Just as the title says. I’m a qualified teacher (PGCE, degree in field), but don’t have that much experience. If my SO (waaaaay more qualified and experienced) got a job at an international school and I didn’t, do you think it would be possible to get an ALT job? Or would they think I’m overqualified/not an English teacher and so would reject me? I have a TEFL too if that helps. Just exploring options. Thanks!
15 comments
Do you have a pulse?
Depends on the employer. Some want a person who knows nothing about education so they can “mold” you into the automaton they want. Other are fine and they will claim it’s so great you have teaching credentials – but you will still have the same tasks, duties, and lack of empowerment someone with a degree in basketweaving and 0 experiecne has. This is assuming you want to work in Japanese schools.
If you are aiming for International Schools, that’s a different discussion.
I think for the better paying ALT direct hire or private school jobs it will help you as long as you have the other boxes checked.
My experience is general subject teachers or teachers from other disciplines tend to have an edge in lesson planning, professionalism, classroom management etc. teaching things like grammar. Their lessons though tends to be very similar to other ALTs just with better trappings.
Teachers with actual foreign language experience are better at teaching communicatively. They understand tradeoffs of accuracy vs communication. How to organize tasks to force communication , how to scaffold. How to use input and pushed out put. Also just a lot of other abstract nuance.
These are skills you normally can’t pick up in Japan unless you really try. Most communicative teaching here is pretty surface level. Even if you know what you are doing it is hard to implement. I had JTEs who were trained abroad for their masters and best they could do was throw in a communicative activity here or there.
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You’ll be fine. They don’t reject overqualified people.
However, you would do better looking for a direct hire or private school position. Higher pay and more respect since you have the qualifications for it.
You might be able to get a job as an ALT (others can comment on that better than me) but no eikaiwa would touch you. Eikaiwa don’t want experienced teachers. They want newbies whom they can train in their particular “methodology”. Someone with actual knowledge of SLA would fuck that right up, because you’d find yourself explaining to them why rote memorization of a form via grammar drills doesn’t equate to acquisition nor contribute to communicative competence in any meaningful way.
And then you’d get fired. LOL 🙂
Don’t do it. ALTing is a dead end career.
Depends how long you wanna stay. Most ‘real’ foreign teachers are long term residents and they aren’t going anywhere so openings are very rare. I’m also a qualified teacher and did the ALT thing for a couple of years. I remember the recruiter saying that I’d be bored as hell, and he was correct. I also tried eikaiwa jobs but they were shi@..
Owners and managers who don’t know crap about teaching trying to tell me what to do. Yet I have the teaching license and 15 years experience. ALT life was easy, got paid, good holidays, no stress. Good for my future teaching prospects. No.
Anyway as I mentioned above, depends how long you want to stay. Also I’m a history teacher so teaching English has nothing to do with what I’m trained as. Actually it is detrimental to a teaching career if you stay in the Japanese English industry too long. You become disconnected with the curriculum of your home country.
Why not try Westgate? You’re a qualified teacher
Do you have IB experience?
It depends on the school. Most ALT dispatch companies and even direct hires with BoEs don’t want a qualified teacher, they want someone who will assist a qualified teacher (JTE). Unfortunately, actual qualified teachers are more likely to disagree with the JTEs because JTEs still generally have outdated pedagogy (usually audio-lingual approaches or grammar-translation approaches). There are some exceptions.
Eikaiwa also depend on the school. Most also don’t want a qualified teacher, they want someone who can be trained in their in-house method that they always claim is new and cutting-edge but is really the same old thing. Again, there are exceptions. Some of the better eikaiwa give you a textbook and trust you to teach it however you want.
Either way, you’ll want to avoid the bigger chains. NOVA, Interac, Peppy Kids Club, etc., all don’t want qualified teachers. Yes, if you apply to these bigger companies with such qualifications on your resume, you are less likely to be contacted. You are also less likely to be contacted the longer you’ve been in Japan because you will be more likely to know the laws and be able to protect yourself from their unfair practices.
As long as you don’t try to tell other people how to do their jobs you can fit in anywhere.
I am a teacher and they were very happy to hear that in the interview, just don’t step on anyones toes and you will be okay
I’ve met ALTs who are qualified teachers so I don’t think that will be a problem. If anything I think it would help you find a job.
I am a licensed teacher and JTEs always don’t like me.