The Trinity College London Certificate for Practising Teachers (CertPT) is growing in recognition among experienced teachers who want to develop their skills in the specific settings where they teach. Here are some of the ways that this development qualification is different from other internationally-recognised teacher development courses:

1) It is regulated at level 6 on the UK Ofqual qualifications framework

This means that it falls between the initial Level 5 (initial teacher education qualifications like the Trinity CertTESOL and Cambridge CELTA), and longer, more in-depth post-graduate qualifications such as the Level 7 Trinity DipTESOL and Cambridge DELTA. If you are not prepared to commit to one of these longer, more intense courses, then the CertPTmakes a great bridge for you to get into some relevant research and practice.

2) It has flexible entry requirements

The Trinity CertPT is designed for teachers with some experience in the online or face-to-face classroom, but does not require the typical years of full-time experience, high level of language proficiency and initial qualifications the Level 7 diploma courses do.

The Trinity CertPT is open to qualified English teachers with 6 months of experience, or teachers with no initial qualification and 2 years of practical experience. In addition, the minimum language requirement for the Language Point CertPT course is just CEFR B2 (IELTS 6 or equivalent), making it much more accessible to the majority of English teachers worldwide. Assessment for the course can even be taken in a range of languages other than English (currently Chinese, Arabic, Spanish and Italian).

3) The CertPT takes you, the teacher, as the starting point for your own development.

The biggest difference between this qualification and others is that it puts course participants rather than trainers into the role of ‘expert’. Only you know the specific groups that you teach, the curriculum and other features of the setting where you work and your students study, so this forms the centre of your development activity. By evaluating the materials and activities that you use in your classroom, the weekly course content is always relevant to what you do. This contextually-informed approach to training is in line with current thinking about the nature of teacher development in an increasingly diverse global environment.

4) The CertPT can be taken by any teacher who works in English

This means that you don’t have to be an English language teacher to benefit from the development on the course - international school and university teachers who work in English as a Medium of Instruction, public school teachers who have students for different language backgrounds, and business English an corporate skills trainers can all develop what they do, or specialise into specific areas of education, through this flexible qualification.

5) The CertPT can be specialised for online teachers

Where other courses focusing on online teaching and learning may be internally accredited by the organisations that offer them, or developed fo teachers to use specific learning management systems, the CertPT takes online teaching and learning as an important art of the language learning landscape today. We encourage you to research current thinking about online methodology and resources, so that you can make the most of the online context, and use the online setting as a learning environment in its own right, rather than simply adapting traditional materials to an online system.

There are many ways in which the CertPT is progressive, inclusive and rewarding, so if you want to take your teaching to a new level, find out more about the course on our website at https://www.languagepointtraining.com/online-trinity-cert-pt

Tom Garside is Director of Language Point Teacher Education. Language Point delivers the internationally recognised RQF level 5 Trinity CertTESOL in a totally online mode of study, and the RQF level 6 Trinity College Certificate for Practising Teachers, a contextually-informed teacher development qualification with specific courses which focus on online language education or online methodology.

If you are interested to know more about these qualifications, or you want take your teaching to a new level with our teacher education courses, contact us or see our course dates and fees for details.