Notes on Independent English Teaching
Stories from Blue Noun
This page gathers longer pieces written while building Blue Noun.
They were written over time, often in response to questions I was sitting with — about independence, English teaching outside institutions, running a small school, and what it actually looks like to work without platforms or prescriptions.
They also reflect a longer arc: training and working first in corporate language environments, initially imagining something different, and then slowly building it. The writing records false starts, course corrections, the sideways shift brought by Covid, and the gradual evolution from English language teaching holidays to English-using experiences.
The path hasn’t been linear. Learning how to choose — and then keep returning to — a north star has been part of the process.
These posts aren’t advice, and they’re not written to be useful to everyone. They’re closer to notes from practice: reflective, sometimes unfinished, and shaped by the realities of doing the work rather than explaining it.
I’ve kept them live as a record of thinking in motion, and in the hope they might resonate with other independent ELT professionals who prefer to read slowly, selectively, and by choice.
Making English Memorable
Over time, I’ve found that I regularly receive messages on LinkedIn from people I don’t know, saying they’d like to build something similar — an English business that works outdoors, at a humane pace, in healthy, low-pressure ways. The questions are often the same: how did you get started, how did you find clients, how did it become real.
I’m genuinely glad of every message. They tell me that English learners are being offered more thoughtful options, and that others are also imagining English as something interesting, lived, and human rather than institutional.
Along the way, I’ve supported people in England, Switzerland, Montreal, and Brussels to turn early ideas into real, working businesses.
The writing collected here reflects some of the thinking I’ve shared as part of that process.
You can find current ways Blue Noun supports independent language teachers here.
I also write a LinkedIn newsletter reflecting on confidence, pressure, and sustainability in independent English teaching.
For more shared thinking shaped by real practice,
