sorry for the throwaway, i have a few family members who also use reddit and i don’t want them to know about my goals because they would try and make it impossible for me to achieve them.
i’m a 30 year old woman who is finally getting her life together after 12 years of dealing with extreme depression and a financially/mentally abusive family. teaching in Japan has been my dream since I was 16, and despite reading all the horror stories from this sub, it’s still something i would very desperately like to do. i have finally enrolled in college after getting my GED this past may, and i’d like to take extra courses that will help me out in the long run.
i’m going for an education degree, specifically for middle-level students w/ an english and social studies focus; i’ve been working as a substitute for the past two years, and i’ve always had so much fun with the middle school crowd, so i figure if JP doesn’t work out, my degree will allow me to bounce back in the US. my college also offers JP as a language course, which I will be taking on top of the self study i do at home. but i am curious to know if there are other courses i should suggest to my advisor next week during my meeting with them that i’d like to take.
while i’d like most of them to be something that helps me stand out when i apply for dispatch companies, i’d also like to take a few that allow me to get a more educational look at things like the cultures and religions of Japan; while i like to think of myself as informed, there’s only so much that i can look for online and even less that will stick with me in 4 years time.
apologies for this long, rambly post. i just realized that outside of taking JP as a language, i had no real idea of any extra classes to take to help me in the future. thank you for taking the time to read this, and any answers you might have!
by teachjpthrowaway
10 comments
Take enough extra classes to get a Master’s degree in education or TESL. It will be worthwhile if you hope to make a career as a teacher. As an undergraduate, be sure to take classes in statistics, too.
Congrats on making a goal for yourself. As a fellow late college goer, it is really difficult to balance studying and working at the same time. You can do it if you keep your goal in mind.
If you have experience as a substitute, get some sort of teaching license. It will look great on a resume and it can help with getting longer visas. A humanities visa would be your goal if you have a license, but a one year visa to start would be fine.
Japan teaches English as a foreign language rather than a true second language, so think Spanish teacher in the U.S. The certification most often looked for is the TEFL (Teaching English as a Foreign Language). There are online courses you can use, but they are not as valuable as a teaching license from a 4 year university. Look to your college of education for what licensing programs they have for teaching. If they don’t specifically have language it’s still very valuable. Some licensing programs don’t require a major as well so take notes.
By all means take your Japanese language courses as well. Although they aren’t a requirement they can be helpful in the long run, especially if you decide to switch jobs later on.
Best of luck! Don’t sweat too much about which classes you take. Focus on the goals you want to get out of college and the class schedule will make itself.
You don’t need to worry about standing out to dispatch companies or eikaiwa chains, you’ll be overqualified and be able to get a job. If you want to get a job at a proper international school you’ll need a couple of years of experience teaching in your home country first. Japanese skills are useful for life in Japan but not necessary to teach English. It can’t hurt to take classes about Japan in university but you don’t need to.
just be genki
If you’re trying to get your life together, Japan isn’t a good goal unless you’re going to push for international school, which will take a degree, license in your country, relevant curriculum experience in your country, and probably 2+ years in another country first.
Japan int’l schools are very competitive, and there are very few of them.
Eikaiwa and ALT jobs are a bad idea for you if you are career minded. They tend to be a trap since they don’t count for work experience, and a lot of people get stuck in an environment where they’re not learning Japanese, they’re not really learning how to teach, and they’re not gaining any qualifications.
The horror stories are told by ALTs, assistant language teachers, who take contracts with sketchy dispatch companies that hire from abroad. That and eikaiwa employees
One route that some educators take is the government JET Programme for a year or more (the long application process starts in autumn) and then transition into private high school, school board direct hire positions, or move on to university teaching after they get their MA TESOL or SLA degrees. Bear in mind that JET is a lottery and the job conditions vary widely (rural or urban placement, scope of your involvement depending on the Japanese English teachers who may or may not integrate ALTs into lessons).
I’m assuming you’re an American? See if your city or state has a sister-city program that is similar to the JET Programme. Also look at https://www.iie.org/programs/esd/about/
The program brings US educators to Japan for a short-term exchange.
Some other options are EPIK in Korea for EFL teaching and Hong Kong NET scheme. Holiday in Japan. These programs have higher salaries and recruit qualified teachers.
Like u/dougwray says, another route is an MA. Maybe he can tell you about the job outlook in Japan for MA TESOL/SLA/Ed holders.
From talking to educators who work in universities here, the teaching positions may or may not be stimulating and teaching positions for foreign educators are precarious here like anywhere else.
Switch to something tech related if you really want a long term career here.
If you’re really set on education then gaining a teaching license and experience and possibly masters can lead to decent jobs at international schools, which is all I can recommend for long term in teaching
Are you looking for experience or money? If money is the main object, well, it ain’t much. You’ll probably be able to live, but I wouldn’t count on saving much, if at all. Yen weak, inflation strong, wages stagnant for more than 20 years.
If you have a teaching degree, you *might* have a chance at an international school, but even then, as the other commenter pointed out, it’s highly competitive.
Not only that, English education here is frankly ass-backwards. There’s a reason Japanese don’t speak English well, and it’s the education. But you will just have to grin and bear it, because you can’t change the curriculum. At international schools there IS a bit more leeway, but not in public education.
If you just want the experience, then by all means, come. I’ve been here nearly 30 years, I love my job and what i do. But I’m tired of being poor.
Just make sure you’re aware… the Japan subs are littered with stories of people who came here with a past of mental issues. If you have problems with depression or other such things, you really want to rethink moving to the other side of the world where your support system no longer exists.
When I read a lot of the posts and comments in this subreddit, I get the feeling that most the people that come here don’t have prior experience with teaching or a background in education until they came to Japan; some I feel like they never had an actual job. Then when they get here and have a year under their belt as an ALT or working in an Eikaiwa, all of sudden they see themselves as experts that deserve more pay and less hours. There are a lot of “horror” stories that are basically nothing but average work experiences in the real world, so take what you read here with a LARGE grain of salt. What you are doing now is great and you have a backup plan if you don’t like it here. Suggestions for courses, I would look into something that deals with instructional technology or educational technology, content area specializations, courses that teach SIOP if your university has that, eLearning design, or ESL literacy. A lot of those topics can be applied to numerous areas so if you come to Japan, you can apply it to EFL education; if you go back to America, you can apply it to whatever subject you take up at a school.