Hey team! I’m currently getting TEFL certified and I’m finishing a teaching contact in May of 2023. I’ve got a bachelors and masters.
So I’ll be applying for Jobs at Eikawas in the spring so I can be in Japan by next summer. Any suggestions on companies to apply for that focus on small groups and 1-1 classes?
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I don’t understand why people with graduate degrees want to apply to jobs that pay so little that they will probably have to ask people back home for money or other things like plane tickets and home appliances.
You have a masters!? Why are you applying for Eikawa?!
My advice is get several years of teaching experience in your home country and then apply for private or international schools, don’t work in an eikaiwa unless you have to, doesn’t make sense in your situation
My thinking (as somebody who came out with similar quals + some teaching experience in Australia) is…
– All the usual (big) eikaiwas will provide a run of the mill experience. Pretty easy… you just sit at a table with a group of ~4 people and talk to them based on the materials provided. Nova and the like aren’t that bad if you’re there short-term for the ‘Japan adventure’ rather than to set yourself up as a senior teacher in Japan (which frankly won’t happen).
– Aim to stay for ~12 months and plan your return so that you don’t get stuck. Even better if you have a full-time job waiting for you on return (e.g. get a full-time teaching gig in the west and then take a year of leave without pay).
– Don’t read too much about eikaiwas. All will be reviewed negatively and will have threads on here with people claiming to have been screwed over by them. IMO it’s just gonna pollute your mind with negativity if you read too much. An open mind is VERY important IMO. You’re overseas in their domain and adapting to their expectations the whole time (while being paid very little). I reckon it’s important to realise this and just be chill about it rather than going postal and hating on your employer. For a lot of people this is their first full-time job… so IMO a lot of reviews are full of raw emotion rather than balanced reflection about how the REAL benefit is that you get to go to Japan to live/work for a while.
With a masters do you have published papers? You can get into uni teaching. Drop me a DM and can give you the details if interested.
One thing that you should know is that you will not use your degree when you teach in an eikaiwa, and I have my doubts whether one will even hire you. They see that on your resume, and will likely just toss it. This is because eikaiwa, at least in Japan, don’t expect you to teach. They expect you to follow a set lesson structure by rote, and to not go beyond that.
Eikaiwa all use the same basic “method”: base a lesson on a discrete grammar point, do grammar-based drills, then an application activity, usually a role play: in other words, grammar-based PPP.
This is not so much teaching as it is scaffolding the lesson planning process. They do this because they hire inexperienced and unqualified teachers who need a formula to follow so they don’t go completely off the rails. At the same time, this provides a consistent product, making learners think they are being taught quality lessons.
The main reason they don’t hire qualified teachers is because they would have to pay them more. But it’s also because qualified teachers know there is a lot more to language learning than getting the students to regurgitate grammatically correct sentences, and knowing that, will try to do different things in the lesson to provide what they know the learners need.
That is discouraged for many reasons. First because they want all the lessons to be the same, since the learners come to expect that. They also don’t want any one teacher standing out as a better teacher, since the learners will notice that teacher does it differently and may start to compare the teachers and have a preference, or realize that the other teachers won’t be able to replicate what the qualified teacher does. Another issue is that the “trainers” also don’t have qualifications, so they will not be able to effectively manage you; and it just creates this mess where the employee knows far more than his boss. And believe me, they hate that.
You won’t learn anything from your Japan experience except how to teach badly, and it may be hard to get rid of those bad habits once you leave.
But if you are dead set on Japan, then just keep this in mind. Don’t stay here longer a year, and don’t put it on your resume if you want to be hired in a more professional context outside Japan. In general, teaching eikaiwa in Japan is looked down on in professional contexts because the low standards here are quite notorious.
With a Masters you should aim for P/T university jobs. Get around 10 classes a week and you can live comfortably.
You are over qualified. Look into college teaching unless your just looking for a easy underpaid job.
The glory days ended about 30 years ago. Will you be satisfied living in a basement apartment and cutting your own hair?
I work at a small eikaiwa that I found through a well known job seeker website. I enjoy working at a smaller school although I don’t have any work mates. But the benifits are not having a shitty work culture. I go to work, teach and come home. It’s nice.
I’d recommend looking into smaller schools.
If you want to teach specifically 1-1 you should apply to GABA.
If you want to stay long term and make a career here try applying for Westgate or vocational schools to get some university experience. Then transition into part time university teaching gigs.
What’s your master’s degree in? If it’s in TESOL, applied linguistics, or something similar, you’ve got a decent chance at getting a university teaching job.
Pretty much all of the eikaiwa companies are the same. You’ll be working nights and weekends. If I were you, I’d come over as an ALT, preferably on JET. You can use your down time to look for university jobs.