italki: How was your experience?

[languist]

I recently started teaching English on italki. In fact, it's my full-time job. For those few of you who haven't yet heard of italki, it's a platform which connects language learners and language teachers via a sort of online marketplace.

I have a lot to say about this site and what I feel is the rather considerable amount of experience I've gathered in quite a short period of time (I've been teaching for 9 days and already have had 180 lessons booked, 73 of which have been completed). However, the reason I'm posting on this forum is because I wanted to ask our lovely members about their italki experiences - both as teachers, and students.

Although "teacher tips" are very much appreciated, I'm primarily interested in student testimonies. How often did you study? How long were your lessons? Which type of lesson/teacher did you prefer? Was your time on italki helpful? What was most helpful? What made your favourite tutor stand out to you? What did you find detrimental during your lessons?

Personally, I have used italki as a student for Slovak, Russian, and Spanish. As a teacher, I very much have my own "style", but I'm equally bringing techniques which I enjoyed about my previous lessons into my own approach. So far, I have a wide variety of students returning to me, so I feel certain that I'm doing something right. Previous experience as a language learner has been an invaluable asset, I'm sure, and it's got me thinking a lot about my own needs as a student, and of course, how I can best address the needs of my students. So how better to learn how to improve than from the most experienced language learning community that I know of?

Any and all responses would be appreciated. :)

[rdearman]

Most of my experience with iTalki has been positive. But I wasn't looking for lessons, only speaking practice. Therefore I typically just took the cheapest community tutors. One thing that really used to bug me was tutors who didn't read the message I sent them. Before I would have a lesson, I would always tell them that I want speaking practice and correction only. Still people attempted to force me to use their lesson PDF, or to give me a list of vocabulary words to practice. I know what I want, and I specifically didn't request to read to you a PDF of children's comics. Those people never got a return lesson from me. So tip one would be listen to what your student is requesting don't force them to use your pre-made lessons.

A follow on from this was I searched specifically for a tutor who did DELF prep lessons. They all charged a bloody fortune but I only wanted one thing from them. I wanted to spend one hour with them and for them to tell me which certification level I should be trying for A2/B1/B2 etc. Since you pay for the exam and unlike some certifications where you test and they certify the level you got, the French make you figure it out in advance. I specifically asked for this in a message before paying for anything. I then reiterated this request when I booked the lesson with this fellow, which cost about triple what I would normally pay. Then he did the exact same thing he does with everyone (I suppose) and for that first hour he talked to me in English and gave me links to various prep PDFs. He told me about his lesson plan and what I could expect. I'm not someone who is rude to people, but after a large number of attempts to interrupt the "lesson" eventually ended and he told me to book the next lesson quickly because he was getting booked up. I didn't book another lesson.

To answer your specific questions. I was booking tutors in French or Italian who charged less than $10 as my rule. Because I only wanted speaking practice I wasn't interested in teachers but mostly just chats with natives. I did approximately 20 lessons like this, plus a couple of more expensive ones. The one described above, and another fellow who specialises in accent reduction (he works in the film industry teaching actors French) . I was using iTalki about 3-4 times per week. The two most useful tutors I had were an anomaly. The first was a young fellow was a teacher, but because he had no history of lessons in iTalki he wasn't getting any lessons booked. So he dropped his prices to my level and did a couple hundred before jacking the prices back up. He was always prepared, always wrote all my errors into a shared google doc. Did corrections but only after I'd finished speaking. I did 4 lessons with him and he always gave me a topic to think about and discuss next lesson. The next fellow lived in Belguim and just wanted to chat. He didn't do lessons only speaking practice. He normally did children and had a bad habit of using English with me. But he was lively and never tired of talking with me. He didn't change his speed of speech so I had to adapt to his quick speaking.

Things I found detrimental during the lesson would be interrupting for corrections because this derailed my train of thought. I had a couple of people who refused to use the video on Skype. It was two women, who told me they didn't use the camera. While I understand why you probably wouldn't want to do this with every other bloke on the Internet, for me is was difficult because I couldn't see the teachers face when they were speaking to me and a lot of my comprehension abilities are linked to facial expressions, etc. I didn't book them again because I could get more or less the same experience with a podcast.

In the end I've more or less stopped using iTalki even though I have money still in my account. I found that for speaking practice language exchanges were just as useful. Sometimes they are more useful since you aren't forced to use someone's lesson plan. There ins't anyone on iTalki offering me what I want from a tutor at a price I can afford. This is because what I would need would be multiple lessons in accent reduction for example and I simply cannot afford the price per lesson these people charge.

Do you use the same alias on iTalki?

[hagestolz]

I use the site a lot - four or five lessons a week on average, mainly because I don't travel much due to health reasons and don't have recourse to native speakers where I live. I agree with a lot of what rdearman says; I actually prefer working with community tutors as I find them much more flexible in their approach on the whole. As an experienced teacher myself they are quite happy to receive 'direction' and work in particular ways. Having said that I'd expect to pay more for exam preparation - as long as the service I receive is a professional one. I have worked with two tutors for over three years now and consider them friends, really.

I always contact the teachers/tutors I use in advance to let them know how I like to work. Correction is a huge thing for me; I state very clearly in advance that I don't want to be corrected in real time but wish to develop fluency. The best people either type ( or better write discretely) notes to discuss later. If it doesn't work out I move on... ( there have been a few!) Luck pays its part but one can use a few strategies to sort the wheat from the chaff...

1 How many lessons has the teacher taught - what is his student-lesson ratio?
2 Is the video intro mainly in the TL or in English talking about how many languages he can speak and his interest in surfboarding?
3 Is the video a cinematic tour de force or a more pragmatic intro which shows the real person behind the camera?
4 Is the teacher a reliable timekeeper or a serial rescheduler ( from the student feedback)

Good luck in your teaching!

[rdearman]

I personally ignore ratings. Recently psychological studies so that public ratings systems will always become unreliable and inflated.

There's quite a bit of evidence that people don't rate people harshly in these systems, even if they maybe had a bad experience or a not great experience just because they don't want to harm the other person. And you can kind of think, if you have a bad Uber ride, you know, you may be unhappy as a passenger. But you don't want to ruin a person's livelihood.... They analyzed data from a large online platform with over a billion dollars in transactions. They find that when the platform tells users that the feedback is going to be private and that it won't be used to punish providers, users start to provide much more critical feedback.

Ratings always get inflated because:

1. We want to be kind. Most people are empathetic to the tutor they just had and know it might be their livelihood.
2. People don't want to be perceived as "difficult" or "awkward", so give a higher than honest rating. With iTalki tutors review you also, and because you don't want a bad rating or comment you don't give one.
3. Some systems (like AirBnB or Uber) drop reviews less than 3 stars. Uber because they have removed the driver because they have to maintain 4.5 rating. AirBnB Because they drop the property.

Basically 4 is the new zero.

I did give one tutor 4 stars even though she rescheduled 5 times! She was pregnant and getting married so she had a lot of unexpected appointments. But really I should have given her a 1 at best. She was also one of the people who wouldn't use a camera and deprived me of visual clues.

[eido]

I've only had two italki lessons. They were for Korean, one with a male teacher and the other with a female.

The first lesson I had was with the female. For some reason she has her schedule completely open (as of this writing). Her rate was cheap because she was a novice teacher, and because of her open schedule, I decided to take a chance as I have weird hours.

The whole time the lesson gave me a weird vibe because I called her, and she freaked out because I'd chosen the video option and she said she couldn't do it at the time. I caught a brief look at her surroundings, and it just seemed to be a plain bedroom. I didn't see the problem with taking a video call, but I had set a block of time out for this, so I had her call me again, and I answered using audio. I was pissed, because with Korean, the syllables are hard for me to hear yet, and I can't pronounce the sounds with a reasonable degree of accuracy. So I wanted to see her mouth. And we're both girls, so what's the deal? I tried to be understanding, though.

Then because we'd had technical difficulties at the lesson start time, she insisted on extending the lesson. I said, "Fine, that's fair." But instead of 5 or 10 minutes more, she extended it to an hour. I didn't think that was fair to her because I'd only paid for a 30-minute trial, and not to me either because I had other things to do. But I couldn't say no; I didn't know how.

Then she proceeded to get snippy with me when I said I didn't know what book I wanted to use to learn, and after I gave her several options and asked her which would be best, admitting I was ignorant, she said, "Well, if you don't pick a book, the lesson can't continue" not realizing she was part of the reason it had gone on so long.

Then, after the lesson ended, and I told her I was considering booking her again, she didn't hint at what was assigned for me next. When she did, I realized we'd had a misunderstanding about what page number I was on because when she asked, she didn't give me enough time to scroll through the PDF and find the section. So I was starting from the beginning. The next week, even though I hadn't booked a lesson, I asked her exactly what we'd be doing in the lesson, and she responded I'd get a quiz, but didn't specify over what.

I haven't booked her again.

My most recent lesson was with a male teacher who has quite a few lessons under his belt. I won't describe his methods in detail since we've only just recently had a lesson and I might continue. He's quite expensive, as most Korean teachers on this site are.

He was pretty patient and much more prepared than the other girl, but one comment gave me pause. I kept messing up on a sentence pattern because I had another similar-sounding pattern ingrained in my brain, and he said, "Well, I know you want to do that, but what about the sentence we're talking about here?" At the time I laughed because it was silly to me that I'd had that pattern so deeply stuck in there, but I thought about it later and thought it was kind of rude.

I'm always afraid to have Skype calls because I don't make eye contact usually with people and I mess up a lot, especially with regard to Korean which I've never formally studied. These people have the power to make or break how much I like studying it, but not how much I like the language itself.

I can't say it's been helpful this early in the game, but I'd say I prefer the professional lessons so far. Hopefully that rant above can help others when knowing what to look for in a teacher, regardless of the language.

[Axon]

Good heavens, nine lessons a day??? I do IELTS prep online part-time and a day with four lessons is a bit of a slog.

I'm interested in iTalki and other similar tutoring sites because I want to be forced into more speaking, as it were. It would also be a great way for me to experience other online tutoring methods. So far I haven't yet bit the bullet and arranged a class.

It seems that rdearman has had generally negative experiences telling people how to teach him, and I worry about the same thing. I'm so used to teaching myself languages that the thought of paying $15 for a single fleeting hour seems scary to me. I suppose the ideal teacher would briefly communicate with me beforehand and we would agree on a couple of different things to work on first - that way I know I wouldn't waste 25 cents a minute figuring out what to talk about. Spending time on this kind of communication may not be cost-effective for you if you're getting so many bookings so fast.

[IronMike]

I too am interested in iTalki but haven't made the leap yet. I'm afraid some of the lessons will be as described above. I've tried to arrange in-person meet-ups, along the lines of "Can I buy you coffee and you help me with my language?" I did that with ASL and it was fun, but had to bail on that as it was during work (she was an ASL interpreter there) and our meets tended to extend well beyond what I could legitimately call my lunch break.

I'll be keeping an eye on this thread though to see what the consensus is, especially with teachers of specific languages.

[rdearman]

It seems that rdearman has had generally negative experiences telling people how to teach him, and I worry about the same thing. I'm so used to teaching myself languages that the thought of paying $15 for a single fleeting hour seems scary to me.

To be fair to the iTalki tutors. I booked well over 20 lessons and probably only about 2-3% of them were trying to force their lessons on me, and I just didn't book them again. For many of them I believe it was outside their comfort zone, they are used to teaching children or monolingual beginners. Like language exchanges it can be a little hit or miss until you find someone who is willing to be flexible (most are) and with whom your comfortable. I was satisfied 80% of the time, but I remember (and report) the 20% of unsatisfactory times. Some people might actually want lessons with homework and all that. I suspect people on this forum are probably more the exception than the rule. Lots of tutors do free 30 minutes trials, so it might be worth doing that if you're on a tight budget.

The first lesson I had was with the female. For some reason she has her schedule completely open (as of this writing). Her rate was cheap because she was a novice teacher, and because of her open schedule, I decided to take a chance as I have weird hours.

The whole time the lesson gave me a weird vibe because I called her, and she freaked out because I'd chosen the video option and she said she couldn't do it at the time. I caught a brief look at her surroundings, and it just seemed to be a plain bedroom. I didn't see the problem with taking a video call, but I had set a block of time out for this, so I had her call me again, and I answered using audio. I was pissed, because with Korean, the syllables are hard for me to hear yet, and I can't pronounce the sounds with a reasonable degree of accuracy. So I wanted to see her mouth. And we're both girls, so what's the deal? I tried to be understanding, though.

Then because we'd had technical difficulties at the lesson start time, she insisted on extending the lesson. I said, "Fine, that's fair." But instead of 5 or 10 minutes more, she extended it to an hour. I didn't think that was fair to her because I'd only paid for a 30-minute trial, and not to me either because I had other things to do. But I couldn't say no; I didn't know how.

Then she proceeded to get snippy with me when I said I didn't know what book I wanted to use to learn, and after I gave her several options and asked her which would be best, admitting I was ignorant, she said, "Well, if you don't pick a book, the lesson can't continue" not realizing she was part of the reason it had gone on so long.

At the end of the day it is your dime, and he who pays the piper names the tune. I've always tried to be very clear in the first message what my goal for the lesson is, and what I want to achieve. This is why it annoys me when people try to force me down the square hole, when I clearly booked the round one! I also think people who want to be tutors, but don't want to be on camera should clearly state they are "audio only" tutors.

I'll be keeping an eye on this thread though to see what the consensus is, especially with teachers of specific languages.

Seriously it is worth doing, especially if you have an objective in mind and you are clear about what you want up front. Also if you're doing Italian I can recommend some very good tutors.

[hagestolz]

Despite all the possible pitfalls, I would describe italki as the single most motivating factor in my language learning. I'm a self-starter like a lot of members here, but the commitment, preparing of topics in advance, submitting 'homework' and actually having to communicate ( ie putting yourself on the line outside of your comfort zone), are all invaluable.

Last week, for example, I prepared a long article in Czech about the self-immolation of Jan Palach in Prague in 1968, which took a good two hours. With a sympathetic tutor we discussed the history, present-day attitudes to his act, similarities with Buddhist monks, and then we spent 20 minutes reviewing and correcting my language. The sense of achievement was huge, the list of structures and new vocabulary provided was detailed, the human interaction was uplifting, and I paid $13 for the privilege - cheaper than a decent bottle of wine but without the hangover.

One other thing I forgot to mention earlier is the Community area, which I use for text correction. In the past I have submitted many texts in 8 languages, which have been corrected by native speakers. People do this out of the goodness of their hearts, so I correct English texts, too, and look out especially, but not exclusively, for people who have helped me out. A good way in for those who may feel a little reluctant to speak or who maybe can't budget for lots of lessons. I fund my hobby through tutoring ( secondary school pupils mainly) languages myself.

OP - correcting texts is a good way to get yourself noticed by potential students, although that doesn't seem to be a problem at the moment!

[Chupito]

he said, "Well, I know you want to do that, but what about the sentence we're talking about here?" At the time I laughed because it was silly to me that I'd had that pattern so deeply stuck in there, but I thought about it later and thought it was kind of rude.

If he is Korean and English isn't his native language, it's quite possible that he didn't realize it might sound rude to you. Navigating what comes off as rude across cultural and linguistic differences can be tricky. I once innocently told my (now) husband that he was stupid and I was surprised that he seemed offended. He had light-heartedly called me silly and I hadn't quite grasped the differences between "you're silly" and "you're stupid".