English_for_africa

Lucia took the fully online Cambridge CELTA course with us this past spring, and performed exceptionally well. Below is her testimonial regarding her experience taking the course with .

I had a very positive experience with English for Africa and the CELTA program they offer. They provide all the necessary materials, including books and learning resources, so you have everything you need to succeed.(no need to buy anything extra)

One of the biggest advantages are their flexibility and price. They offer online, in-person, and blended learning options, which makes it much easier to balance the course with work or other commitments.

The support I received throughout the program was outstanding. The trainers are highly experienced, knowledgeable, and encouraging. They challenged me to reach my full potential and helped me grow into the teacher that I am today.

I learned so much during the course, and it gave me the confidence and skills I needed. It also played a significant role in helping me secure teaching opportunities afterward. I would highly recommend English for Africa to anyone considering taking the CELTA course.

OANA LUCIA COSTIN

, ,

🚀 Free English Classes in Casablanca (Hay Essalam) – August 2026!
As part of our University of Cambridge CELTA teacher training program, English for Africa is delighted to offer FREE, high-quality, in-person English courses this summer!
Why are these courses free? Because our trainee teachers need real, motivated learners like you to complete their practical training. By participating, you directly help shape the next generation of English educators while rapidly improving your own language skills.
What to expect:
Interactive lessons based on Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) methodologies.
A supportive, dynamic, and immersive classroom environment.
Direct supervision by highly experienced Cambridge-approved CELTA trainers.
Schedule & Levels: All levels from A1 (beginner) to B2 (upper-intermedaite); 🗓️Monday to Friday; ⏰ groups study either from 10-12:30 or 15:30-18:00. 📍 Location: British Workshop, 9 rue Asserdoune, Hay Essalam, Casablanca.
👥 Who can join? Learners aged 16 and older.

⚠️ Important – Attendance & Deposit: Regular attendance is crucial for our trainees' success. To secure your spot and support our trainers, a small commitment deposit of 150 MAD is required. This deposit will be fully refunded at the end of the course, provided you attend at least 80% of the sessions.
🚨 Seats are strictly limited!
📩 How to apply:
WhatsApp / Phone: +212 660-127773
Website: englishforafrica.net
Join us this summer, boost your confidence, and master your English! 🌍✨

English for Africa — Morocco's first privately owned Cambridge-authorised CELTA centre — has launched a new pathway into TEFL certification.
In partnership with the TEFL Institute of Ireland, we now offer a Highfield-accredited, OfQual Level 5 TEFL Diploma: a 180-hour online course with assessment by DELTA-qualified tutors and live teaching practice with real students via Zoom.
The qualification is:
— OfQual regulated (UK)
— EQF Level 5 aligned
— Vital Consular verified for overseas work permits
— Recognised by employers and visa authorities worldwide
Two formats available: self-paced individual study (3,900 DH) or structured group course with teaching practice (5,800 DH).
Next group cohort opens 20 July 2026.
🔗 Full course details in the comments.

De le cadre le formation de nos professeurs d'anglais au certificat de University of Cambridge CELTA, nous sommes heureux d'offrir des cours d'anglais gratuits en présentiel dans le quartier de Hay Riad à Rabat.
Ces cours sont offerts à titre gratuit parce que vous, les apprenants, sont une partie indispensable de la formation de ces enseignants. Ces cours permettent aux enseignants de mettre en pratique la théorie de l'enseignement communicative, basée sur la communication au sein de la salle de classse. Les cours sont interactifs et dispensés sous l'égide de formateurs experimentés CELTA de University of Cambridge.
Comme une présence assidue est essentielle pour nous aider à former nos enseignants, il vous sera demandé de verser une petite caution de 150 dh, qui vous sera rendue à la fin de la formation, à condition d'avoir assisté à au moins 80 pourcent des séance.
Pour tout complément d'information et pour vous inscrire, contactez-nous au +212611404343, ou bien écrivez-nous à [email protected]

Ahmed took the Cambridge CELTA course in the mixed mode format with us in the summer of 2025. He had already trained as a public school teacher, and had been teaching for two years in the public school system in Morocco when he joined us on the course.

Cambridge CELTA Mixed Mode Testimonial in Morocco Ahmed took the Cambridge CELTA course in the mixed mode format with us in the summer of 2025. He had already trained as a public school teacher, and had been...

https://www.englishforafrica.net/post/fully-online-celta-course-testimonial

Fully Online CELTA Course Testimonial Jihane Nyabi took the fully online CELTA course with English for Africa this spring. She is from Morocco, and came onto the course with very little prior teaching experience. Jihane stood out for her motivation, attentiveness, and openness to learning. She formed strong, positive connections with bo...

________________________________________
EFA 120-Hour TEFL Course in Collaboration with Cambridge One
________________________________________
English for Africa is launching a new 120-hour TEFL course based around Cambridge One, Cambridge University’s online teacher development platform, supplemented by trainer.
What makes this course different?
The EFA TEFL course is built on the same principles as the Cambridge CELTA: solid theoretical foundations, self-reflection, and feedback on both micro-teaching and teaching practice with real students. It is a more accessible course, both in terms of financial commitments and in terms of scheduling.
What sets this particular course apart from other TEFL offerings is the integration of Cambridge One, Cambridge University Press's online teacher development platform. Trainees complete eight modules through Cambridge One, and receive a Cambridge University certificate for each module completed. At the end of the course, trainees will receive eight internationally recognized Cambridge certificates, plus the EFA 120-hour TEFL certificate itself summarizing the content of the course.
For teachers building a professional portfolio — whether for local schools, bilingual programmes, or international positions — eight thematic Cambridge certificates documenting specific areas of expertise tell a far richer story to employers than a single qualification alone.
Another distinguishing feature of this course is that it is either run by CELTA trainers or experienced trainers who have shadowed and been trained by CELTA trainers. The feedback, both on forum discussions and on teaching practice and micro-teaching, is therefore informed by the same experience, and reaches the same level of detail and support, as on a CELTA course.
The 120 hours: what they actually consist of
Cambridge One Modules — 40 hours Twenty hours of self-paced study across eight modules — covering areas including classroom management, lesson planning, teaching mixed-ability classes, and communicative language teaching — plus twenty hours of forum tasks and structured self-reflection. Both halves are equally foundational. The reflection component, made up of tasks and forum discussions moderated by the course trainer, is essentially in fostering the awareness and self-reflection that are key to continuing development as an EFL teacher.
Guided Observations — 12 hours Trainees observe experienced teachers at work, with structured tasks guiding what to focus on (6 hours), followed by post-observation reflection
Micro-teaching — 18 hours Each candidate teaches two 15-minute micro-teaching slots to their peers, preceded by assisted lesson planning and followed by both oral and written feedback. Learning takes place both when teaching peers and when being taught, as candidates participate in and benefit from feedback given to their peers as well as their own.
Teaching Practice — 36 hours Each candidate teaches two 30-minute lessons to real learners at different levels — one hour of actual classroom teaching per candidate in total — with lesson planning support and full oral and written feedback on each lesson. Here too, the benefit is cumulative, as both lesson planning and feedback are collaborative, collegial processes that lead to development of awareness and critical thinking in all the trainees.
Assignments — 14 hours Four written assignments: a learner analysis, a language systems awareness task, a language skills lesson design task, and a reflective training journal maintained throughout the course.
Two formats, one qualification
Fully Online — Opens 18 May 2026 (7 weeks) Teaching practice and micro-teaching are conducted online. All other components — Cambridge One modules, observations, assignments — are also online. Designed for maximum flexibility: if you're based anywhere in Morocco or beyond and need to fit training around work or family commitments, this is your route in.
Hybrid (Face-to-Face TP) — Opens 13 July 2026, Casablanca and Rabat (3 weeks) An intensive three-week format. Cambridge One modules are completed online, but micro-teaching and teaching practice take place face-to-face — live classroom experience with real learners, and in-person feedback from your trainer. For teachers who want an intensive experience, and can take three weeks out of their summer schedule, this is a serious option.
Both formats lead to exactly the same qualification: eight Cambridge One certificates and the EFA 120-hour TEFL certificate.
________________________________________
Who is this course for?
The EFA TEFL is designed for two kinds of people.
If you're new to teaching, the course gives you a structured, internationally accredited entry into the profession. It's practical enough to make you classroom-ready from the first day you stand in front of learners, and rigorous enough to carry real weight as a credential.
If you're already teaching but haven't formalised your training, the course provides something arguably more valuable: a framework for the experience you already have. The teaching practice and micro-teaching components, and in particular the rigorous criteria-based feedback, are designed to surface and help remediate gaps in your teaching you may not yet be aware of.
In either case, the Cambridge One component ensures you leave with documented, specific professional development that is immediately recognisable to any employer familiar with Cambridge's ecosystem.
________________________________________
Course fees
Format | Fee Fully Online | 5,500 MAD
Face-to-Face Hybrid (Casablanca / Rabat) | 6,500 MAD
________________________________________
Secure your place
Places on both cohorts are limited. To find out more or register your interest, complete the enquiry form on our TEFL course page: https://www.englishforafrica.net/tefl-course.
You can also contact us directly by writing to [email protected] or calling/texting +212 680-736803.
The May cohort opens in a matter of weeks — don't wait too long to apply!

Cambridge CELTA Assessment Explained Criteria 2A: Setting and Maintaining the Context
The Cambridge CELTA course is an intimidating prospect for many teachers, in part because of the shroud of mystery that often envelops it. As part of our demystifying efforts, we are publishing a series of articles on the CELTA course, starting with some of its assessment criteria.
The CELTA is a criterion-assessed course, and this is part of what makes it so valuable: employers know that the same criteria were applied in assessing all of the teachers who take this course. What is confusing to many candidates (and possibly to many employers, too) is what the criteria are, how to meet them, and how they reflect best practice in the classroom (they do!).
As part of our effort to demystify the CELTA course, we are starting a new series of articles on the CELTA assessment criteria. Today, we start with criterion 2C, wetting the context.
Criterion description: Providing clear contexts and a communicative focus for language
Subheading: Topic 2 Language Analysis and Awareness
Assessment Objects: Classroom practice; lesson materials.
This criterion is commonly known as setting and maintaining contexts. In the CELTA syllabus, this is the description you will find of how to meet this criterion:
• provide a context for language by means of text, situation or task using visual aids and realia as appropriate
• ensure there is a clear link between the context and the target language
• ensure that the context provides learners with sufficient opportunity for communicative practice
Defining Con-text (or “with text”)
As with most criteria, the key to achieving this one is understanding the terms. So we’ll begin with an etymological approach to understanding the meaning of context.
If you speak a romance language, you’ll probably know that “con” is a prefix which means “with;” if you have a linguistics background, you’ll also know that the word “text” doesn’t just apply to the written word, but any linguistic means of communication. Thus, we can speak of “oral texts” and “written texts.” For our purposes, the text in question is the language we’re focusing on in the classroom.
So context is that which comes with the text. It supports, encompasses, and frames the text—meaning, very specifically, that it is not the text. In other words, context is the important stuff going on in a lesson that isn’t the target language, nor the language skill being practiced (e.g., reading, listening, speaking, etc.). It is the non-linguistic information that provides a background and—to a very large extent—meaning to language.
Why it’s important (or how language is learned)
Context is generally the most underrated factor in the language classroom. In fact, its importance is capital, and its absence can ruin an otherwise solid lesson, because it is central to the way we establish meaning in life, and therefore to the way that language is learned.
At a very simple level, context changes the meaning of language. Think of the word “run,” and how someone sitting in front of a telephone or computer screen will understand it differently (as in run an app) to someone on a track course.
At a more profound level, context is all the non-linguistic information we use to understand the world, including language. If you’re sitting in front of a computer screen, and your English teacher says “run,” then points to the tab on the screen that launches your app, you’ll immediately understand what that word means.
The role of context in an EFL lesson
Context is key to several factors that enable a successful EFL lesson:
• Personalization. Clear contexts allow students to relate the target language/skills being practiced to their own lives, which in turn increases engagement, enhances language retention, and generates better rapport.
• Activating schemata. If you have the same context running throughout your lesson, students need to activate only one schema (that is, world-view), thus enabling them to bring more focus to the language. Switching contexts means switching schemata, which can be a major distraction and a drain on intellectual resources.
• Communication. When a lesson is personalized, and when schemata are efficiently activated, students immediately get the feeling that the lesson is a well-organized whole. They feel more confident, and more prone to expressing themselves; they can focus more on language accuracy and production.
How do you choose your context?
All of the lesson planning frameworks taught on the CELTA course give context pride of place—indeed, each of them suggests starting tart with a stage specifically designed to “set the context,” the lead-in.
Thereafter, the source of the context will depend on the type of lesson planning framework being used.


Lesson planning framework Source of context
Skills lessons
Receptive skills (reading or listening) The topic of the text being read/listened to
Productive skills (speaking or writing) What you want the students to speak/write about
Language lessons
Text-based presentation The topic of the text containing the marker sentences
Test-teach-test A theme common to the marker sentences being used in both tests
Situational The situation developed by the teacher to elicit the marker sentences

How to build and maintain context in your lesson
Here are a few tips to setting and maintaining context:
• Most importantly, know what the context of your lesson is. If you’re not sure, ask your trainer.
• Use the lead-in to set your context. Ask a personalized discussion question that is related to the context.
• Relate every stage of your lesson to the context. In case you end the lesson with another productive task, makes sure that it too is related to your context—but also that it is not identical to your lead-in task.
• Ensure that marker sentences are related to your context. If you are analyzing language that doesn’t match the context of your lesson, you are weakening your context.
• Use transitions between stages to remind students explicitly of the context. For example, say: “We’ve just finished a text about employer-employee relations. We’ll now discuss those relations. In the workplace, do you prefer to be the boss or the employee? What are the advantages of each? Please discuss with your partner.”

Use these tips, and others in our series on CELTA assessment criteria, to help you succeed on your CELTA course and to help you improve your teaching.
Join us for a fully online, mixed mode, or face-to-face CELTA course this summer. Write to [email protected], or call +212 680 542220.

https://www.englishforafrica.net/post/beyond-think-pair-share-interaction-patterns-in-the-efl-classroom

From building rapport to time management and differentiation, varying student interactions can completely transform a language classroom. Leveraging interaction patterns—deciding who interacts with whom—is perhaps the most under-sung tool at a teacher’s disposal to successfully manage the EFL classroom.
What are Interaction Patterns?
The first thing that comes to many teachers’ minds when they think of interaction patterns is pair work, hence the famous acronym TPS, for “think-pair-share.” While useful, having students work in pairs (as opposed to working alone) only scratches the surface of what is possible by manipulating interactions in the classroom.
Here’s an (abridged) inventory of other ways to vary interaction patterns:
Alone. There are in fact several ways a student can work alone. A student can be asked to think silently to prepare to talk, read, write or listen; by having a student stand, put their hands on their heads, or close their eyes while they prepare to talk, the dynamic can be further modified; you can also ask students to walk around the room, do tasks posted on the wall or on the board.
Group work. From three students and up, the size of a group can vary tremendously. One key thing to keep in mind when assigning group sizes: difficult tasks are better done with larger groups (more on this below, under “time management”).
Mill drill. Students walk around the classroom and at a given signal they stop and pair up with the partner nearest to them to perform an oral task (asking a question, having a dialogue, etc.).
Pyramid feedback. After working in pairs for a brief time, two pairs come together to form a group of four, and then two groups of four join up with each other, and so on, until the entire class is ready to share. Students discuss the same task, but with more and more participants in the group each time.
Facing lines. Students line up in two lines facing each other. At a given signal the people in one line all move one space to the left, so that everyone suddenly has a new partner. Repeat until time no longer allows.
Random playing cards. Each student is given a playing card. By calling out numbers, suits, and colors, the teacher can arrange students in groups of various sizes with minimum instructions, e.g., all students with hearts work together; all 1s together; red cards of each number work together.
It’s not About the Size—it’s the Way you Move
As the brief list above shows, varying interactions isn’t just about the size of the group, it’s also about who you talk to, how your partner(s) are chosen, and the dynamic through which the interaction pattern is introduced into the classroom.
Teachers Who Roll the Dice. Teachers can decide who works with whom (Julietta, please work with Mohamed now), or they can take a more random approach (using playing cards, giving students a number and having them find the student(s) with the same number, mill drill, etc.).
There’s an element of risk, almost like gambling, when the teacher removes him or herself from the process. Students don’t know who they’ll be paired with, and just as importantly, they don’t know why; any time a teacher tells two or more specific students to work with each other, most students will immediately wonder why, and try to guess the teacher’s strategy. Random groupings free students of these thoughts, and the spontaneity tends to produce more authentic communication.
Rapport. This is, indeed, one of the main ways interactions patterns can change, and improve, rapport in the classroom. Random groupings change a top-down dynamic, a teacher-determined task, into something immediately more fun.
Interaction patterns with movement enable students to stretch their limbs and leverage the very physical nature of communication. Students who dislike staying motionless at their desks for long periods of time will be very grateful. Even if the interaction pattern is stationary, just the act of getting up to switch seats with another student can introduce a kinesthetic element into the classroom.
Differentiation
Just as there is a time to let interactions shuffle students around randomly, there is a time to very judiciously choose who works with whom: when the teacher is aiming to support differentiation in his or her classroom.
Differentiation is simply defined as adjusting tasks to suit the needs of a multi-level classroom. Of the many techniques available to help with differentiation, varying interactions is the most effortless, in particular by selecting partners for students. Pairing weak and strong students enables, for example, peer teaching; putting weak students in larger groups enables them to pool resources, and if you simultaneously put stronger students in pairs, thus slowing them down, this can help level the playing field; separating strong and weak students enables teachers to give each group different, better graded tasks, and to provide differentiated feedback on those tasks.
The Key to Time Management
These differentiation techniques also help with time management: pairing strong students with weak students helps tasks to go more quickly (if you’re short on time).
Indeed, the most common problem I get asked to solve for trainee teachers is time management, and varying interaction patterns is my go-to answer (in particular for more skilled/experienced teachers).
Varying interaction patterns enables the teacher to extend tasks considerably, in particular speaking tasks—which is precisely why we recommend to teachers to always try to end their lessons with a speaking task. By allowing the teacher to extend or shorten the length of speaking tasks, the final speaking task acts as a pressure valve, either letting the lesson extend to fill in vacant time, or bringing the lesson to a quicker end.
If you have very little time for the final task, opt for pair work or even a whole-class interaction. Extend the task by using several different interaction patterns in a row, so that students are talking to different students, thus enabling both extended language practice and allowing students to talk to new partners/groups.
Classroom Management isn’t and Art, it’s a Craft
Successfully managing a classroom isn’t an art given to a select charismatic few, it’s a craft with its set of techniques and principles and ample room for personalization and self-expression—every teacher manages their classroom in a somewhat different way.
Learn more about the craft of classroom management in the other installments of our classroom management series, to be found by following the links below.
What is good classroom management?
Classroom management skills: Grading language
Classroom management skills: Setting and maintaining context

Beyond Think Pair Share: Interaction Patterns in the EFL Classroom From building rapport to time management and differentiation, varying student interactions can completely transform a language classroom. Leveraging interaction patterns—deciding who interacts with whom—is perhaps the most under-sung tool at a teacher’s disposal to successfully manage the EFL ...