by Kelly Blackwell

I think it's a worldwide problem for teachers, we just aren't well-paid. I'm sure we've all had times in our lives when we have been little short of some ready-cash. In this article I like to share with you some of the things I've done, or thought about doing, in order to relieve my cash flow worries. And the method I have finally found to relieve my cash flow worries long-term.

Tutoring in Your First Language
One of the first things I ever did was to tutor people in the English language. At the time I was living in Taiwan, working as an English language teacher so it didn't take me long to realise that I could make extra money tutoring people. This was extremely lucrative for me and it was easy to find clients.

Now you might be thinking that you don't live in Taiwan so how is this helpful to you? With the amount of migration in the last five to 10 years it should be easy to find someone in need of English language tutoring, regardless of where you're living.

Tutoring in Your Subject Area
Of course the other alternative to tutoring people in the English language is to tutor them in your teaching subject. I have tutored students in math and accounting, and these aren't even my teaching subjects!

Something I've never done, but have seen people do very successfully, is to tutor students in English language using the curriculum they were covering at school. This will work for students in high-school and university, and you can certainly charge more per hour for this kind of tutoring.

Marking exams
When I lived in the United Kingdom I marked A-level exams for three years. This is another way I have earned a substantial amount of extra money. But the benefit wasn't just monetary; I became better able to prepare my students for the exams they sat. After I had marked exams for the first time, I noticed that my students' grades improved and continued to do so over the next two years.

I made around £3000 ($US 5930) my first year, rising to around £6,500 ($US 12,850) in my third year. The reason I made more money was because I marked more papers, began to moderate coursework, and became a team leader.

The two problems with marking exams is that you have to do it right to be for the summer holidays at the end of a long hard year, and that you can only do it once a year. With this method you cannot control when you earn the extra money.

Teach Evening Classes
I worked my way through my Post Graduate Teaching Diploma by teaching English Language evening classes at the local high school. The pay was excellent and the hours suited the lifestyle I wanted to lead. The government put a cap on how much I was allowed to earn and I reached that limit teaching evening classes four hours a week.

If there are any evening classes being offered in your area, you could try approaching the organiser with a proposal. In my experience evening class organisers are always looking for new classes to add to their brochure.

Teach English Overseas
Teaching is a skill that can be adapted to almost any subject. Once you can teach you can teach almost anything, including language. There are a lot of hungry students in the world looking to learn English. If you can speak English, and you are a teacher, then you can teach English.

I know that I earlier mentioned that you can tutor the English language in addition to your current salary, but one way to increase your current salary without increasing your workload would be to move overseas and teach English abroad. A non-monetary side benefit to this option is that you get to live an exotic lifestyle and explore new cultures.

In summary
In this article I have discussed five ways for teachers to earn extra money. I hope that this has given you some ideas for improving your own cash flow situation. Oh, I forgot to tell you how I've improved my cash flow situation long-term. I moved overseas, I now teach at an international school in Thailand full-time. I now earn enough money from this one teaching position that I don't need to look for any other way to supplement my income. In non monetary benefits I now live in summer weather 12 months of the year, teach only 180 days a year, and have a sizeable professional development allowance. I have found teaching abroad to be a fantastic opportunity, you should check it out.


Kelly's been teaching for 9 years, and while she loves the job she's not too pleased with the lack of money in her pay-packet at the end of the month. She's done extra work for 8 of the last 9 years to supplement her income, but now she's found a more permanent solution, she's making much more money teaching overseas. Check it out!