Getting qualified

To get any decent job in Prague, you will need a certification, and they aren't cheap - expect to pay around £800 for a month course plus another £400 or so for accommodation. You only want to do this once, so it's important to choose the right training school. There is lots of info on the web about the merits of different schools and it's worth ploughing through them all to find the right one.

I went to INTESOL Prague and can highly recommend it. It is small, professional, yet personal enough to feel that they are really working towards getting you placed in a good job. I did teacher training in Britain just two years before I came to Prague, and the month-long TEFL course was a short, intensive version of what I'd spent a year doing to qualify as a secondary school teacher.

Don't expect it to be easy. I could never understand the many people I know who did the course with no real intention to teach. It's a hard, nerve-racking month. Learning to teach is an exercise in public humiliation and it's almost certain that someone will end up in tears. Living in shared accommodation with the other student teachers can be both a blessing and a curse. They are great for the emotional and educational support you'll need but a nightmare when nerves and tempers are already at breaking point.

Things to look for and ask about:

• How many students are on the course
• How many study hours / how many teaching hours
• What kind of qualification (though as long as it is a recognised one, don't worry too much about which one it is)
• What facilities do they provide
• What is the age group of the other students (you don't want to be everyone's 'mummy' or 'daddy')
• Will they help you find a job / place to live / whatever else you need

I've never found a truly comprehensive and objective list of all the schools - in the end I picked one that felt right, mainly because the I chatted by email and telephone over a period of several weeks with the administrator and knew that I was going to like it there.