{"id":761,"date":"2024-04-24T15:09:47","date_gmt":"2024-04-24T13:09:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.rwth-aachen.de\/intern-abroad\/?p=761"},"modified":"2024-04-24T15:09:47","modified_gmt":"2024-04-24T13:09:47","slug":"working-as-a-foreign-language-assistant-in-dublin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.rwth-aachen.de\/intern-abroad\/2024\/04\/24\/working-as-a-foreign-language-assistant-in-dublin\/","title":{"rendered":"Working as a Foreign Language Assistant in Dublin"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"twoclick_social_bookmarks_post_761 social_share_privacy clearfix 1.6.4 locale-en_US sprite-en_US\"><\/div><div class=\"twoclick-js\"><script type=\"text\/javascript\">\/* <![CDATA[ *\/\njQuery(document).ready(function($){if($('.twoclick_social_bookmarks_post_761')){$('.twoclick_social_bookmarks_post_761').socialSharePrivacy({\"txt_help\":\"Wenn Sie diese Felder durch einen Klick aktivieren, werden Informationen an Facebook, Twitter, Flattr, Xing, t3n, LinkedIn, Pinterest oder Google eventuell ins Ausland \\u00fcbertragen und unter Umst\\u00e4nden auch dort gespeichert. N\\u00e4heres erfahren Sie durch einen Klick auf das <em>i<\\\/em>.\",\"settings_perma\":\"Dauerhaft aktivieren und Daten\\u00fcber-tragung zustimmen:\",\"info_link\":\"http:\\\/\\\/www.heise.de\\\/ct\\\/artikel\\\/2-Klicks-fuer-mehr-Datenschutz-1333879.html\",\"uri\":\"https:\\\/\\\/blog.rwth-aachen.de\\\/intern-abroad\\\/2024\\\/04\\\/24\\\/working-as-a-foreign-language-assistant-in-dublin\\\/\",\"post_id\":761,\"post_title_referrer_track\":\"Working+as+a+Foreign+Language+Assistant+in+Dublin\",\"display_infobox\":\"on\"});}});\n\/* ]]> *\/<\/script><\/div><ul>\n<li>Master of Education<\/li>\n<li>Ireland, Dublin<\/li>\n<li>Colaiste Chilliain<\/li>\n<li>10\/2023 \u2013 03\/2024<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>1. Application\/Finding an internship<br \/>\nI first learned about the \u201cForeign Language Assistant\u201d program through friends. The application process<br \/>\nwas comprehensive but straight-forward and needed to be completed by January. It required submission<br \/>\nof a CV, Letter of Motivation, transcript of records, certificate of study, and a university report<br \/>\n(Hochschulgutachten) from a Professor (some documents needed to be submitted in English + German,<br \/>\nthis varied according to your chosen destination country). The program encompassed numerous countries<br \/>\nwith varying internship durations but Ireland, offering a placement of 6-8 months, resonated most with my<br \/>\npreferences. Moreover, Ireland was one of the very few destinations that allowed me to indicate preferences<br \/>\naccording to the destination COUNTY. I could give three preferences and chose county Dublin as my first,<br \/>\nsince I expected this would be the spot with the highest frequency of FLA placements (which turned out<br \/>\ntrue!). Following the initial application, I progressed to the second stage, receiving an invitation for an<br \/>\ninterview with representatives of PAD in March. In May, I was then finally informed that I had been accepted<br \/>\nto the program, so I immediately applied for Erasmus funding and a break semester (Urlaubssemester). By<br \/>\nJune 1st, I received my school assignment along with the instruction to contact the principal and introduce<br \/>\nmyself immediately, since Ireland would be starting the summer holidays on June 2nd. I did as told and<br \/>\nreceived an answer on the same day.<\/p>\n<p>2. Accomodation &amp; Living expenses<br \/>\nI started looking for accommodation as soon as I got the notice, but I quickly discovered the harsh realities<br \/>\nof Dublin&#8217;s sky-high prices and housing issues. I searched platforms like Daft.ie and HostingPower which I<br \/>\nwas told about by a former FLA. There were new offers daily on Daft.ie, but most were either extremely<br \/>\nexpensive, seemed rather unpleasant or were labeled as \u201con a mon-fri basis\u201d. Additionally, HostingPower<br \/>\noperates on a commission base, which means you pay a fee if you find accommodation through their<br \/>\nagency. However, the offers on HostingPower are always reviewed and approved of by their staff, so the<br \/>\nplaces are usually nicer than on Daft.ie. I think it\u2019s important to point out the following: almost all options<br \/>\nwere rooms inside a family home \u2013 there were almost no student flat-shares (WGs), which I was a little<br \/>\nstruck by, since Dublin is a rather large University city that houses a lot of students. So prepare yourself to<br \/>\nlive with a \u201chost\u201d family. I came upon the question of whether to prioritize proximity to school or the city<br \/>\ncenter and initially decided on the latter, but the matter was decided FOR ME by the housing crisis itself,<br \/>\nleaving me little room for choice. I contacted countless ads for weeks but only two even replied in total.<br \/>\nEventually, I managed to secure a room in a suburb\/town through Daft.ie, that meant a good 50-minute bus<br \/>\nride from the city and 25 minutes from school. Looking back I wouldn\u2019t call this a problem since there were<br \/>\nso many buses that operated between my place and the city center which made going up to Dublin really<br \/>\neasy. However I still find the rent of 800\u20ac\/month PLUS expenses like gas, electricity, and WiFi adding<br \/>\nanother 100\u20ac\/month very excessive for a room 50 mins from the city center. But this seems to be the reality<br \/>\nyou have to face when moving to Dublin, most of the other FLAs had similar rents. My experience with my<br \/>\nlandlady however was rather unpleasant. She acted welcoming at first but then later expected me to<br \/>\nbasically disappear into thin air every time she was home. She would prefer if I could manage it so that she<br \/>\n\u201cdoesn\u2019t really notice I\u2019m there\u201d (???) She gave me a list of time slots in which she\u2019s not home and asked<br \/>\nme to please limit my time in the common rooms (e.g. to cook meals, do laundry, shower etc.) to those time<br \/>\nslots and to otherwise be quiet (she didn\u2019t use those words directly, but that is what she expected). She<br \/>\nwas downright delusional. It made the living situation really uncomfortable but in the end I managed to work<br \/>\naround her. This was just MY unlucky experience, other FLAs had great flats \u2013 I guess you can never know<br \/>\nif your pick was good until you live there a few weeks. There is no strategy to the housing matter, you just<br \/>\nneed a little luck which I hope you will have!!<br \/>\nWhat you will have to acquaint yourself with is that Dublin in general is a rather expensive city. Still I would<br \/>\nsay in hindsight that your salary plus your Erasmus grant will be enough. I didn\u2019t really have to restrict<br \/>\nmyself expenses or count every penny though I still tried to spend responsibly. I prioritized trips and<br \/>\nbrunches\/dinners over pubs and beers, but that is just my personal preference :). Also, a lot of museums<br \/>\nand galleries are free for students or at least discounted. The offers for students are great, so make sure<br \/>\nto look into that. Grocery shopping I mostly did at Lidl and Aldi which are the cheapest options. The Lidl+<br \/>\nApp is a game changer when trying to save money, they have amazing offers, you just need the app. Tesco<br \/>\nand Dunnes are great for meal deals and offer a larger assortment. They also have saver options<br \/>\n(Clubcards), but you need an irish phone number to apply for those, I think. Public transport fares like<br \/>\nbusses, the Luas (tram), and the Dart (train) are way cheaper if you have a student leap card. It\u2019s an ID<br \/>\ncard that you apply for online. You use it to pay public transport and top it up with money via an app. The<br \/>\nwhole concept is brilliant if you ask me, there is even a weekly limit to your spendings, which means if you<br \/>\nreach that limit, you travel for free. Cosmetics (shampoo, make-up, moisturizers) and anything drugstore related are really expensive compared to Germany, so if possible, stack up on those at home. You prettymuch will not need cash anywhere, which I found to be really handy. Everything is paid by card, some<br \/>\nplaces don\u2019t even take cash. My German debit card worked perfectly fine but I switched over to a Revolut<br \/>\naccount (including a digital debit card) since I had to pay my rent via Revolut as well.<\/p>\n<p>3. Everyday life\/ the internship<br \/>\nI worked at an Irish secondary school on a 12h\/week basis. The 12 hours were to be completed from<br \/>\nMonday \u2013 Thursday, Friday was a day off. All FLAs usually get either Monday or Friday off in order to be<br \/>\nable to take trips and explore the country. We were all very fond of this rule . So at school I attended 12<br \/>\nGerman lessons divided between two German teachers. The classes at my school were 60 minutes each,<br \/>\nbut other schools also had 45 minute classes.<br \/>\nAs a Foreign Language Assistant, my main task at school was to assist the teachers in their lessons. In my<br \/>\ncase, this really meant \u201cjust assisting\u201d in the beginning. I watched the lesson and helped students where<br \/>\nhelp was needed. Later on, I planned out little bits about German culture, geography, holidays. I reached<br \/>\nout to the teachers with my ideas, but to my surprise I often heard back \u201cOh that sounds lovely, but I\u2019m<br \/>\nafraid we have such a tight schedule, maybe next class\u201d or something along those lines. So all in all my<br \/>\nmain tasks at school did not really include educating about German culture but rather just assisting and co-teaching stuff from the textbook.<\/p>\n<p>I also did a lot of correcting class tests, vocab tests and homework<br \/>\nassignments, which I enjoyed a lot. Occasionally I did some one-on-one work with students who needed<br \/>\nsome additional practice and I helped prepare the leaving cert students (Abiturjahrgang) for their final<br \/>\nexams in German. Looking back on my time, I can say that my role as Language Assistant was not very<br \/>\nwell defined. On some occasions, the teachers didn\u2019t seem to know how to make effective use of me and<br \/>\nmy qualities. At the end of the day, I still believe that my work affected the students in a positive way and<br \/>\nmade them realize that there can be fun in German class, but I would have preferred to be a little more<br \/>\ninvolved \u2013 especially because I expected this program to enable me to improve my own teaching skills \/<br \/>\nlesson planning. However, the rather \u201csmall\u201d workload (in my case!!!) enabled me to prioritize exploring the<br \/>\ncountry, which I\u2019m definitely not mad about!<br \/>\nA major issue that I struggled quite a bit with was the language of interaction at school. Technically, Irish<br \/>\nthe official language in Ireland but in reality, it is rarely used in day-to-day life. Only some regions on the<br \/>\nWestcoast (they are called Gaeltachts) actually speak Irish daily. The majority of Ireland\u2019s people don\u2019t<br \/>\nspeak the language fluently. However, some schools in the greater Dublin Area made it their mission to<br \/>\nrevive Irish as a spoken language and bring back some of the forgotten culture (which is an amazing<br \/>\nproposition!). Those Gaelscoils use Irish as the language of interaction and instruction, which means that<br \/>\nno English is spoken at any time by any person on the school grounds. Turns out, I was allocated to a<br \/>\nGaelscoil. I don\u2019t speak Irish. Sounds quite non-sensical, huh? Spoiler though: It all turned out fine and was<br \/>\nactually really interesting! Of course, the staff and students were all very considerate and always used<br \/>\nEnglish when talking to me. However, there were still some things that I struggled with and made me feel<br \/>\na bit lost at times. Interacting with my colleagues and just casually chatting in the staff room can be hard<br \/>\nwhen everyone around you is speaking a language you don\u2019t understand. You can\u2019t just casually drop into<br \/>\na conversation you overheard with a \u201coh yeah, that exact thing happened in my class last Friday, too\u201d or<br \/>\n\u201cWhat is the name of that pub you\u2019re talking about?\u201d. This led to me not really feeling close to most of my<br \/>\ncolleagues, I mostly talked to the German teachers I was assigned to. One of them was actually half<br \/>\nGerman half Irish, we got along really well and she didn\u2019t speak Irish either, meaning her lessons were held<br \/>\nin English. My other teacher strictly spoke Irish during the German lessons which made me feel a bit left<br \/>\nout and awkward. My time at the school was challenging in some ways, but we made the best of it! I learnt<br \/>\na lot about Irish culture and picked up some bits of Irish, which was fun!<\/p>\n<p>4. Free time\/tips<br \/>\nAs I said, the FLA program is designed to give you the time and space to do travelling and exploring, which<br \/>\nis fantastic. Most of my weekends were spent with other FLAs in the Dublin Area, we planned a lot of<br \/>\nactivities in Dublin and trips around the country. We went out for brunch, coffee and dinner a lot, most of<br \/>\nus not being heavy drinkers so we prioritized restaurants and caf\u00e9s over pubs. Dublin offers uncountable<br \/>\noptions. Just go strolling through town and every 2 minutes you\u2019ll walk past a place that you\u2019ll want to try.<br \/>\nActivity-wise I recommend checking out everything that is free (or discounted) for students: museums, art<br \/>\ngalleries, markets. Free-walking-tours are a great way to get a first impression of the city\u2019s must-see places<br \/>\nAND hidden gems. In general, Ireland\u2019s nature and national parks are great for hiking. Sadly, most of the<br \/>\nspectacular hikes are not accessible via public transport, but renting a car to do a trip with some friends is<br \/>\ndefinitely worth it. Driving on the lest side might be intimidating at first, but you\u2019ll get the hang of it in no<br \/>\ntime! Keep in mind though that roads on the countryside can be very narrow and curvy and driving in the<br \/>\ncity can be stressful. I recommend renting a car at the airport, since that is usually a little further outside of<br \/>\nthe city. During the mid-term break (one week off school in November and February) we took a trip to<br \/>\nScotland, which was a real highlight. Below you will find a list of recommendations<\/p>\n<p>&#8211; Trips around the country<br \/>\no Kilkenny \u2013 2 hours from Dublin, cute small town, beautiful norman castle<br \/>\no Galway \u2013 4 hours from Dublin, west coast flair, very cute around Christmas time<br \/>\no Cork \u2013 3 hours from Dublin, great town &amp; university<br \/>\no Belfast \u2013 Northern Ireland, very pretty city<br \/>\no Sligo \u2013 Sligo city is rather dull but it\u2019s close to Strandhill, surfers paradise, great hiking<br \/>\noptions in the whole county (e.g. Queen Maeves grave)<br \/>\no Killarney + Ring of Kerry \u2013 great national park, amazing views, Paddywagon does a great<br \/>\nbus tour<br \/>\no Wicklow Mountains<\/p>\n<p>&#8211; Trips to other destinations<br \/>\no Edinburgh + Glasgow \u2013 great cities<br \/>\no Scottish highlands \u2013 amazing views<\/p>\n<p>&#8211; To do in\/around Dublin<br \/>\no Howth cliff walk<br \/>\no Bray + Bray head<br \/>\no Malahide + castle<br \/>\no EPIC Museum<br \/>\no Craic Den Comedy Club<br \/>\no Irish Film Institute (for movies)<br \/>\no Brunch at \u201cJoy of Cha\u201d<\/p>\n<p>5. Conclusion<br \/>\nTo conclude: I would recommend doing the FLA program to anybody wanting to explore Ireland (or any<br \/>\nother country they offer). Working at a school and \u201eteaching\u201c German will give you a whole new perspective<br \/>\non your own language and it will benefit you in a lot of ways! The Erasmus+ internship grant will enable you<br \/>\nto make the most out of your time. This experience along with all the lovely people I met are now a part of<br \/>\nme that I never want to miss! Time spent abroad will always have some ups and downs, but you will gain<br \/>\nso much from every experience (positive AND negative)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Master of Education Ireland, Dublin Colaiste Chilliain 10\/2023 \u2013 03\/2024 1. Application\/Finding an internship I first learned about the \u201cForeign Language Assistant\u201d program through friends. The application process was comprehensive [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5051,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"c2c_always_allow_admin_comments":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,36,34,88],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-761","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-allgemein","category-dublin","category-ireland","category-teachers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.rwth-aachen.de\/intern-abroad\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/761","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.rwth-aachen.de\/intern-abroad\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.rwth-aachen.de\/intern-abroad\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.rwth-aachen.de\/intern-abroad\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5051"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.rwth-aachen.de\/intern-abroad\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=761"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blog.rwth-aachen.de\/intern-abroad\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/761\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1400,"href":"https:\/\/blog.rwth-aachen.de\/intern-abroad\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/761\/revisions\/1400"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.rwth-aachen.de\/intern-abroad\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=761"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.rwth-aachen.de\/intern-abroad\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=761"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.rwth-aachen.de\/intern-abroad\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=761"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}