English lessons for exam preparation

Education has always been one of my main interests throughout my life, ranging from early years to adulthood. I was born in Romania, in a modest family and, since secondary school, I have always had a strong desire to change things that did not work in the educational system of the time, either teaching approaches or syllabus design.
I graduated the bilingual high school in Romania with “A” at the European Baccaulareate which made me pursue my studies in Foreign Languages and Translation at “Babes-Bolyai” University in Cluj-Napoca, Romania. I studied English and Italian for one year and had the opportunity to apply for a scholarship in the southern part of Italy, where I completed my studies in English and Spanish withDistinction, being awarded a Bachelor’s Degree in Foreign Languages and Literature.
I had the great opportunity to start working in a language school in Italy, mainly with young learners at the beginning, which opened many career opportunities, but also made me question about the several teaching approaches observed within the school. This extraordinary work experience led me towards specific training courses that I successfully completed, such as Celta and Delta.
Moreover, I have realised that having a passion for education will always push me towards further training because motivated teachers will inspire and motivate future successful learners. The more training I got the more questions I had, therefore I decided to take up a Cambridge Speaking Examiner training course in order to understand my students better, along with their difficulties during the actual speaking exams. After having worked as a Cambridge Speaking examiner for about three years I realised that I can do more as a teacher and help my students using different teaching approaches rather than the ones that I had been using so far.
Furthermore, I decided to enrol in a Master’s in Education-TESOL at Oxford Brookes University that helped acquire the knowledge regarding the different teaching approaches I was not familiar with. I am very excited to be writing my final dissertation on “lack of motivation” and conducting research at the University of Salento, that will help practitioners better understand their students and plan and deliver more engaging lessons.