Ten years ago, I had the opportunity to take the In-service Certificate in English Language Teaching (ICELT) at the British Council in Mexico City; the ICELT is an internationally recognized qualification issued by the University of Cambridge. During a year of hard training, I was able to produce and enhance high-quality lesson plans; the intensity and excellence of the program was unquestionable. We had roughly 150 hours of contact with tutors, 200 to 300 hours of self-managed independent study, including reading, research, assignments, essays, 8 hours of direct peer observation in classrooms, and finally, we had 4 in-service observations performed either by a tutor or a moderator from Cambridge University. Unfortunately, the training program was so time & effort demanding that only 6 of us out of 12 participants who had enrolled with me in the program that year were able to finish and get their certificates.
Although ICELT was discontinued in July 2020, it´s still a point of reference in
the development of teacher´s awareness of the principles underlying learning
and teaching while supporting you to reflect on your teaching methodologies.
As an update, there are other teaching qualifications and courses you might
find suitable depending on the skills you are looking to develop, such as the
TKT, DELTA, Language for Teaching, etc.
We will be covering more of the syllabus of these international programs for
teachers in further articles for you to choose the one who suits you better.