State university teaching jobs tend to offer lower salaries than the private sector, but make up for this with fewer teaching hours per week, longer (although probably unpaid) holidays, and in some cases smart and motivated students. Administration might not be the most efficient, but you’re not too likely to find you’ve been rented out to a higher-paying school on the other side of town, and generally speaking as long as the students aren’t complaining, nobody will bother you too much.

Teaching at private institutions in China tends to be a bit more . . . challenging. These are profit-orientated schools, and that means they need to make the most of their resources – namely, you. Expect a higher workload, an administration eager to squeeze as many students into the classrooms as possible, and customers who can be very vocal if they don’t think they’re getting what they paid for.

On the plus side, you should be getting more money for your time, and if you’re lucky enough to end up teaching adults you could have students with a lot more life experience than a bunch of undergrads who moved right from home into a university dorm.

Another option is freelancing. You’ll need to sort out your own visa for this, but if you can get past that obstacle you may find you’re able to pick and choose where and when you teach, and have the flexibility of dropping any jobs you find to be more hassle than they’re worth. Teaching jobs could be a few hours a week at a private school which doesn’t have the staff to cover all classed in-house, dropping into a company on Wednesday afternoons to teach business English to sales staff, afternoon or evening tutoring with elementary or high school students, and private classes with real live grown-ups in a nice cafe.

Do however bear in mind that unless you’ve found some loophole we haven’t thought of, freelancing isn’t going to be legal – so don’t go placing any TV ads for your services, and we’d recommend you avoid taking on any teaching work in actual schools, as you’re more likely to come to the attention of the authorities there.

How these rules are applied vary across regions, institutions and time – if a school really wants you, they may well find a way to get you in. It’s also possible that schools – particularly private schools – will push teachers without a degree towards working on a tourist or business visa. This isn’t ideal and is not recommended, but if you’re desperate.

Teaching English in China without a degree is possible – but it’s going to be more hassle, and you’re going to find yourself pushed towards the less popular jobs, at the less reliable schools, and you’re likely to have a constant question mark hanging over your visa.

Some online movie and tv sites to try follow after the break.
Links all point direct to home pages, look around or try the search box to find what you’re after. These are of course Chinese online video sites for a Chinese audience – so if you can’t read Chinese, you’re in for a bit of a shock. Nor can you expect English subtitles

Online movies and TV at Ku6.com. Note the list of categories across the top.
Ku6 – better categorization of movies and TV than most.
Sohu’s HDTV channel prides itself on quality – so you can probably expect it to be an even greater bandwidth hog.

Something I’ve found moderate success doing is in letting students assign their own homework. I know it sounds a bit strange but sometimes it works. Here is what I do…

At the beginning of the course I tell students that they will be able to assign some of their own homework and I make them do so a few times throughout the term. As a homework assignment I tell students to come up with their own English homework assignment. They have to write an assignment on a piece of paper and show it to me next class. It can literally be on any topic. The students who are more interested and motivated to learn English will make a homework assignment relating to the class content, and the less motivated students will choose to do an assignment on their favorite music, or something along those lines. The good thing is that it usually gets everyone to do something.

When you give the assignment for the students to make their own assignment you should give a few examples. For one example give a real assignment that has to do with the content in class. For another examples give something else (e.g. memorize the words to a new English song and sing for the class, or read a celebrity magazine and write a report on the best new gossip).

When it is difficult to get everyone involved (i.e. the middle school classroom) this works well.

In most cases, if the students say you are good then you are. If they say you are bad then you are. It seems a bit silly, but at the moment that’s how the cookie crumbles when it comes to teaching ESL in China.

The Chinese people make any excuse to celebrate and be happy. This is seen through their gracious celebrations of other countries’ holidays. If there’s a holiday, the Chinese are sure to set aside some time to forget work and be merry. When it comes to their own holidays they pull out all the stops.

As many of you know, or recently discovered, Spring Festival is not just a Single day of celebrations like most holidays. It’s a solid three weeks of craziness! Spring Festival is a time when living in China really puts my patience to the test. I’m excited to celebrate for a day, two days, or maybe even a week for the Chinese New Year. But after a solid week of fireworks exploding directly outside my bedroom window and a constant stream of car alarms going off I get a bit agitated.

The celebrations, and the fireworks really start in full swing on Xiao Nian (small new year), which is a week before the actual New Year. Then there is the 15 days after the New Year that hold different special meanings and, of course, all demand their own special fireworks.

Chinese believe, in a few words, that the more fireworks you set off the more good fortune, luck, and money you will have over the next year. I always try to be culturally sensitive, but it is hard to do when I’m walking down the street and someone releases a sonic boom 5 steps from me, leaves my ear ringing for and hour, and doesn’t think twice about it.

Comparisons
I don’t mean compare the student with others in the class; I mean compare the student with him or herself. Show the students how they are improving. As you probably have experienced personally, there are times when you really feel like you are making no progress with your second language. By giving students short quizzes at the start and end of units you can show them how much they have learned.

Verbally praise students
By giving some students in the class verbal praise, they can serve as an example of how to do things right. Most students want to impress.

Give them an example of your language learning struggles
Take a personal example of a hardship you had when learning a second language and how you overcame the problem. I real-life example from their teacher is always helpful and encouraging. I truly believe that you can’t be a good language teacher unless you are constantly learning a second language yourself.

Give them a real life context
Bing in another foreigner (a friend or visitor from home) to talk with the students. They will want to ask questions and have no choice but to use English. This lets them understand that English has a real life application.

You can use these different techniques throughout your course. Mixing them up may help keep your class lively and motivating.

In the activity each team will make a vocabulary test for the other team. All words must come from vocabulary they have been given in the past. Round up all the words and put them in one big list. If you have enough words, split the list in two and give each team one list. This will give the tests more variety.

The test should have 2 questions per person on the team. The test can consist of only one type of question. The students must write sentences leaving a blank for one word. A correct answer is writing the correct word in the blank. Students can’t simply write any sentence for the question. The sentence must come from their textbook or another source. They must find the vocabulary word in context and copy down the sentence with a blank for the word. When making the questions students can use any resources they have at hand including dictionaries, textbooks, and other books. When answering the questions students can only use their vocabulary lists and definitions. No dictionaries or textbooks

Give the teams 15-20 minutes to make up their tests. They must write individual questions on separate cards or pieces of paper. They must make two cards for each question (one containing the answer). The leader’s role is to organize the team and give out responsibilities (e.g. who looks for what specific words, making sure everything is finished on time, how to attack answering the other teams questions). Review questions as they make them to be sure there are enough context clues to answer the questions.

Teams are given 10-15 minutes to answer their questions. When time is up, collect the tests and record the results.

If the students are advanced don’t throw out teaching roots entirely. When you teach new vocabulary, never forget to mention the word roots. In addition, when you first teach the word it helps to associate the word with either a positive, negative, or neutral feeling. The Interchange ESL books by Cambridge University Press do this with many of their vocabulary sets as well. Literally have students go through and put a “P” or “N” or “Nu” beside each new word. These acronyms represent Positive, Negative, and Neutral, respectively. This will give them an immediate feeling towards the word and help them recognize it faster when they see it in the future.

President Obama’s recent inauguration speech is a great example of the Chinese government’s fears being seen.

According to the BBC website the Chinese government censored key words and phrases in the Chinese translation of the speech (the English version was left untouched). When Obama said, “Recall that earlier generations faced down fascism and communism not just with missiles and tanks, but with sturdy alliances and enduring convictions.” The word communism was omitted. Now this I can somewhat understand as China’s ruling party is the communist party and this statement does not shine positive light. However, later in the speech the president said, “To those who cling to power through corruption and deceit and the silencing of dissent, know that you are on the wrong side of history,” this sentence was omitted from the Chinese translation.

By omitting this statement is the Chinese government admitting they are “corrupt” and “deceitful”? This is a question certainly up for debate. At the very least, they are acknowledging the fact that many people in China feel this way or that they are scared that Chinese people will begin to feel this way because of the outspoken, free words of an influential American citizen.

In any case, it is a good reminder of the situation that surrounds us. My personal belief is that we, as foreigners in China, should accept these things and attempt to operate within them. After all, a majority of Chinese citizens have come to accept these things. Always be careful, keep your mind about you, have dreams, but live in the world.