Great, You Graduated. Now What? Teaching in Japan Might be an Option for You
Although there are 3 basic roads to teaching in Japan most recent graduates use to start their teaching careers, the destination in terms of salaries and working conditions are fairly similar.
Teaching English Conversation in Japan “Eikaiwa” The Most Heavily Traveled Road
“Eikaiwa” refers to the teaching of English conversation and it’s billion dollar industry in Japan. These consist of your large chain schools like ECC, Berlitz, Geos & Aeon. They employ thousands of English teachers all over Japan and can be found in all but the tiniest cities. There are literally tons of private English schools dotting the country side.All of these schools are attempting to carry out the daunting task of teaching English to the Japanese.
What You Need to Teach
You need a 4 year degree from an University to get a job. (2 year degrees won’t cut it.).You need to be a native level fluent speaker of English. Some do succeed in finding work in Japan, even though English isn’t their first language but the overwhelming majority of postions that get filled are filled by native level fluent teachers.
Most English teachers make roughly 250,000 yen per month before taxes. A typical work week will be 5 days long. Don’t expect western stuff like weekends off. The “eikaiwa” or English conversation business whirs like a motor on Saturadays and Sundays and someone has to teach the students right? This means that most teachers work at least one Saturday or Sunday with another weekday off. Vacation packages are quite similar for most schools. 2 weeks of paid vacation and a handful of national holidays off is the norm. Schools differ on which national holidays they observe but the norm is 8 to 10 per year. It’s worth noting that ECC has the best vacation package of the monster chain schools and arguably the fewest complaints. Here is a handy chart to help you compare salaries and working conditions for huge chain schools like Geos, ECC, Berlitz and Aeon.
Expect to work close to 40 hours per week. Each school is different but you can expect roughly 20 to 25 actual teaching hours per week with the rest being office hours.Many schools will subsidize your health insurance or pay for it out right. Most office hours get filled by preparing lessons, talking with students and taking class notes. And (depending on the school) some teachers are expected to hand out school advertisments. No joking here folks, by the end of an average day, you’ll know you worked. When the dust settles, your typical teacher workds roughly 40 hours per week.
Huge chain schools, mentioned in the previous paragraph, all have fixed curriculums. This means you’ll be using their in house texts, tapes and other support materials for teaching. Those with little teaching experience often like these teaching conditios becasue it reduces stress and makes the headache of lesson planning go away.) Those who need to express their creativity in the lesson will probably find it stifling.
ESL teachers typically teach all ages. Literally from 5 to 75 year olds. Some schools have only children as students like Amity English school and Peppy Kids Club. Other schools like Gaba concentrate on adults. Because of the competitiveness of this industry, most schools cater to all ages. Most teachers teach children, young professionals and some housewives.
Most of your large chain schools will provide you with some type of accommodations. This is a very big help as it’s difficult to find accommodations on your own without the help of a Japanese national. And it’s definitely not cheap. But the type provided will vary, you should expect things to be half the size of what you might find in most western countries. Furnishings are usually sparse and typically will be collections of things from departing teachers.