Story time. Впечатления о работе в китайской онлайн школе английского

Summary of the Video (Auto-Subtitles Likely Contain Errors)

The speaker shares a personal “story time” about working as an English teacher in a Chinese online school. They cover first impressions, pay/contract details, what they liked, and what they disliked. They also explain how lessons run and how materials are handled.

Work Schedule & Workload

• They started working around the first marketing period (“с первого рынка”).
• In the early days, they had about ~12 lessons per week, which they felt was manageable.
• They liked that they could set their own schedule and open lesson slots:
  • Opening more slots increases the chance that students will book.
  • If they don’t have time, they can open fewer slots (they mention something like 1–2 hour blocks, ~5 times a week).
• They note a practical limitation: if they can’t physically keep up, there can be penalties.

Summer Holidays, Salary Timing, Transfers

• Salary is paid on a specific date in late July.
• They describe a cycle like this:
  • Work for one month
  • Receive payment around the 15th–20th of the next month (based on the previous month’s work)
• They specifically mention receiving salary on July 19.

What they disliked

• The delay felt too long. For example:
  • First lessons on June 1 → salary arrives around mid-July
• They called it inconvenient.

Pay Method & Commission (PayPal / Bank)

• They received salary via PayPal and then transferred it onward.
• They mention a commission of ~$3.5 when transferring money out of PayPal.
• They were trying to transfer to Sberbank:
  • They had to confirm card/account details.
  • It took about 5 days for confirmation.
  • Then it took about a week for the transfer to complete.
  • Arrival was around August 5.

Teaching Style & Student Profile

Main advantages they highlighted

• Materials at first:
  • They could download ready-made, colorful presentations to use in lessons.
• Later, the situation changed:
  • They were no longer allowed to download presentations—only view them on the website.

Student expectations and age range

• Students are mostly motivated and self-driven.
• Student ages vary:
  • The speaker was initially afraid of working with 3-year-olds online, but after a few sessions it became workable.
  • They personally preferred teaching around ages 8–9+.
  • They also mention adult learners, including an example of a 35-year-old.

Communication requirement (English-only approach)

• The school’s goal is to teach English to Chinese students.
• The speaker emphasizes they try to speak only English during class.
• When students struggle:
  • They type in text (sometimes in Russian transliteration), and the system converts it to Chinese.
  • The speaker sometimes has to explain repeatedly using visuals/gestures.

Downsides (What They Didn’t Like)

Quality of some lesson materials

• Some ready-made lessons/textbooks were described as outdated or poorly designed, such as:
  • Black-and-white slides with minimal visuals
  • Tasks where much of the content is in Chinese without enough support
• They also disliked certain lesson structures from “London books,” describing:
  • Screens/pages with limited practice
  • Assignments with short time limits (their students finished far faster)

Flexibility problems due to the contract

They say they couldn’t:

• change the schedule on the same day
• cancel a lesson easily if something urgent happened

They gave an example where a child got injured and they had to go to a surgeon, but they still felt they couldn’t cancel Chinese lessons without consequences.

Late/missed lesson penalty

• Missing or being very late could result in withholding ~35% of salary for that month.

Stress from unexpected changes

• They felt stressed because each session could involve different students:
  • new accents
  • new approaches
  • having to repeatedly meet different people (especially difficult if you’re introverted)

Technical/platform discomfort

• Because they had to use website materials, they sometimes needed to open PDFs/screenshots during lessons, which they found inconvenient.

One awkward incident

• They mention accidentally letting a slot end/forgetting, and that a manager noticed.
• They weren’t sure exactly how the penalty would be applied.

Would They Work There Again?

• They said they don’t regret it, viewing it as:
  • valuable experience in a foreign international company
  • useful teaching experience
• They intended to work until the end of the contract (mentioning a possible end around Dec 31, 2020, and then “June next year” as discussed).
• However, personally they prefer teaching directly with parents/students because:
  • scheduling is more flexible
  • homework and communication are easier
  • there’s no manager layer and fewer sudden risks of losing pay

Notable Locations / Products / People Mentioned

• Locations
  • Omsk (where materials/book-related resources are found)
  • Odessa (mentioned in relation to a teaching situation)
• Platforms / products
  • PayPal
  • Sberbank
• Schools / brands (examples)
  • “Skyeng” (mentioned for contrast)
  • another Russian school (also mentioned for contrast)
• Book/program references
  • “Cambridge” materials/files
  • “London books”
• Managers/systems
  • a “manager” who noticed the scheduling/slot issue