Teaching Without Borders: From Survival to Stability Through Online Teaching

This is a true story of how online teaching created financial stability, professional independence, and a global career for me—all from home in South Africa.

There is a quiet kind of turning point that does not announce itself when it happens.

At the time, it looks like loss. Or limitation. Or simply survival.

Only later do you realize it was redirection.

My own online teaching journey began not with confidence, but with necessity.

In early 2016, I lost my car.

It was a Toyota Corolla, fully paid off for just two months. After years of financial discipline, that car represented independence. It meant freedom of movement, freedom from debt, and the ability to continue building my tutoring work across Pretoria.

Then one afternoon, while sitting in stationary traffic, a driver behind me—distracted on his phone in a Nissan Infiniti SUV—looked up too late and crashed into the back of my car.

The damage was severe enough that the vehicle was declared a write-off.

The insurance payout was about R30,000—approximately $2,500 USD at the time.

That money did not replace the car. It became our living expenses.

My tutoring income was modest and unpredictable, and there was no realistic way to purchase a similar vehicle with what insurance provided. From that point onward, I began using my parents-in-law’s 1981 Mercedes-Benz, which I still use today.

It is a vehicle I am deeply grateful for. But it was never mine, and its fuel consumption in Pretoria traffic made face-to-face tutoring economically unsustainable. Much of what I earned disappeared into petrol.

That season was marked by financial uncertainty, loss of independence, and the quiet weight of responsibility as a husband trying to provide stability.

Looking back, it was also the season that forced me toward something new.

I had completed my first TEFL certificate in 2004, and it had served me well during my international teaching years. But by 2017, the industry had evolved.

When I applied for overseas teaching positions again, a recruiter told me plainly that my Level 3, 100-hour TEFL certificate no longer met current standards.

It was difficult news, but it clarified what needed to be done.

With limited income, I enrolled in a Level 5, 168-hour TEFL Diploma course. My mother-in-law graciously helped cover the upfront payment when the course was on special, and I repaid her later with tutoring income.

During that diploma course, I encountered something that would change the direction of my professional life permanently:

Online teaching.

For the first time, I saw that it was possible to teach students globally while working from home in South Africa. No commuting. No fuel costs. No geographical limitation.

Just connection, preparation, and consistency.

I completed the diploma in January 2018.

Within weeks, I began applying.

In February 2018, I was accepted by EF First.

The pay was modest—approximately:

• R90 per 45-minute lesson (about $7 USD)
• R40 per 25-minute lesson (about $3 USD)

By international standards, this was very low. Yet remarkably, I was earning more than I had been through face-to-face tutoring—without driving across Pretoria.

My mother-in-law helped me secure a Telkom LTE router package, which became the technological foundation of my new career.

I taught as many hours as I could get—typically 4 to 5 hours per day—gradually building experience, confidence, and professional rhythm.

Online teaching was no longer theoretical. It was working.

With experience behind me, I applied to a Chinese platform called Hujiang, which offered $7.50 USD per 30-minute lesson.

My workload increased significantly. I was teaching 5 to 6 hours per day, five to six days per week.

For the first time, we experienced real financial improvement.

We were able to begin buying basic necessities independently—things my parents-in-law had generously helped provide for years.

These may seem like small victories. But they represented restored dignity and forward motion.

Online teaching was becoming not just income—but sustainability.

In 2018, an opportunity arose to work on the PetroChina Oilfield project in Iraq.

This interrupted my online teaching journey for approximately six months in total.

Yet even that season clarified something important.

Online teaching was not simply a temporary income stream. It was a viable long-term profession—one that aligned with both my abilities and our circumstances.

When I returned, I pursued it more deliberately.

In April 2019, I joined Skyeng, where I have remained ever since.

Initially, I taught only four classes per day while completing additional academic commitments. But once I opened my schedule fully, my workload increased to between 25 and 40 teaching hours per week.

Over the past seven years, across Skyeng, Hujiang, EF First, and italki, I have taught more than 9,000 online lessons to adult students around the world.

My students have included engineers, analysts, managers, consultants, IT professionals, corporate executives, and business owners.

Online teaching became more than income.

It became stability.

It became structure.

It became a profession that allowed me to provide consistently, while working from home in South Africa.

When COVID-19 arrived in early 2020, it reshaped daily life across the world.

South Africa implemented some of the strictest lockdown measures globally, second only to countries like Australia.

Entire industries were shut down overnight. Businesses closed. Millions of people lost jobs, income, and long-term financial stability. The uncertainty was widespread, and the economic consequences were severe.

By that time, however, I had already been teaching online with Skyeng for nearly a year.

What had begun as a survival decision in 2018 had, by 2020, become a stable and structured remote profession.

While movement was restricted and traditional workplaces closed, my classroom remained open.

Each day, I continued teaching students across Europe and Asia from my home in Pretoria. My professional routine remained intact.

My income, while never excessive, remained consistent. Online teaching provided continuity in a time when continuity had become rare.

I was deeply aware that many others were not as fortunate. Friends, colleagues, and countless South Africans faced sudden unemployment and financial insecurity.

Online teaching did not make me immune to the global crisis—but it allowed me to remain economically active, professionally engaged, and forward-moving during one of the most disruptive periods in modern history.

I eventually contracted COVID-19 myself in 2022. Fortunately, my case was manageable. I took one week off to recover, and shortly thereafter, I returned to teaching.

The experience reinforced something I had already begun to understand.

Online teaching was not merely convenient.

It was resilient.

It was a profession that could continue even when the world itself had slowed down.

It was during that global shutdown that I fully realized what I later wrote in Teaching Without Borders: when the world closes, online teaching keeps the door open.

While online teaching removed geographical limitations, it did not remove the realities of infrastructure challenges in South Africa.

Working online from Pretoria required continuous adaptation to conditions beyond my control:

Loadshedding and power cuts. Internet instability. Water outages. Safety concerns.

To maintain reliability, I gradually invested in essential backup systems:

UPS units, portable power stations, rechargeable lighting, and backup power solutions.

These were not luxuries. They were professional necessities.

Online teaching depends on consistency. If power fails, the classroom disappears instantly.

Reliability became part of the profession.

In 2022, after years of savings, I built a small Nutec garden office on our property—about 10 square meters in size, at a cost of approximately $3,000 USD.

It became my classroom.

From this modest space, I teach students living across Russia, Serbia, Poland, Portugal, Cyprus, Turkey, Germany, the Netherlands, Austria, the United Kingdom, the United States, Kazakhstan, Thailand, Japan, Malaysia, Croatia, Montenegro, Mauritius, and beyond.

Every lesson is a reminder that geography is no longer a barrier.

The world arrives through conversation.

In February 2025, after more than seven years of continuous online teaching and more than 8,000 lessons taught, I began building something of my own.

Henry English Hub.

It began as a simple website where students could book one-to-one lessons directly with me.

But it quickly grew into something much more.

I began writing structured teaching resources, starting with my eBook, Teaching Without Borders, a guide for aspiring online English teachers who want to build a sustainable career from home.

From there, I developed a full trilogy of English courses called The English Journey, designed to help adult learners progress from functional fluency to advanced professional communication:

Intermediate Foundations (B1–B2)
Upper-Intermediate Ascent (B2–C1)
Summit of the Cultured Professional (C1–C2)

At the same time, I built the infrastructure behind the platform:

Course systems. Booking systems. Sales funnels. Digital resources. Teaching materials.

For the first time, I was not only teaching online.

I was building something of my own.

Henry English Hub became the natural evolution of everything online teaching had made possible.

Online teaching did not begin as a dream.

It began as survival.

It began in a season marked by uncertainty, financial pressure, and the quiet realization that the traditional path I had known was no longer sustainable. Losing my car had made face-to-face tutoring increasingly impractical. Fuel costs consumed too much of what little I earned. Opportunities overseas had become harder to access.

The future felt uncertain, and the margin for error was small.

Online teaching was not something I pursued out of ambition at first. It was something I pursued out of necessity.

But necessity has a way of revealing possibilities that comfort never does.

In the beginning, the goals were simple: earn enough to cover basic expenses, reduce reliance on others, and restore some sense of stability and independence. Each lesson mattered. Each booking was meaningful. Each student represented not just income, but continuity.

Gradually, something began to change.

What had started as a temporary solution began to develop into a professional foundation.

Online teaching removed the geographical constraints that had limited my opportunities. It allowed me to work from home in South Africa while connecting with students across Europe, Asia, and beyond. It provided structure where there had been uncertainty. It provided consistency where there had been instability.

It became the financial backbone of our household.

Over time, it also became something more than income.

It became a space of growth. Through teaching thousands of lessons, I gained not only financial stability but also professional clarity. I refined my teaching methods, developed long-term relationships with students, and gained insight into industries, cultures, and perspectives from around the world.

Online teaching allowed me to move from dependence to independence.

It allowed me to invest in reliable equipment, backup power solutions, and a dedicated garden office. It allowed me to build routines, restore dignity, and regain control over my professional direction.

Most importantly, it allowed me to build Henry English Hub.

Henry English Hub represents the culmination of everything online teaching made possible. It is the result of years of experience, persistence, and gradual progress. It is a platform where I can teach independently, create courses, publish teaching resources, and share practical guidance with both students and aspiring teachers.

What began as survival became stability.

And stability created the foundation for something greater: ownership, independence, and the ability to help others begin their own journeys.

Today, online teaching continues to sustain us. It continues to provide. It continues to open doors that once seemed closed.

It is not merely a job.

It is the path that carried us forward—one lesson at a time.

If you are considering becoming an online English teacher, know this:

It is possible to build a stable, meaningful, global career from home.

Not instantly. Not effortlessly. But step by step, with preparation, persistence, and a willingness to begin where you are.

Online teaching changed the direction of my life. It allowed me to move from uncertainty to stability, from dependence to independence, and from local limitation to global connection.

That is why I wrote my guide, Teaching Without Borders.

In this eBook, I explain exactly how I began, how I secured my first online teaching positions, how I built consistent income, and how I gradually transitioned toward greater professional independence.

It is written specifically for teachers who want practical guidance—not theory, but real-world steps based on lived experience.

The Teaching Without Borders eBook can be downloaded here:

https://www.henryenglishhub.com/online-teachers-toolkit

Whether you are just starting out, or looking to build a more stable and independent teaching career, this path remains open.

It begins, as mine did, with a single step—and a single lesson.