Sorry if this is a commonly asked question, but I can’t seem to find anything on the subject.
Everything I can find online deals with ALT’s and other programs like that, but I’m trying to find a rough outline of the steps I would have to take to become a teacher at a school, not counting eikawas. For reference I’m 17 and have been studying Japanese for about 2 years now if that makes a difference.
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At 17 you have a lot of time before you will reach your goal. The general consensus is that ALT work (outside of JET but to an extent even including JET) is often very low paying and hard to pivot out of. Most ALT companies are taking advantage of people who want to live in japan and have no other means to. It is possible to go to Japan as an ALT and then pivot into private school, but it is not easy and private schools also often dont pay well.
Your first step to becoming a *full-time* teacher making a real salary in Japan should be to get a teaching license in your home country. If you are doing this at a university, it could be productive to do so at a university that teaches japanese or has a japanese studies major/minor that you can get alongside your teaching degree. Ideally a school with this program would have study abroad opportunities in Japan that you can put on your resume and that will let you preview the country. When all that is said and done it still might be hard to find a good teaching job in Japan as they can be competitive, but you will at least be qualified.
If your goal is just to live in Japan though, study coding or business or engineering and maybe pair that with a japanese minor.
Get an undergraduate degree either in education that ends in a teaching license or any other topic (best ones are the “core subjects”) and then pursue alternative certification.
Make sure your GPA is as high as possible. Study study study!
Once you have a bachelors and teaching license, you’re good to start applying to international schools and private schools.
A masters degree would help make you even more competitive too once you get your bachelors.
That’s your pathway. The details (subject and ages you want to teach) are up to you. Good luck!
To teach in Japan (not as an ALT or international school), you need to have a licence, which means to sit an exam all in Japanese and pass. So you would have to be a near native speaker. If you were to get hired, you would then be expected to work 12 hour days plus Saturdays and possibly Sundays. All this for maybe $50k a year. So fluency, a degree in teaching and then get a licence to work a hell of alot of hours for not much money. Its a very difficult path
Hello fellow Canadian!
I am currently a full time teacher at an international school in Japan (a certified K-12 school… not what all the preschools like to call themselves in Japan). I can answer some of your questions.
The process to become a full-time teacher at an international school in Japan is not very different from anywhere else in the world.
Required:
1) Get your degree in education
2) Get your provincial teaching license
Recommended:
3) Get at least 2 full years of classroom teaching experience. I know this can be hard in Canada and you might only get substitute teaching experience the first few years. Please know positions at international schools in Japan are competitive. At my school, we probably get over 50+ qualified teachers from around the world applying for each position…not counting the random unqualified people who apply.
For the mid to high level international schools, your Japanese level would not really matter that much. That is not what they are hiring you for. It might show you are more open-minded and less prone to culture shock, but it really will not make a huge difference. (But if it is down to 2 applicants, it could be the tiebreaker!) Your qualifications and experience in teaching will matter a lot more.
Like others have said, if your passion is not teaching, there are other easier ways to work in Japan without going the ALT or language school route.
Apply for jobs
You are mentioning becoming an engineer. This would be a MUCH better career path.
With the money you make being an engineer, you could build an international school in japan , teach a STEM class (I have a friend who made $30 an hour teaching CompSci in shibuya while still in college) , or even become a professor if you wanted. This is a muchhhhh better path.
Teaching in japan and getting all the certs for it is 100% not worth it. There are other, better paths for you especially at 17!
Like at an international school? I don’t understand, ‘teacher’ is quite broad. What sort of teacher ?