# Teaching English in Central Portugal



## Blunderman

Can anyone recommend any foreign language schools in central Portugal that might be looking for a qualified, native English speaking teacher?
Cheers!


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## lena green

Hi, have to advise, this country is 97% non English speaking. The Portuguese see no reason to learn English as Portuguese, believe it or not, is the most widely spoken language in the world, even more than chinese or english. However, step out of Portugal and you`ll need to go a long way before you find another person to talk to. Sad really,but here you are. talk to me please


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## l.a.a.s

Blunderman said:


> Can anyone recommend any foreign language schools in central Portugal that might be looking for a qualified, native English speaking teacher?
> Cheers!


Hi!

DREC (Direcção Regional Educação Centro) is the official department for education an they can give all the informations you need

best regards

luis


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## lena green

*Are you there Blunderman*

I.a.a.s wrote to you, Luis is giving good advice.Get in touch as Portugal needs to learn English badly.
I`m English, today I rang my bank to ask to transfer money from one account to another (critical business deal) they hung up on me. I had a round trip of 75 kms to visit the bank personally to arrange this.

Regrettably Portugal sadly lacks in its ability to speak English. 

Recently, children in school were granted 2 hours a week English lessons. If they upped this to 2 hours a day, naturally, they would learn a lot faster.

If Luis could give you an address or email, that would help you even more. But be aware, if you phone them, they won't speak English (maybe)


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## l.a.a.s

Hi Lena green !

Here is the site wwwdrec.min-edu.pt 

Best regards

luis


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## lena green

*no contact*

wwwdrec.min-edu.pt


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## l.a.a.s

lena green said:


> wwwdrec.min-edu.pt


Hi!
As newbie we not suppose to use links. All you have to do is put the dot after www

regards

luis


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## lena green

When I am King, President or Pope I will recind this dumb 'dot' law and people will die, heads will roll.

anyway I`m off to bed now.................thanx for your input back tomorrow


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## Alvorge_famalia

Hello, I was interested in all the feedback going on. I am just of to do a CELTA in Lisbon and it's the only way i can get to teach. Spain is always after English teachers. I however am not a huge fan of our neighbours so I'll just keep plugging away here.


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## JPV

*Another looking for ESL in Lisbon*

Hello all, like Blunderman and Alvorge, I am looking to set up shop in Lisbon next year. Of course I am just doing some groundwork to find out how the market is. It really seems shallow, with only a couple of big names, one of which is IH wwwihlisbon dot com, from there you can also find other schools in other cities.

You can also check wwweslbase dot com/schools/portugal and scroll down to Lisbon. There are 20+ schools listed including IH.

I myself will start sending my CV out, so if anyone makes any contact or has furtehr information, please send to this thread.

All the best


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## Sceptic101

lena green said:


> Hi, have to advise, this country is 97% non English speaking. The Portuguese see no reason to learn English as Portuguese, believe it or not, is the most widely spoken language in the world, even more than chinese or english. However, step out of Portugal and you`ll need to go a long way before you find another person to talk to. Sad really,but here you are. talk to me please


Like the humour! They do believe this, as well, eh? Along with the belief that Portuguese is the hardest language in the world to learn.

Years ago I worked in Tomar, about an hour or so North and inland from Lisbon. Lovely town. They had a couple of language schools there. And Lena, I couldn't disagree more, the Portuguese of have quite a good grasp of English, try travelling to Spain, the next door neighbours, and you'll know what not speaking English is all about!

Good luck, with a TEFL cert. or a CELTA qualification you can get work in these smaller towns in central portugal. Lingua Cultura was one, I seem to remember...


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## tomarense

Hi,

There are a number of language schools in Tomar, a great placeto live, and a fair demand for english.

Lena, living in Tomar, I don't recognise your Portugal.


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## Sceptic101

Hi Lena,

I have lived and worked in Portugal on and off for the last 16 years, I work in industry here, in Spain and in other countries. I would say the average level of Engilsh here is pretty good _compared _to many other countries.

Tomar is a lovely place, after a while you can get a bit stir crazy but nowadays communication is a lot better so you can run off and recharge your batteries nore easily. 

What else do you see? We can compare Portugal's


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## lena green

Hi Sceptic101,

I see Portugal struggling for along my friend until kids leave school with full command over the English language.
All jobs where the public domain is involved should only be offered to bi-lingual applicants only.
Night school courses in English should be widely offered free and the kids instructed to learn it. Only then will Portugal be a real willing abd successful member of the EU.


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## tomarense

Hi Lena,

Where are you living? Seriously, I don't recognise the Portugal you are living in.
However, if you really believe your comments, wouldn't you be better suited to living in an enlish speaking country? BTW, there are over 250 million native speaking Portuguese.


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## omostra06

I live in Tomar, been here 5 years, its a great place to live.


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## lena green

Speaking as an ex-pat since `89, I don't expect everyine to be able to speak english. We all have respect for the older generation and only yesterday I enjoyed a clear conversation with an elderly Portuguese lady who spoke it perfectly, but my young bank teller, my young estate agent and my local insurance company can't even answer the phone. Fiscal in Tavira have two staff members who get through OK out of 40 on display and Silves Camara have one who can communicate in Pidgeon English
The EU Treaty sugests we all speak 2 languages, the more the better and I`m all for that, but which two. I`m ok with French and English but it would appear the Portuguese prefer Portuguese and Portuguese.

Portuguese, by the way, is the mostly widly spoken language on earth, even more so than English or Chinese. Anyway, I resigned to the fact there will never be one universal language in my lifetime but it could be arranged in the next 10 years by educating the kids now far moreso than what they are doing. School carriculum is 2 hours a week for English, if it were 10 hours a week, they'd' learn 5 times faster.


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## tomarense

Hi Lena,

Are you taking the piss, or are you in your dotage?

20yrs, more or less, as an ex-pat! You live in Portugal, speak english and french - not portuguese, and you expect the Portuguese to accommodate you???

Unfortunately, your comment is so far off the wall that I cannot decide whether you are being facaetious, or not. I would hope that you're being sa"lyrical".


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## omostra06

why not view from the uk, if a Portuguese person walked into a bank, an estate agents, the council, in England, would the staff speak Portuguese!(or be expected to) and should the Portuguese person get annoyed that they dont speak thier language.


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## Sceptic101

lena green said:


> Speaking as an ex-pat since `89, I don't expect everyine to be able to speak english. We all have respect for the older generation and only yesterday I enjoyed a clear conversation with an elderly Portuguese lady who spoke it perfectly, but my young bank teller, my young estate agent and my local insurance company can't even answer the phone. Fiscal in Tavira have two staff members who get through OK out of 40 on display and Silves Camara have one who can communicate in Pidgeon English
> The EU Treaty sugests we all speak 2 languages, the more the better and I`m all for that, but which two. I`m ok with French and English but it would appear the Portuguese prefer Portuguese and Portuguese.
> 
> Portuguese, by the way, is the mostly widly spoken language on earth, even more so than English or Chinese. Anyway, I resigned to the fact there will never be one universal language in my lifetime but it could be arranged in the next 10 years by educating the kids now far moreso than what they are doing. School carriculum is 2 hours a week for English, if it were 10 hours a week, they'd' learn 5 times faster.


Lena, I do believe that you've got a little lost along the way. I have also been an ex-pat since 1989, not always in Portugal, and speak Spanish and Portuguese. The Portuguese do like to say their langugae is widly spoken but it is not, contrary to your belief, the most spoken, in fact it is not even in the top 5! Portuguese is 7th in the world. 

Lena, common sense dictates that chinese would be 1st, there are billions of 'em! Spanish, much to the poor Portuguese's disgust, is way above Portuguese in the world, with an estimated 332 million speakers (Compared to the 170M speakers of PT...)

I have lived all over Portugal and been in many parts of Spain and South America and the Portuguese, bless them, have a much better general grasp of English than any Spanish speaking country.


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## silvers

Everytime I try to speak Portuguese here, the person invariably replies in Perfect English.


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## portugalweb

hi to all almost 97% people of porugal use portugese there is no need to know english.


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## portugalweb

silvers said:


> Everytime I try to speak Portuguese here, the person invariably replies in Perfect English.


because of they use english for writing and portugese for speaking.


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## omostra06

depends where in Portugal you are, if you are on the Algarve there will be more English spoken by the locals, if your in the rural areas, then only Portuguese


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## portugalweb

omostra06 said:


> depends where in Portugal you are, if you are on the Algarve there will be more English spoken by the locals, if your in the rural areas, then only Portuguese


very true in urban areas portugese are coommon.


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## FrancescaJohnson

Hi there, there are a couple of International schools in the silver coast? maybe that would be an option for you? Most of the staff are English i believe. 

Hope this helps


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