Hello everyone!
I recently took a position as an ALT at a Senior High School here in Japan. Surprise, surprise, I don’t have experience teaching in a school and it’s my first year as an ALT.
Most of the resources I’ve found have been for ALTs teaching at the Elementary or Junior High School levels; Senior High School level stuff seems pretty rare.
Have any of you worked as an ALT at a Senior High School? What kind of atmosphere did it have? What expectations did they have for you as an ALT? i.e. did they have you making lesson plans on your own, did you make the plans alongside the JTE, or did the JTE make them and take you along for the ride?
I’d love to hear about your experiences because I truly have no clue what to expect!
7 comments
Seinor HS is supposed to be only English, and what you’re expected to do depends on exactly which class and how often you teach and what level you’re teaching. Aka a high performing school or not.
Now whether not you’re expected to plan your lesson will depend on the school.
My lesson is once a week, mostly focused on the students producing their own dialog and I plan everything. But I’m also not an ALT, straight up not my job title, and I’ve worked for the school for years, so they trust me to be able to plan and lead lessons.
It really depends on the job description. If you were hired through a dispatch company, then it is highly likely that you won’t know what is expected of you until you meet the head of the English department at the school.
High schools now have two different English classes “English communication” and “English logic and expression”. I’m guessing you’ll team teach in the latter one. Student’s ability will depend on the school/class and can range from understanding quite a lot to understanding almost nothing.
Have fun introducing yourself and try to make the classes a bit more communicative if the JET isn’t really doing that.
I’ve been working high school almost exclusively for 13 years now, let me know if I can answer any more specific questions
ESID. I’ve had positions where I’ve lead the entirety of the classes and had full creative control over the lessons and curriculum. Positions where I had premade lessons and was told to follow them. Positions where I was given a book and told to make lesson plans based on it. I’ve had positions where I stood in the corner for 47 of 50 minutes and was a tape recorder for 3. Ive had team teaching positions and those can be great or terrible depending on the Japanese teacher. Unfortunately you won’t know your specific situation until you start your first day. The only thing that is certain is being a tape recorder is what you should hope for the least.
Depends on the HS. I taught at low level schools and they were no different from JHS.We literally used New Horizon and all that. Kids were just bigger
Are you assigned to 英語コミュニケーション or 論理表現 or both? All years? Find out. Ask what textbooks and supplements are in their curriculum and study them.
Like u/rainbow_city says, high school lessons are supposed to be delivered primarily in English according to MEXT’s latest Course of Study. Are you expected to lead an hour or more of a course or assist a JTE? It really depends on the course that the English department has decided on.
ESID is always a valid statement.
I’ve been at academic high schools where I taught all classes (once grammar points were done, so basically zero classes until June and then 7 classes a day).
I’ve been at farming high schools.
I’ve been at all-girls high schools where the focus is on preparing them to be a good wife.
I’ve been at night schools.
I’ve been at “middle of the mountains” high schools where you get in if you can write your own name.
I’ve been to technical high schools where kids are super interested in English as it pertains to their future careers.
I’ve been to correspondence high schools where students only came to school once every two weeks because social situations are hard on them.
The situation at each type of school is going to be staggeringly different.
In some schools you do exactly what you’re told. In some schools you’re told what to make to fit a certain grammar point. In some schools you run the whole show while the JTE enjoys “reading a novel” time or “perusing their smartphone” time.
The level of school is going to determine what you can do, though. Talk to the teachers (not that it matters that much, regardless of the level of the school, the standard statement seems to be “our kids aren’t that good at English”), then make an intro lesson that can be used for any level of kids. You may have a chance to talk to the kids in the hallway before classes actually start, which would also help you get a feel for their level.
Thank you so much to everyone who replied! What I gathered is essentially… every school is different, and I won’t really know what to expect from the school or the teachers until I actually start work.
After reading some materials from my company, it seems that lesson planning (which is the thing I’m most nervous about to be honest) is “supposed to be” the responsibility of the JTE, though I will likely at the very least be reviewing the lesson plans with the JTE, and there’s a possibility that the JTE will want me to write my own lesson plans. From what I’ve gathered about my school, it’s pretty high quality and looked upon favorably by people, so I’m hoping that at least while I’m figuring things out, the JTE will be handling most of the lesson plan writing. If it sounds like I’ve misinterpreted anything please let me know!