• Duration: 6 weeks 
  • Orientation: 3-days
  • Village-stays: 3-week sessions

• 2010 Program Dates 
  • Orientation: June 24-27 
  • Program ends: August 6

• Orientation Location: Budapest
• Number of volunteers: 17-18
• Language Requirement: None
• Village Setting: Rural
• Living Conditions:  Modern (TV, possibly internet)
• Students’ Level of English Proficiency:  Mostly advanced, but a range over all levels

For questions not answered on this website, contact the 2010 Program Director, Ridge Blanchard at hungary.slovakia@learningenterprises.org.

On the Sunday afternoon of orientation, you will depart from Budapest, leaving your fellow volunteers and anticipating the next part of your adventure: the village. Your first village will be your home for three weeks, following which, you will rejoin with the other volunteers in the city of Komarno, on the border between Hungary and Slovakia. This mid-point break lends you the opportunity to swap lesson plans, discuss your experiences in the village, and work together to improve your teaching strategies. You will part ways with your fellow volunteers after midpoint break, when you move onto your second three-week teaching assignment. Volunteers usually teach in a village in Hungary for the first three weeks, and then teach in Slovakia after the midpoint break, or vice-versa.

The areas where you will teach will be a village or small town. In Hungary, many volunteers are centered around the city of Zalaegerszeg but others are scattered, three or four hours from Budapest. In Slovakia, most of the volunteers are placed in the southwest part of the country, about two hours from Bratislava, the capital. While you may not be too far from your fellow volunteers, you may not be able to visit because of limited transportation. Inside the village, you should be able to walk to where you teach, though some families provide bicycles for an added convenience. 

Each volunteer will be placed with a host family. You will most likely have someone in your host family who speaks English. Most host families will have moderate amenities, such as TV, landline phones, and showers. Internet is occasionally available inside your home, but usually you will go to a café in the village to check your email. However, you might not have air-conditioning and might have to share a room with a host sibling. Most host families treat volunteers as they do their own children, and are warm, welcoming, and protective. Get ready for lots of food and hospitality!

In your free time, you can walk through a sunflower field (carefully), enjoy a bike ride with your host siblings to their favorite spot or get ice cream with some teenagers in the village. You will spend two full weekends in your village, and we encourage you to spend as much time as possible in your host village. One weekend, you will spend with your host family; usually they will take you on a day trip to see the surrounding landmarks. The second weekend, you are free to travel or meet other volunteers in the larger cities, or remain in the village to explore more.

In your villages your teaching space will most likely be a room in the community center, town hall, or local school. Usually, you will have a blackboard and chalk at your disposal, but resources in each village differ. Extra supplies can be obtained during the orientation in Budapest, if you don’t want to carry them from home. The amount of students that you will teach in each village ranges between 20 and 70. Your students may be between 5 and 45, with various levels of English. Often, you will have enough teenage and adult students to create a separate class for advanced speakers. Three hours of teaching each day is required, but most volunteers will teach about four hours. You will be expected to plan your own lessons for each class. Feel free to get creative and add in your own interests- the best lessons often involve races and games! 

Schools in Hungary and Slovakia require that students study a foreign language, and the majority of students choose to take English. For many of your students, English is a tool that they hope to utilize in order to excel in both school

and their future careers. While many students are excited to continue their studies, even though your English classes are during their summer vacation, our goal is to encourage our students and make learning English enjoyable.