We get a few days off from teaching in person in the ESL field because of Lunar New Year and a lot of the people that I work with take this time to go and get drunk for 4 days in a row. Since I don't really get drunk all that often and I abhor hangovers, I decided to play the game a bit different this year and instead set myself up and made myself available for online classes over the holiday.
It is quite popular for people to be online ESL teachers over here in South East Asia because while you are technically allowed to do this job from anywhere in the world, doing it over here works out a lot better because you are in a similar time zone to China, which is where a majority of the students reside.
I don't expect you to know what that pic is but that is the icon for Cambly, which is one of the largest online English-teaching apps / companies that operates out of China.
Lunar New Year is a very big deal in this part of the world and I was surprised to hear about how much time other countries in the area get off from work. I heard in Vietnam that the schools give them 2 weeks off... for a New Year? That's insane if you ask me but whatever man, enjoy your time off.
For me, while I won't tell my school this but they probably already know. I only teach in-person at the school for the sake of maintaining a work-permit and therefore a visa for Thailand. I still do a good job but I recognized a long time ago that the earning potential is pretty terrible and it seems to be capped at a wage where you aren't really going to build any sort of nest egg as far as savings are concerned. I have written many times before about how I do NOT consider teaching English in person in Thailand to be a career. I consider it to mostly be a waste of one's life. Sorry if you are currently doing this for a living but unless you are a properly qualified teacher at an international school, you are making peanuts and it is a dead end for all of the mostly alcoholics that are involved.
During Lunar New Year, Cambly, as well as other services that I also use, offer incentives to encourage teachers to not just work during the holiday, but to work a LOT. Basically you are getting overtime pay during the entire holiday. There isn't as far as I am aware, any other time of year where financial incentives are offered to teachers to work during this time.
Normally, if I really push for it, I can get 2-3 hours of contact time with students on Cambly at $15 an hour. Not a great wage I know, but you have to consider the very low cost of living where I am before you make a judgement on that.
When I teach in person, I will normally have 15-30 students all at once. This is extremely difficult to do and honestly, I don't think it is very beneficial to the kids or me. I also only make around $6 an hour for this. It's horrible but I deal with it for the visa.
Online I make a minimum of $15 an hour and during the Lunar New Year I make $22 an hour and I can easily, if I wanted to, teach 10 hours a day. I didn't teach 10 hours a day because that would be exhausting but I did do two 4-hour stints for each day and made BANK.
while my co-workers were out getting drunk and feeling like crap every day I was pulling in $200 a day and yes, I understand that isn't a lot for all of you people with actual careers but it is a very good wage for me over here when you consider that my rent is $400 a month.
Apparently, the Chinese students don't really get holidays and are expected to study even when they are not in school. I guess I feel bad for them but they don't seem all morose when I see them online. I think they are just kind of used to this being how their lives are and hopefully it pays off for them later in life and they get really good jobs.
In the meantime I am taking advantage of this every year and look forward to it even though it means that my holiday days off are actually busier than days that I don't have off. The Lunar New Year benefits are already behind me but during those 7 days I made almost 50 days worth of wages that I would normally get from this system.
So if you are an online English teacher I highly suggest that you at least throw you hat into the ring with someone like Cambly, even if it is to just cash in on the huge amount of demand that exists during Lunar New Year. For me, even though it is technically work, it feels like Christmas because I am the supply and there is a massive amount of demand that I'm guessing they have a difficult time filling during this time of year since most of their teachers decide to take the holiday off as well.
It's a good way to make some money!