Would Like Some Info On Mediakids

[Thulemin]

Hello all!

I just got a conditionnal offer from Media Kids. They place teachers in public schools throughout Thailand, in primary or secondary school, from urban settings to rural villages. I consider the pay to be decent, plus the accomodation is provided, as well as the visa and the WP.

I would be teaching 22-24 hours a week but would stay at school 8am - 4.30pm. No evening or week-end classes, one 1-day english camp per semester.

I've read some bad and good short comments on forums but nothing detailed. I got a "they exhaust the teachers" without further explanation, but don't see how it could be so, as they place the teacher but are not the one supervising them.

So here are my questions :

- Have you ever dealt with MediaKids and what would be your insights and feelings about them ? (remember the "naming and shaming" rule of this forum >> pm me if you have a really negative comment plz)

- Do you think a "22-24 hours a week" workload would be enough to exhaust a teacher ? Tire, ok, but exhaust ?

Just for information, I'm French, with a BA (and the TEFL is due in March) with a part-time one-year experience. So I'm pretty happy nonetheless with their offer. Would just love some more information before pulling the trigger Thanks a lot !

[allane]

I do not have any information on Media Kids, but here are some thoughts on your question about workload:

22 - 24 hrs. per week is just "do-able", but only if you do not have to do any lesson planning or marking.

If you are working in an elementary or high school, you should allow about 1 hour marking time for every hour of teaching time. From my experience, it is essential that the students know that the time with the foreign teacher counts for something in terms of their grade. That requires that you give them a markable assignment approximately every second class, and that you grade it and return it to them.

Conversely, if all that you are going to do is walk in, talk and wave your arms around, and then walk out, you will very quickly get to the point where the students are ignoring you, and waiting for the Thai English teacher to come in to give them enough knowledge to pass the written exam.

If you are going to be able to do enough marking that the students regard you as a teacher (rather than an entertainer or clown), your in-class time should be no more than 16 - 18 hrs./week, say 16 if you are a beginner, perhaps 18 if you are teaching the same course as you have taught previously.

[Loaded]

I would be teaching 22-24 hours a week but would stay at school 8am - 4.30pm. No evening or week-end classes, one 1-day english camp per semester.

In my experience, around 18 teaching hours is normal. There are many extra duties teaching in a Thai school including test writing/marking (2 each semester), report writing (weekly, first/second semester), lesson planning, school activities that need to be factored in as well. If you have never taught before and you go straight into a 22-24 hour teaching week, you'll be exhausted and may burn out.

[TenDreams]

Hello all!

I just got a conditionnal offer from Media Kids. They place teachers in public schools throughout Thailand, in primary or secondary school, from urban settings to rural villages. I consider the pay to be decent, plus the accomodation is provided, as well as the visa and the WP.

I would be teaching 22-24 hours a week but would stay at school 8am - 4.30pm. No evening or week-end classes, one 1-day english camp per semester.

I've read some bad and good short comments on forums but nothing detailed. I got a "they exhaust the teachers" without further explanation, but don't see how it could be so, as they place the teacher but are not the one supervising them.

So here are my questions :

- Have you ever dealt with MediaKids and what would be your insights and feelings about them ? (remember the "naming and shaming" rule of this forum >> pm me if you have a really negative comment plz)

- Do you think a "22-24 hours a week" workload would be enough to exhaust a teacher ? Tire, ok, but exhaust ?

Just for information, I'm French, with a BA (and the TEFL is due in March) with a part-time one-year experience. So I'm pretty happy nonetheless with their offer. Would just love some more information before pulling the trigger Thanks a lot !

I worked for MK years ago.

I am sure I never did more than 16 hours teaching a week. It depends where they place you. Some people I know did barely 6 hours a week.

At the time, they were very good about getting documentation sorted.

Accommodation will probably be very basic but livable (again all depends on your placement).

From what I have heard, all the Thai workers that worked there and knew and cared what they were doing have left and been replaced by muppets.

If you are teaching 24 hours a week in classrooms with no AC, along with all the planning and other stuff, you will probably be pretty tired.

Plus, MK expect you to do gate duty and things like that, which is OK at first, but gets old real quick.

Having done a lot since then, I look back on the school they placed me at as the best I have worked in in Thailand, the most easy going and low stress job I have had too. A lot depends on where you end up!

Good luck!

[skettios]

I got an offer from them two years ago. I was looking for a teaching position in Bangkok and the woman who called me told me she had found one in Angthong. She asked if I knew where that was, new in town I told her no. She said, don't worry it's pretty close to Bangkok.

Then she told me to pack my bags and meet at a van at a BTS the next day.

I thought about it for a few hours and called her back and cancelled. I didn't like the way she was rushing me through things. She was pretty cool headed about the whole thing.

Overall, I didn't feel like she was trying to pull a fast one, just that I was too green to understand what she meant when she was talking about the placement.

[PeaceBlondie]

skettios' story about being put on a bus to Angthong is not unheard of with agencies, although I know nothing about Media Kids.

Yes, 22 hours each week is too much. The experienced, half-dead Thai teachers could do it in their sleep (let me see, past perfect indicative continuous with adverbs of time and dependent clauses, yeah, I have done that 29 times before). And they can create marks out of nothing at all (let me see, Potakorn, son of poo-yai, dull as a rusty knife, lazy as a jing-jok...top grades). For new teacher, and not a native speaker either, too much. And when they say it is in Lampang, it is more likely 14 km east of where Buddha lost his sandals.

[colino]

At my school in Ang-Thong media kids did have the contract, they paid 35000 plus apartment rent 2000, but not electric and water the apartment eletric is very expensive , the teachers that worked at my school did 19 hours a week but had to attend 8am till 4pm and sit around the staff room doing little ,then the school asks that as your not busy could you please just do this and that, also an extra was gate duty and morning talk once a week ,

oh also mediakids hit them for 500 baht amonth for the so called teacher licence that they never saw.

this is not a name and shame mediakids did look after the teachers well and payment was on time each month ,

its the school that puts you in the postion of doing more for free.

colino

Ps Ang-Thong is 104km north from BKK

and after 3 years we just got our first KFC no Big C or Tesco Just a small Tops and 3 7/11s

boring if your not working .

colino

Edited February 1, 2009 by colino

[Thulemin]

Thank you, that was helpful!

I'll see with them about the workload and location when/if they write back. They first wrote to me last Monday with this conditional offer and I replied the next day. Got no news since then but I keep in mind you surely have Thais in front of the screen and that I may have to wait a little before getting an answer...