Live online English courses with teachers from the USA, localized for Spanish, French and Russian speaking students.

As a leading provider of synchronized (“live”) online education, eTeacher is expanding its offerings both in the language programs offered and in the target markets. Currently it is expanding its English program to Spanish, French and Russian speaking students worldwide.

The technological platform for all eTeacher Group programs is highly advanced and is constantly being upgraded and improved. The various language programs have been written by top academic scholars and have been specially designed for live online courses.

eTeacher’s teaching method is based on the virtual classroom, where a teacher, based in his or her native country, connects online through video conference technology to a group of students that also connect online, each from his or her home, anywhere in the world. Once a week teacher and students meet for an interactive synchronized lesson.

eTeacher’s English adaptation to Spanish, French and Russian includes localized learning material (study kit) that students receive when they sign up. This includes students’ workbooks, multimedia presentations used during the lesson, homework assignments, etc.

Based in the USA, all eTeacher English teachers are certified American teachers experienced in teaching English as a second language and specially trained in online teaching.

 The ESL (English as a Second Language) is a very competitive market, but we are confident that we have developed the best “formula” for effective English learning: Advanced technology, well-structured programs and the best teachers, Our many years of experience with other language programs (Chinese, Biblical and Modern Hebrew), enable us to offer what we believe is the most effective and convenient method to learn English.   

For more information about eTeacher’s English program go to: www.eTeacherEnglish.com

Watch video clips:

French

Russian

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Teachers K.P.I’s (key performance indicators)

Hello Everyone,

In my last post I promised I would talk more about the virtual teacher. As I already said – in the world of synchronized learning I believe the teacher is the most significant factor of the product. The sales policy in eTeacher today allows customers to participate in two trial lessons and only then decide if they are interested in participating in the full course. This arrangement puts a lot of pressure on the teachers by including them in the sales process and in effect turning them into sales reps as well. If the student likes the first lesson he will buy the product, if not – he may decide to discontinue and cancel the deal.

The virtual teacher

The virtual teacher

We feel very confident and we believe in our products and our teachers. Our experience, backed by our data, shows that 85% of students that sign up to a trial lesson go on to purchase the full course. Furthermore, a large percentage of graduates purchase another course. Our registration advisors are aware of these numbers and feel highly confident when they recommend our trial lessons to new customers.

These numbers vary from product to product and there are also other factors regarding students from different countries. But the most significant factor influencing the conversion rates (students who sign up to a trial lesson that purchase the course) is the teacher! If a teacher is unable to create a positive learning environment that affects student’s motivation to learn, this will be reflected in his or her numbers and he or she will not be able to teach.

In the virtual school everything is measurable: Attendance, drop-out rate, continuing students rate, students conversion from trial to active, feedback at the end of every lesson, etc. Our Business Intelligence System processes the data and provides the management team with detailed reports showing every teacher’s conversion rates and trend lines. I don’t believe that regular schools have this level of measurability, especially due to the fact that collecting this kind of data would be more complicated.

And that’s not all. At the end of every lesson a feedback form pops up automatically for every student asking them to rate the teacher and add any comments they may have. These forms are automatically transferred to the teacher and to his or her product manager via email. These feedbacks are also saved in our database and are included in the reports system that we, the managers, receive on a regular basis. At the end of the day we can see a detailed K.P.I (key performance indicators) report of every teacher.

But it doesn’t end here. In eTeacher all lessons are recorded. This means that every word the teacher utters is practically eternal. The recordings turn every lesson into an accessible document for re-viewing by students and for the purpose of professional feedback by our product managers.

So the virtual teacher enjoys the fact that he or she doesn’t have to leave the house and can teach from anywhere in the world. They can relocate to a different city or country and continue teaching as long as they maintain their high level of professionalism. The level of supervision and student’s satisfaction is very high in eTeacher. Data is continually collected and presents a clear picture of highly professional teachers and very satisfied students.

That’s it for this week. We’ll meet again next week.

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Virtual school, what it’s made up of and what really matters.

Teaching Chinese Online

Teaching Chinese Online

 Hello everyone, 

Last week we discussed schools and the question of – will the school disappear in the age of distance learning. This week I want to talk about the virtual school, what it’s made up of and what really matters.  

Our school is located on the computer, or to be more precise – on many computers located in different locations around the world. I am not a computer programmer and my understanding of how all this really works is limited. As a CEO I can tell you that we spend a lot of money on maintaining various types of servers (powerful computers). These are dozens of computers with different functions on which we store our websites, databases various applications and technologies that make up the learning environment and through which the lessons are carried out. 

This learning environment was developed over the past 10 years by a team of dedicated software engineers working here at eTeacher. It consists of and combines many technologies including original software that we developed and continue to develop in-house. This software connects the different human factors involved in the school: students, teachers, managers, sales reps, finance, support and service personnel, campus managers, human resources and content writers. 

The software allows us to manage a class schedule for students around the globe located on different continents and indifferent time zones. It can also tell us exactly how each student reached us, which search term he or she used to find us or which online ad they clicked on before reaching us and signing up. And so on. 

What’s being done on the technology side is really impressive, and even though I have accompanied the whole process, I am still impressed. However, I know today that it is not as impressive for our clients, and his or her decision whether to sign up to one of our courses or not depends on an entirely different consideration: the teacher. 

This seems obvious, but it took us a while to realize that at the end of the day, in spite of the great investment in technology that bridges distances and connects students and teachers from different corners of the earth, what really matters in a virtual school is what really matters in the traditional school: the teaching quality. 

That is why our registration advisers, who speak to hundreds of customers from all over the world, put an emphasis on our teacher’s profile and on the unique learning experience that combines the comforts of home and a professional and experienced teacher that (usually) teaches from another country. The student understands that his learning process is affected primarily by the teacher and only secondarily by the technology. 

The technology simply enables us to bring the best teachers we can find in the world to our students, by overcoming geographical boundaries and limitations. 

So that’s it for today, next week we will continue talking about the virtual teacher, what is required of him or her and why I believe that virtual teaching is more challenging than frontal teaching in a classroom. 

See you then. 

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Will distance learning replace the physical school some day?

The blog is already 3 weeks old and I am getting quite a few responses from people interested in this field. I enjoy reading the messages and responding to them. One of these emails addressed the question of the future of conventional school in the age of distance learning. This is, naturally, a frequent question when discussing online learning:

Will distance learning replace the physical school some day?

 As part of my job as a CEO in eTeacher, I get to meet with teachers (In the past when the company was small I met them more often here in the company and also in the schools), and this issue seems to be on teachers’ minds, coming up often in my conversations with them. There is usually at least one teacher that remarks sarcastically “pretty soon they won’t need us anymore” or “when will it replace the school as we know it”?

As far as I’m concerned, as opposed to other technological revolutions (the industrial revolution and technological inventions that replaced human workers), distance learning will not replace the teacher or the school. On the contrary: It will open up more opportunities for both teachers and schools. Teachers will find more work outside of school and schools will have another tool that will enable them to enrich their curriculum during and after school hours (we will probably discuss this issue further in this blog).

Many of the teachers who work for eTeacher work in schools in the morning and with us in the afternoon hours. Some teachers live in remote places where there are no jobs in their specific fields, and they can only find teaching jobs through distance learning companies. There are also those teachers that work for us full-time. Some of them relocated to other cities or even countries and could keep their jobs while doing so. We have created hundreds of teaching jobs for teachers around the world and that really is the answer to the question. More jobs, more opportunities!

And as for schools; we all know that a school is more than just a place that provides knowledge. It is also an educational institute and an arena for social interaction, growth and development. It is a basis and an anchor on which our economy and workforce is based since  it enables us parents to go to work knowing that someone is watching over our kids.

So, besides providing knowledge, distance learning cannot all other school duties.

I am very clear on this. Distance learning will not replace teachers or schools!

See you next week.

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Posted in e-learning | Tagged | 1 Comment

Online Academic Accreditation – new opportunities in the academic arena

The Hebrew University of Jerusalem

Academic recognition from the Hebrew University

In the previous post I wrote about our vision and how we founded eTeacher. In those early days, when things didn’t always go as we expected, we naturally turned to our imagination and fantasized about how far we could possibly go with distance learning. I remember myself driving home and imagining an online school teaching Chinese, where the teachers are located in Beijing and the students are located in the US or Europe. I also remember myself thinking of the remote possibility of our company getting recognition from a large, well-known University that will provide academic accreditation to our courses. Some of these dreams have come true, some have not and some never will.

A month ago we signed an agreement with the Hebrew University in Jerusalem under which our Biblical Hebrew courses will be recognized by the Hebrew University. According to the agreement we will open separate classes with academic requirements (attendance, paper submissions and a final exam). Students that pass the course will receive 4 academic credit points from the Hebrew University.

So, 10 years of hard work have passed and we have reached yet another significant stepping stone; academic recognition from a leading international institution.

There is no doubt that academic recognition is a big honor for eTeacher, received following a professional and scrupulous examination that included: assessment of the content, the teaching faculty, professional management and teaching methods. But it is also a small stepping stone in the history of the Israeli academic world; the Hebrew University, the oldest and most prestigious academic institution in Israel, with generations of graduates that have taken classes in its campuses, is initiating its very first distance learning program, and it is doing it with eTeacher!

Distance learning opens a fantastic window of opportunity to the academic world. If I was a president of a big university I would try to figure out how to take advantage of today’s technology, the internet and methodologies that have been developed to open the gates of the university to students from all around the globe. Every university has its academic assets, those fields that it specializes in, sometimes drawing students from far away countries to study these fields. These are the fields that should be adapted to online learning.

The Hebrew University in Jerusalem excels in many fields. But it obviously has a clear international academic advantage in fields such as Bible studies, Israeli studies (history, archeology) and Judaism. Every head of a large university can identify parallel fields of expertise in his university.

So now the question is how to recruit students and make money from it. Do we cooperate with a private company, do we develop the distance learning ability in-house, do we use synchronous tools (like the ones we use in eTeacher) or a-synchronous like most.

Obviously my advice would be – use the experts! Online learning has become a profession. Collaboration with experienced players can save the university precious time and money. In this field it’s easy to make mistakes and to spend a lot of money without seeing the expected results.

And if anyone wants my advice or assistance, my email is available and I would be happy to help.

Read more at Yahoo News

Yariv@eteachergroup.com

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How it all began

Yariv Binnun, Co-CEO

Yariv Binnun, Co-CEO

Hello,  My name is Yariv Binnun and I am the co-founder and co-CEO of eTeacher Group. 10 years ago my brother Boaz and I founded eTeacher with the aim of creating an electronic arena that will enable teachers and students to meet and communicate online. A lot of water has passed under the bridge since then and we have come a long way. Today eTeacher is one of the largest online language schools, employing hundreds of teachers and serving thousands of students from all over the world.  

Every week, our students log on to a virtual classroom, from their homes, where they meet their teacher through video conferencing technology. Our teachers, which live in different countries, also log on and teach the lesson from home. So, a Chinese lesson is taught by a teacher in Beijing, an English lesson is taught by a teacher in the USA and a Hebrew lesson is taught by a teacher in Israel. But I’ll talk more about that later.  

Watch how it works:

This blog is for anyone interested in e-learning, online education and distance learning entrepreneurs. Once a week, here in this blog, we will share our thoughts, ideas, executive dilemmas and stories from the world of online learning. As pioneers in this field, we feel it is our mission to “spread the word”, if you will, of distance learning. We live and breathe this topic every day, in our marketing, sales and program management. And now, through sharing our experience and knowhow to anyone who is interested.  

So, to start off – today I will briefly share the story of how eTeacher was founded.  

eTeacher was founded in the year 2000. Our initial idea was to take the eBay concept and apply it to private tutoring; an open arena where any teacher can offer their services and students can choose any teacher for their private lessons. Our intention was to take a commission for every transaction but not to directly employ the teachers. The website went live in 2001; teachers started signing up and even conducted video chats with students for a fee. However, very quickly it became apparent to us that we will not be able to make money based on this model. Traffic was too low and the internet in those days was way too slow.  

So, we made the required changes and in a short time the website became a regular private tutoring service. The company employed teachers who went from house to house and gave private lessons while the website was used only for advertising.  

Then, in 2002 the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs published a tender for a virtual online school to teach children of Israeli diplomats all over the world reading and writing through the internet.  

We realized the great potential of this project, submitted our offer and won the tender.  Within two months we started offering live online lessons to 300 students in dozens of countries. Today, 8 years later, we are still running this one-of-a-kind program. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs is an international pioneer in this field and as far as I know is the only one in the world running such a program.  

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ school marked our turning point. Through it we learned a lot about how to operate synchronous online learning. But more importantly, we saw that it actually worked! First grade students learned how to read and write and high-school students took their exams (SATs) and got very high scores.  

The potential of teaching languages online was definitely there. We saw how convenient and how effective it was. We saw how a teacher in one country can teach his or her language to a student in another country, and we saw the undeniable advantage of teaching a language directly from its native country.  

We knew then that we were on to something innovative and ground-breaking.  And that is how it all began.

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Posted in eTeacher News | 4 Comments