Today is my last day working at my current school. I have worked there for three years.
It is also possibly my last day working as a teacher.
After this the wife and I will be moving to Australia. I do not have the necessary qualifications to work as a teacher outside of teaching TEFL so cannot work in most English-speaking countries.
I’m not sure what I will do. Before becoming a teacher I worked in retail for six years. I sold sports clothes at some shit-hole store in my hometown for a year before moving to a shop down the street to sell home wares. When I went to university I worked in a bookshop for my first two years and then the local branch of the home wares store.
Teaching came about when I graduated university. I went to Thailand for two months to travel around and met some cool people. When I got back to England I moved in with my brother and started working for a different branch of the home wares store.
Life during this period was not great. I was getting up at six, leaving at seven for work, working a full shift, and then getting back home at seven. I was exhausted all the time and never had any money. My co-workers were fine and I was living in Manchester, which was awesome.
At some point I received an email from one of the people I had met in Thailand asking me if I could consider moving there to work at her school. For me this was a big decision but for my brother and parents it was a no-brainer. They all but packed my bags for me and kicked me out of the door (in the nicest possible way).
I was absolutely terrified of the prospect of teaching. Actually standing in front of a group of people and talking scared me no end. I was twenty-one years old and still quite shy, happy to blend in with the crowd and keep my head down.
In the end my first few days of teaching were pretty nerve-wracking but I survived them. I start teaching high school but was unhappy there so my boss moved me to teaching third grade were I flourished.
Over the years I’ve taught pre-school, primary, junior school, high school and adults. Primary has always been my favourite. It is an age group where they are still very childish and fun, but there is an emerging rebellion and cynicism within some of the quicker developing kids that makes the whole thing interesting.
I taught in Thailand for two years, which was incredible, and South Korea for two and half, which had its ups and downs.
This past three years I have been teaching in Istanbul, which have been amazing.
TEFL teaching appeals to an interesting selection of people. There are the people who see an opportunity to see and live in a different part of the world. To try new things and eat new foods and see new places. I have had the good fortune to meet a lot of these people including my amazing wife, (my muse, my flame, the light of my life and the fire of my loins)
And then it also seems to appeal to a wide range of very annoying people, but that’s a story for another day.
So with today being my last day as a teacher I am somewhere between sad and happy. I am sad to say goodbye to my students and sad to say goodbye to most of my co-workers. It will be odd to have a job in the future where I am not hugged all day. Where I am not told that I am fat or ugly or smelly but loved anyway. It will be weird to have a job where I can’t just spend thirty minutes telling stories to enraptured kids. It will be strange to have a job where I can’t shut people up by telling them that if they’re quiet their group will get two dragons and if they get five the whole class can watch Gangnam Style.
I am happy because I managed to do it. I moved away nine years ago and at the time I kept hearing, ‘I don’t see you as a teacher’ or ‘I can’t imagine you teaching.’
I felt the same but, after nine years and especially because this year my co-teacher and I have been killing it, I am very happy to have proved myself wrong.
