I’m interested to know if you’d rate yours as good or bad in regards to how you’re treated as an ALT, how English teaching is approached, how other staff is treated in general, and how happy/satisfied you are in your prefecture/city. I haven’t made any final decisions yet but I’m currently in Japan and have re-contracted for my third year as an ALT but I’m looking to either change jobs this year and/or look for work this year in other prefectures as a direct hire ALT or at a private school.
Do you think English teaching is done well at your school? Or that your students are at least learning something?
Are you able to provide input to the curriculum?
I’m really just looking to gage a general opinion and what your individual experiences have been like so anything you can provide would be great.😁
Edit: someone brought this up and I totally agree, I don’t have a JTE at my school and have had to deal with the burden of everything which is fine but I would like to update this to ask where people feel like they have a balance of culture exchange with their school and/or communities as well as teaching.
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Hey 5th year at a low level SHS here. ALT stands for Always Last Told. The irony of Communication English teachers who don’t/can’t communicate with the four ALTs is disheartening. However, I’ve come to learn that it’s due to a variety of reasons not least of which being that the JTEs here just don’t want the students to realize that they themselves can’t carry a simple conversation with me mid lesson. So the issue has less to do with me than it is a matter of their own self confidence.
That aside, I have a lot of creative freedom when it comes to lessons. Unlike in previous years, I’m in charge of much of the 1年生 Logic & Expressions curriculum, semester projects, and act as liaison for the surrounding international schools for joint activities.
In terms of whether English teaching is done well here, it’s hard to say. All of the JTEs hate each other and they often argue in the staff room. Rather than feeling left out of lesson planning, policy changes, etc., I’ve come to realize that the JTEs do everything possible not to talk to each other. As a result, there’s no consistency between the classes and their GTEC scores have been trending downward.
I look forward to the teacher shuffle next month as a lot of the bad eggs are on their way out. Dunno if you’ll find this useful. The takeaway is that you shouldn’t take it personally if you find the behavior toward ALTs lacking. In truth, I love my job and placement and have learned to work around everyone’s abhorrent dislike for one another.
I’d think the other way, think about where you’d want to live and where you can find a job.
I would recommend the Maebashi BoE here in Gunma. Our ALT supervisor is awesome. She understands what ALTs are good for and how to best advocate for us to our schools. Additionally, she understands that people come and go. Another ALT was applying to grad school and told her that he wouldn’t know if he was truly staying until May. She basically said, “Say yes to returning and then we can always get an alternate later if you have to leave.” Basically took all his stress away about the whole situation.
Honestly? I really think Gunma (and Maebashi in particular) is a gem hidden in plain sight. Not many know we‘re here and those of us who live here find it quite agreeable.
My BoE is friendly enough and hands off but contracted with a cheap dispatch company so that they could be hands off I imagine (they had JET until recently). I would grade it a C-
Going into my second year of direct hire (3 years of dispatch for the same BOE) and its been solid.
Teacher, staff and students have been kind and friendly. No issues at all except my BoE is slow at informing me (and teachers) about schedule changes.
All ALTs should be the same. There should be no difference between individual BOEs.
>Do you think English teaching is done well at your school? Or that your students are at least learning something?
Are you able to provide input to the curriculum?
None of that is your concern. You are not legally allowed to influence anything. All you are allowed to do is back up the Japanese licensed teacher, nothing more. If they are asking you to do anything else, they are breaking the law. Only MEXT can change the curriculum, not the teacher and especially not the ALT.
If you want to teach, work on moving out of ALT work.
I think I have a good BoE because we have supervisors who we can go to for stuff. A lot of others don’t and have a lot of problems communicating directly with them. It really helps having that middle person for communication.
They’re really understanding and will listen to our input. If we want to make something and implement it into classes they’re only happy to help.
English teaching is…well as good as it can be. It’s a rural area with mediocre schools so English isn’t really a priority for kids or teachers. I think nearly all the ALTs in my area lead classes because the schools just aren’t confident in the content and the city doesn’t know how to train them for it.
In JHS I get irritated with the weird English the prefecture wants them to know for high school exams sometimes but the JTEs can flag stuff and give feedback so I guess an ongoing process? I’m always kept in the loop and they’re always asking me to confirm stuff at least.
In saying that it’s a lovely community and everyone is really nice and welcoming. I enjoy talking to the kids about global stuff and having fun with them more so than getting their English level up.
I’m not an ALT any more but in the time I was, I worked for two different BOEs. The first was in rural Kagoshima and they were wonderful. Very supportive, very welcoming, always tried to include me in events. The second I worked for was in Miyazaki. That wad less welcoming and they didn’t really acknowledge me outside of English classes.
Teaching environments really depended on the JTE/HRT. With the HRT, almost always they knew no English, just had a general topic idea (for 1-4) or textbook chapter (5-6), and would leave the rest up to me. A few knew some English and would try to work with me.
Most of my JTEs were pretty good. If it was JHS1-2 grade, they would try to involve me a lot. If it was JHS3, they were more constrained because of testing. I had one JTE who clearly didn’t want an ALT in class at all and she was a challenge to deal with. But the others were great.
I had asked about direct hire at my Kagoshima BOE because I loved working there and was there for the full five years on JET, but they decided to stick with JET.
Direct hire. My BOE is actually very hands off, and I see them along with the other ALTs about 3 times a year. They sent me letters in the school mail every few weeks or so to notify me about relevant information, and I get the other information from the meetings at school (which are entirely in Japanese) or other staff members.
I like this system a lot because it means I’m not being micromanaged. However, I think it would be difficult for someone who doesn’t speak Japanese or needs a lot of help with their daily life.
I’m at a BoE in a fairly small city in Wakayama Prefecture and honestly I can’t praise them enough. From even before I’ve arrived they’ve been supportive and helpful and the schools I teach at are great. Everyone really makes an effort to help the ALTs feel welcome and to help us out as much as possible. This is NOT the universal exprience. I know some people in towns 10 or 20 minutes that have had the opposite experience, but personally I couldn’t be happier or more grateful.