, my preparations so far have been pretty basic. Submitting my visa application was an unexpectedly tedious process, but it's awaiting approval in the consulate now! Within the next two weeks I should hear back and get an appointment to go get my passport stamped at the consulate. I found a fantastic deal on my flight to Santiago, from STA Travel: $570 roundtrip from Chicago to Santiago! I also had to decide what to do about my phone and debit card. Since I will have to purchase a cell phone in Chile for local calls, we decided to use an international calling card and just shut off service to my American phone completely (though I will still have it with me to use wifi). And I started a new checking account, carefully chosen for its zero ATM fees *anywhere.* The next project is picking and purchasing travel insurance!
The English Opens Doors Programs does not require participants to have a teaching certificate, or even TEFL certification (as many programs do). I have neither. My experience working at a language school in DC (helping Japanese businesspeople with their English in one-on-one sessions) and now as a substitute teacher will hopefully come in handy, but I felt my English-teaching expertise was still lacking. Thankfully, another volunteer in the program took a TESOL (Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages, similar to TEFL, or Teaching English as a Foreign Language) course and was kind enough to share with everyone else all the materials he received. So over the next few weeks I will be poring over those documents!
That's all I've got for now--I will update as I get more specifics! This first post is longer than I anticipated, but I might as well share everything I can off the bat. I look forward to March!
I am creating this blog to share my experiences in Chile with friends and family back home. I graduated from college a month ago and wanted to go away and do something different for a while before I decide what I want to do next. So I will be living with a host family in Chile as a volunteer for the English Opens Doors Program! This program, run by the Chilean Ministry of Education with the goal of bringing English into every classroom, will have me working full time in a public school, side-by-side with the Chilean English teachers. The idea is that the students can learn grammar and reading from their English teachers (who may not be native speakers) but need to interact with a native speaker (that's me!) in order to learn conversation, as anyone who has learned a foreign language can attest.
I still have a little over a month before I leave for Chile, but I wanted to get this blog up and running so I can get the hang of posting now. Unfortunately, I won't know my exact placement (city, school, and host family) until orientation in Santiago, but two weeks out I will learn which region I will be in (so that I can pack). As I've been eagerly explaining to friends and family at home, Chile is a very unique country with great climate diversity. In the north we have the Atacama Desert, the driest place on earth. The central region is where most Chileans live; all three of Chile's largest cities (Santiago, Concepcion, and Valparaiso) are located here, and this region has a Mediterranean climate. Southern Chile is renowned for its beauty and extreme terrain (especially Torres del Paine and Patagonia) but it is much colder here. In my application, I ranked a large or mid-sized city in the central region as my first location preference, but I'm not guaranteed an assignment there. Fingers crossed!
Since I don't know yet where I'll be, my preparations so far have been pretty basic. Submitting my visa application was an unexpectedly tedious process, but it's awaiting approval in the consulate now! Within the next two weeks I should hear back and get an appointment to go get my passport stamped at the consulate. I found a fantastic deal on my flight to Santiago, from STA Travel: $570 roundtrip from Chicago to Santiago! I also had to decide what to do about my phone and debit card. Since I will have to purchase a cell phone in Chile for local calls, we decided to use an international calling card and just shut off service to my American phone completely (though I will still have it with me to use wifi). And I started a new checking account, carefully chosen for its zero ATM fees *anywhere.* The next project is picking and purchasing travel insurance!
The English Opens Doors Programs does not require participants to have a teaching certificate, or even TEFL certification (as many programs do). I have neither. My experience working at a language school in DC (helping Japanese businesspeople with their English in one-on-one sessions) and now as a substitute teacher will hopefully come in handy, but I felt my English-teaching expertise was still lacking. Thankfully, another volunteer in the program took a TESOL (Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages, similar to TEFL, or Teaching English as a Foreign Language) course and was kind enough to share with everyone else all the materials he received. So over the next few weeks I will be poring over those documents!
That's all I've got for now--I will update as I get more specifics! This first post is longer than I anticipated, but I might as well share everything I can off the bat. I look forward to March!
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