Turns out this year I have at least 5 days a month with absolutely no classes. There’s only so much work I can make for myself…
So, I was wondering, in what ways have you all used your desk warming time at school, and what did you get out of it? It could be ways that you’ve developed yourself personally, professionally or even developing yourself as an ALT!
I’m looking forward to reading the responses!
36 comments
Studying Japanese. I am at small schools (less than 200 kids total) so I have at least 3 hours of desk warming time a day. Being able to read, listen, write, and speak Japanese is hugely helpful to quality of life here. So far I’ve passed the N3 and have read over 800 pages of Harry Potter in Japanese (almost all of my reading and studying happens at work lol). Just being able to understand the world and do more things by myself is great.
study japanese and other subjects that interest me
I read the dictionary to increase my Japanese vocabulary. I was pretty elementary when I came to Japan and conversational by the time I left. The girl I was dating at the time knew almost no English.
A dozen years later we are still happily married and speak mostly Japanese at home.
Get a masters degree.
code…cause I need to get a job after JET
I am a CIR in a place with sooooo much desk warming you wouldn’t believe it (especially during sowing and harvest season) and I have been using the time to translate a book from the Edo period that I am almost done with.
I started reading at my desk. Just download a bunch of e-books onto my laptop so I don’t have to worry about carrying books or finding English books in Japan. Since January i’ve finished about 10 novels. I never complain about desk warming because it’s doesn’t feel like a chore. I actually really look forward to it now since I usually teach 4-5 classes a day.
I start the day off with some Japanese study, and then after that I work on practising web development and working on a distance-learning CS degree. As another poster said, I’m thinking about what I want to do after JET and working towards that.
i try to create more materials! planning ahead a few months at a time and having the materials already done lets me have more time to goof off (which is my favorite thing ever to do). if im not making something, im reading ebooks or scrolling reddit.
when i was in studying education in college, designing material and curriculum was one thing i struggled with. however deskwarming has helped me immensely in improving my skill.
Go to other classes and help kids with their math or just teach more classes or play sports in PE.
And watch baseball. Lol
Lots of reading, lots of job hunting and preparing for job hunting, but probably the most valuable thing was **budgeting**. I think in my… 2nd? 3rd? year I had a good chunk of free time over Winter Break where I sat down, got You Need A Budget, and actually started tracking where all my money is going and it’s made quite a huge difference in my lifestyle and quality of life.
^also ^moderating ^on ^^reddit ^^but ^^idk ^^^how ^^^”valuable” ^^^that ^^^is…
Reminder than you don’t need to be productive all the time and you work hard and deserve to be able to chill during your down time, so you can enjoy being paid just to desk warm and it’s ok to scroll Reddit or watch videos on your phone. I recommended downloading Netflix episodes to watch without internet on your phone.
Got a Masters and farmed reddit karma
While desk warming, I’ve improved my Japanese (passed N3 first, then N2), and I’ve thought about and have taken steps what to do after JET.
Edit: I’ve also planned out multiple trip itineraries around Tohoku, Kansai, and South Korea while at work teehee
I’m almost done my masters (after 1 year) and improved my Japanese level A LOT. My deskwarming time is 70% grad school work, 25% learning/studying Japanese, and 5% preparing for upcoming team teach lessons (it only takes me about 30 mins to an hour to prepare lol).
I’m getting my masters in clinical psychology and after JET, I’m hoping to work remotely for a company in the US and continue to live here. I published 2 articles already, so I’m hoping it’s enough to get my foot in the door. I’ll be on a spouse visa after my instructor visa is expired next year (married to a Japanese National) and we are planning to stay in Japan for the unforeseeable future. If the job market still sucks back home, then I’ll look for a university teaching position or a direct hire ALT position .
Edit to add: currently going on to my 3rd year of JET and my prefecture stopped extending contracts to 4th and 5th year as of 2022. 2023-2024 will be my last year on JET. Even if they extended it, I was planning not to re-contract for a 4th year.
Studied Japanese. Seemed the best use of my time. I’m still here almost 30 years later 🙂
Taking online training and/or courses, studying Japanese, and reading. Although, some days, I am not motivated at all. On those days, I watch documentaries and try to keep up with global news and issues.
Studied Japanese and published a research paper. Also I’d advise spending time looking into post-JET options.
Finishing my graduation thesis from grad school.
God my desk warming situation is so bad I read your “5 days without classes” and thought “damn only 5?” ðŸ˜
I teach about 7 classes between both of my visit schools each week… I teach like 10 classes per MONTH at my base school…
To actually answer your question, I’ve started an English board to work on in between wani-ing my kanis. It has helped immensely because it gives me something extra to plan, prepare, and I even interview non English teachers for it so it’s a great chance to speak to new teachers during break periods. It’s no masters like everyone else or anything but I enjoy it.
I did an online Masters Degree program that I’m pretty sure helped me to land my current job (direct hire at private school).
I also studied Japanese, something I def miss having the time for now that I have zero desk warming time.
I did an online TEFL course, although I feel like mine wasn’t really that useful, maybe there are better ones. I took a TEFL class during my MA that was much more helpful.
Other than that I would read books or read the news. Not the most productive, but I enjoyed myself lol. Wouldn’t recommend if your school is very strict.
When I’m genuinely desk warming and not preparing loads and loads of materials for the lessons, I’m writing my novel. If not full chapters, then at least plot points or dialogues that come to mind.
(I am very excited. The novel is almost finished!)
I took private Japanese lessons and would do my homework/study for the JLPT. I got from N3 to N1 during my time on JET
Studying Japanese.
Studying Japanese, writing for a local magazine/publications, did some volunteer work outside of work but would use free time at work to do work for that, any emails or life admin tasks that I could do from my tablet, volunteer to help with JET stuff (like the Skills Development Conference) if they need volunteers for stuff like that in your prefecture, took an online course and would do work for that during free time at work, read books occasionally during school holidays, went to the school library to chill and read books during school holidays, visited other club activities during school holidays (check with the teacher first), researched things like grad schools/further training and made notes
During work hours I did things that would benefit the students.
I didn’t sit there studying Japanese all day for my own gain, but would ask the JTE if there was anything I could help with.
I took on projects like the International Day planning to help JTE workload.
I even did professional development sessions with non JTE colleagues.
My biggest advice is to have a volunteer side hustle. I did some stuff that took a few hours after work here and there which landed me a new career post jet and a very decent wage 4 years post JET exp.
1. Get a LinkedIn Learning free trial
2. Take as many data analytics and executive communications courses as you can in 30 days
3. Now you’ve got two high in-demand skills you can slap on your resume.
I work in HR now and I swear the only thing business leaders talk about these days is how nobody knows how to use data and nobody knows how to communicate about that data. Being able to do those two things will give you a big leg up in a lot of applications.
Also learn how to utilize chatGPT for work projects. That’s already proving to be a game changer in the corporate world.
Learn the names and faces for all of the students that you teach by memorizing the photoroster.
2 things: I planned out bicycle trips. And I learned Japanese.
The librarian at one of my junior high schools puts in requests for origami displays, so this month I’m making a paper aquarium that she’s hanging in the window of the library. It’s really fun and the students seem to like it.
Study. Japanese.
Getting TEFL certified!!
The most valuable 3 things I’m doing are reading Japanese books to learn Japanese. I’m currently doing the N1 in July. 2nd is reading self-help, I have particularly been reading a lot about healthy relationships from this website [https://markmanson.net/articles](https://markmanson.net/articles)
Lastly, I have been working on making connections with others (Japanese people/ other ALT’s in the area). I suck at keeping in contact so I try and message people I know more often. I reccomend getting out of your confort zone and trying new things and exploring different places in Japan. Recently I’ve been using meetup and going to group events like BBQ parties and concerts, I highly reccomend it.
Making a 10-minute-a-week course on teaching English phonetics to kids to improve their speaking and listening
Rewriting the decades-old Japanese and English materials for an English course on making presentations (god the clipart is so bad…)
Attempting to talk about weird things with my coworkers in Japanese (and learning weird Japanese as a result) (e.g., my morbid insistence on watching Hoarders marathons)
Looking ahead at lessons and figuring out ways to make this terrible textbook more useful (e.g., making an assignment with a real immigration form for the lesson on going through customs, finding real English equipment rental agreements for the lesson on renting snowboards, extracting the important phrases from the truly batshit “conversatoin model” for each lesson so students can remember it better, etc.)
Attempting to eavesdrop (…i miss eavesdropping in English……)
Planning events for my local AJET chapter
Find a new job
Study japanese, catch up on local news/events, and when I have a ton of time I draw on my ipad because a couple other teachers use them too. Sometimes I draw manga-esque slideshows for my lessons and the JHS kids really like those. Overall I have wayyy too much free time at JHS though so sometimes I spend like 6 hours studying Japanese/burn myself out/do nothing/repeat.