Get to know PROLOG - Sebastian
“When I first started working for IH Berlin PROLOG in spring 2002, I had no real idea of what lay ahead of me. At first I was employed as a language teacher, mainly on our Super-Intensive and evening courses. When I look back, I remember many of my past students and realise how much I learned from them as well as them (hopefully) learning a lot from my teaching!
Over the following couple of years I switched over to teaching many of IH Berlin’s company and individual courses. As a teacher, this was a great period of development for me. All of the fantastic experiences I had in the classroom, together with the relationships I developed with the rest of my colleagues, only served to strengthen my commitment to teaching and to IH Berlin PROLOG.
In 2005, I became IH Berlin's Director of Studies for English. My job covers three main areas: PROLOG’s company service, the professional development of our teachers and expanding the range of services and courses we offer to our customers. One of the recent projects I’ve been involved with is the EUROLTA-Certificate training programme which we’ll be starting in January 2010. EUROLTA is exciting because all foreign language teachers will be able to develop their teaching skills and theoretical understanding and gain an internationally recognised certificate. Interested teachers will find more information at www.eurolta-berlin.de
Working at a school affiliated to International House World Organisation has allowed me to take advantage of many opportunities I otherwise wouldn’t have had. I attended the last three Directors of Studies conferences in London and had the privilege to meet some of the leading figures in the English teaching world. With IHWO, I’ve been involved in piloting a number of teacher training courses and have myself taken courses in online tutoring, the methodology of individual tuition and the IH Certificate in Advanced Methodology. As a teacher at an IH school, there is a whole range of courses on offer.
Living in Berlin suits me down to the ground. The city has everything I love; from great restaurants and cafes to interesting galleries and museums, as well as more lakes than I could possibly swim in during one summer! At the weekend it’s a piece of cake to get out of the city, and my bike and tent have had a fair bit of use over the years! I can’t picture being anywhere else”.
- Sebastian Taylor
When the Football World Cup was in Berlin back in 2006, Sebastian and I, Rik Mayda, made a video explaining some English football vocabulary for German students. Sit back and enjoy the teacher extraordinaire...