BootsnAll Travel Community

Maybe I missed it somewhere in the board and the other helpful links that I have been perusing but I can't seem to locate any info on what type of training you receive when teaching english overseas. I am specifically looking at Korea for a year-long contract but am curious to find out what if any training they give you.
Do you just walk in, they hand you a roster and say "Good luck" (probably not), or are there specific lesson plans and structure to what and when you teach?
I am interested to hear others experiences (even if different countries).

Definitely check out the Korean forums at Dave's ESL Cafe, but at the same time, take all the postings with a pound of salt. People are a lot more apt to complain than praise their jobs, especially under the cloak of anonymity. Also, some people are not very, uh, mature or used to working a full-time jobs, so their complaints reflect this (for example, one of my favorite complaints is that one boss worked their employees too hard because when teachers were expected to work during their entire shift, and couldn't spend the time slacking off or nursing a hangover!).

The Galbijim wiki project is geared towards ESL teachers in Korea, and has a pretty good section on how to start teaching English in Korea.

Teacher training and preparation seems to vary from school to school, ranging from training periods and standard curriculum and ready-made texts and teaching materials to throwing a teacher straight of the plane in front of a class with no or poor-quality teacher. I've mainly been looking at hagwons (private institutes) rather than public schools, but my understanding is that if you teach in a public school, you will usually have a Korean co-teacher.

Before you sign any contracts, you should definitely make sure if and how much training you will receive, how much curriculum is already prepared, (especially if you don't have much teaching experience), how much prep work is required (and if it's paid time!), etc. and try to talk to other teachers in addition to the boss.