Hey There .. Welcome to my first foray into the world of blogging 🙂
You may be wondering what is VIPKid and what does it have to do with coaching or healing. Those are great and valid questions!
First, VIPKid is a company that I am an independent contractor with to teach children that primarily live in Beijing to speak English online. It’s a fun and rewarding endeavor! Second, it has to do with my coaching because it allows me to do not only what I love (teaching) but also as a way to have another source of income! I have a lot of new financial goals this year that not only include going on a few trips, getting rid of some credit cards, buying a house, etc. If you ask me, multiple income streams is never a bad thing!
There is good, bad, hysterical, exhausting and rewarding with teaching children how to speak English online. Because Beijing is 12-13 hours ahead of my time zone (EST) it means that I need to get up at the butt crack of dawn to become animated enough to capture and keep a small child’s interest. I’m a night owl by nature, so this flipping around of my schedule has brought some special challenges ~ and resulted in me being a bit more zombie like than normal. The great is that I get to watch as these kids start speaking English! It’s so rewarding to be a part of the process when these kiddo’s start to understand what is being taught to them! And you know, it’s never a bad thing when you can sit in your home, wearing your PJ’s, while making money! (yes, it is real money, it’s American money, it goes straight into your bank account, it arrives in your bank once a month every time)
One thing about me that you may not know unless you know me in real life, is that I have interesting and fun things that happen all the time come up in my world that I love to find the humor in. There are many Facebook groups that I am a part of, and I have annoyed the other teachers in those groups with the events that I have found amusing since I began my trek on this journey. It hit me the other day that I wanted to share these moments with others too!! Hence, the birth of the idea to make this into a blog!
Let me go back and start at the beginning so you can all understand the process that leads up to teaching for VIPKid. First VIPKid is a legitimate business based in China. (I say this because there are disgruntled folks who say this is a scam..which is totally not the case) They are actively recruiting teachers who are native born in the US, you can live anywhere in the world, the company was founded by a woman, which is pretty unheard of in China and they are growing at a phenomenal rate! I heard about them from a FB ad. Work at home, make 1000-2000 or more a month, need to have a Bachelors degree in any area and have some experience with children. Well, yeah I could fit into those parameters, so I applied. Very quickly I heard back that they wanted me to move forward with the application process. This meant that I needed to do an interview and a video of me teaching a 10 minute demo class. First thought was, “nope, don’t wanna do that” and left it alone. A few weeks later, I thought of this again and thought “why not”.
Not going to lie to you guys, the thought of doing this “demo” class video was intimidating. VIPKid sends you videos to show you examples and lets you know that on YouTube there are many more examples. ( Yeah, YouTube, why didn’t I think of looking there) Yes, on YouTube there are hours and hours and hours of videos from VIPKid Teachers on the demo classes. The videos talk about TPR (total physical response), props, the kiddos and goodness knows what else.
I tell ya, those videos were intimidating too! I was watching these cute 20 something year olds being more energetic then Mary Poppins on crack bouncing all over, wearing silly hats & glasses, putting their fingers up to their chins and cupping their hands to their ears! It didn’t make a great deal of sense to me at first.
Still I decided to learn more ….. soon I realized why they were doing what they were doing … yeah, it started making sense. I found a few videos from multiple people (a few who looked more like me) instructing how to pass this demonstration. I dove in, for days scripting this class, making and buying a few props, getting an orange shirt (VIPKid’s company color is orange … “yuck NO ONE looks good in orange” ) after a few days I was ready! Don’t let this glibness fool you, this is a lot of work and takes up a lot of time!
Finally I decided that I had practiced all I could. I then went to a specific part of their site (they send you the link) to a modified classroom. You get 1 hour to practice and record your 10 minute demo. So I sat down and began recording this class. I was ready, I had practiced, I could do this in one take! Right?? Yeah ….. not so much.
First, I didn’t realize that the camera just starts recording. You don’t have to press anything. So for 10 minutes of my hour, I was looking for a place to click on that didn’t exist, I was checking out my makeup in the camera, looking to see that I didn’t have lipstick on my teeth, probably picked my nose, adjusted my bra strap, talked to myself.. you know all those things you do when you think that no one is watching you!
Once I realized that I was being recorded already, I jumped into my professional mode and began teaching this demonstration class. I start with “Hi I’m X and have X for credentials and onward into the lesson. I’m thinking that I am doing good. Started to relax.. THEN ….. it went downhill, quickly!
My very old, infirm dog starts walking down the hallway towards the room I am in, “click, click, click” …you can hear her nails echoing as she waddles towards me…. “great”….. She sits near me while I ignore her “gotta go, gotta go, gotta go” right now dance..so she then proceeds to poop on the floor next to me… I didn’t say anything but the look on my face must have been priceless as the aroma took over the room….then she goes over and wakes up the cat …who she then instigates into playing….. well the cat jumps up on my desk, slips on the white board I have for the rewards systems and slides in front of me, yes directly in front of the camera, there goes the cat …then the cat and the whiteboard goes crashing onto the floor, keyword here is CRASH, loud crash..as I’m still moving onward with the lesson….then the dog starts barking at the cat….nonstop for about 2 minutes… I pick up my puppet and say Timmy….Lucy the dog is saying hi and I start waving like an idiot…..then wrapped up that demonstration.
They do give you enough time to record multiple times and they pick the best one to grade. Even after all of that I had time to record once more, sans the exploits of the resident mammals.
I am still shocked that they moved me forward in their process. I had the feeling they were going to just shake their heads and say Pass on this one after all that. Clearly someone has a sense of humor at VIPKid! (I bet that I am part of a blooper role they show at their Annual Party)
Next time I will tell you more about the rest of the process and how my first week went (oh yeah it was amusing!)
If you would like more info on becoming a VIPKid teacher, you can read about it on their website. Please feel free to use this link https://t.vipkid.com.cn/?refereeId=6786448&refersourceid=a01
Full disclosure, yes you do earn a ONE TIME ONLY dollar amount for people you refer that become teachers!