I was lucky enough to interview a student who is currently learning English as a foreign language online in Katowice, Poland. This blog helps online TEFL teachers understand what it’s like to be a student learning English online.

Interview with an online student; Questions

1. How do you usually find English language teachers online?

There are a lot of useful websites where professional English teachers can advertise themselves online to students like me:

e-korepetycje.net, korepetycje24.com, preply.com and also on OLX.

2. What online platforms do you use?

I actually don’t use any other platforms to learn English online.

This is because my English teacher provides me with all the learning material I need via email.

3. What are the advantages of learning English online?

The best thing is that I can have an English lesson at 7 am in the morning before work.

With winter months in Poland being very cold this factor allows me to learn from the comfort of my own home.

4. What are the disadvantages of learning English online?

I mainly use Skype because it’s free and I can use it on my laptop or phone.

But, sometimes the connection is lost so we have to change to talking on the phone such as Whatsapp.

5. What ESL learning material do you use?

My English teacher creates her own material specific to my learning needs and combines my University studies.

The conversation is key and I learn new vocabulary in reading exercises/ texts.

6. How does your teacher give you homework?

I do all of my English homework on PDF editor and then I can easily send it over via email.

English lessons Holidays and Celebrations

In other news, it was valentine’s day recently and here in Poland, they have gone crazy for the Western holiday. Therefore, I prepared some material for younger learners to create. Following step by step instructions in English they created Valentine’s Day cards depicting (Bee my valentines). The next celebration I will celebrate will be St Patricks Day. It will give me the opportunity to talk about the Irish holiday and religious holiday celebrated around the world. I think it’s important for the young learners to learn about different holidays and traditions outside of Poland. Using my own material – vocabulary, conversation questions, video exercises and a quiz.