ESL Jobs in South Africa Teach English in South Africa

South Africa, is a country located at the southern tip of the African continent. It borders Namibia, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Swaziland, and Lesotho (an independent enclave surrounded by South African territory). South Africa is a member of the Commonwealth of Nations.

South Africa has eleven official languages: Afrikaans, English, Ndebele, Northern Sotho, Southern Sotho, Swati, Tsonga, Tswana, Venda, Xhosa and Zulu. In this regard it is second only to India in number. While each language is technically equal to every other, some languages are spoken more than others. According to the 1996 National Census, the three most spoken first home languages are Zulu (9.2 million), Xhosa (7.2 million) and Afrikaans (5.8 million). The three most spoken second home languages are English (2.2 million), Afrikaans (1.1 million) and Zulu (0.5 million). The four most spoken home languages are Zulu (9.8 million), Xhosa (7.5 million), Afrikaans (6.9 million) and English (5.7 million). The 1996 census does not include information about languages spoken elsewhere than at home.

EFL is in it's infancy in South Africa, and infrastructure is still poor - with poor further training available to English teachers, and difficulty finding ESL teaching resources. It is fairly easy to secure a job teaching English in South Africa, and not many experienced ESL teachers choose to settle in South Africa. Reasons for this are the high crime rates of some cities in South Africa as well as the very poor pay compared to other countries, and the lowly valued Rand.