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A Not Great Experience Teaching English in Japan
I first started at an international pre-school/kindergarten that doubled as an after school English program in the evenings. And I can honestly say that it was kinda miserable—mostly.
The mornings were great. Teaching kindergarten was the most fun. You got the same kids every day so you could really build a relationship in the classroom, and most importantly, they genuinely enjoyed being there. And we got to do fun field trips with the kids like going to Kidzania (awesome location, 10/10 wish I could have gone as a kid).
Pre-school was a bit tougher. The kids were 2-3 years old so a lot weren’t potty trained yet. This meant you spent a lot of time changing diapers and potty training. And for the class time you did get, they were pretty difficult to get all to sit at the same time to do any lessons. But still super cute and playing games and doing crafts with them was fun.
Then there were the afternoons—where things really fell apart.
The way this school worked was if the kid’s parents couldn’t pick their kids up after kindergarten/pre-school, they could stay and do the after school care as well with the elementary students. Where they played the same games and did the same lessons again, just in the evening… which obviously didn’t go over that well the second time, but that’s besides the point. The main point is the sheer amount of kids you might end up with once the after school program students arrive. We often had 30+ kids aged 2-12 in the same room with only 1 or 2 teachers who didn’t speak Japanese. Recipe for chaos in the best of times, let alone in the worst of times.
To escape this madness, you could also be assigned to go pickup kids from their various elementary schools. This involved walking to the neighboring schools, finding the afterschool program students, and then either walking or cabbing them back to the afterschool program. Some wanted to come, some REALLY didn’t (queue several rounds of tantrums and a couple meltdowns in the street). But despite the tantrums, the solo walk to the school was probably your only true break of the day (there was no break room for teachers and we ate lunch with the kids) so I still reveled in these small moments of peace.
For the afterschool program we basically repeated the same thing every day, and played the same games every week. It was incredibly repetitive and most of the games were only ten minute games that you'd have to play over and over again until time was up. The kids hated it, the teachers hated it, but we weren’t allowed to change it. And for all that exhaustion, the pay was only ¥210 000 per month ($1350 USD). I quit after 8 months.
A Good Experience Teaching English in Japan
My next job was at a different English school where I had a totally different experience. This program was only after school care. So it was half day care, half English school.
Almost everything at this school was better. We were given several hours a day to prep our lessons, and got a lot of freedom around how we wanted to teach them. Each day we would teach an activity (such as a game, arts & crafts, science project, etc. that changed per day), a reading/phonics class, and an English class.
The school had its own textbook, for English class, and provided ideas for the activity if you needed it. The kids were great, the lessons were fun, the pay was ¥250 000 ($1600 USD) a month (average), and they renewed my visa for me. I finished my year contract with no complaints.
Between these two experiences (and hearing from countless other people about theirs), I feel like I got both sides of the teaching English in Japan experience. And what I learned is that it really comes down to what school you get.
But how do you pick a good one? Long answer short, you can’t. But you can at least pick the right type of company and the right position to give yourself the best shot.
Which Type of Company is Best
Private Teaching Options
If you like kids and are thinking of coming to Japan for only a year or two, I would recommend teaching English. I would avoid the big Eikaiwa’s if you can if you want your weekends, but a lot of the better schools don’t sponsor from overseas. For the big companies that do sponsor from overseas, I consistently hear that ECC is the best but also quite difficult to get. I recommend finding an afterschool program instead of an Eikaiwa because you will have less classes, get more unstructured time to just hang out with the kids, and will likely have more control over your classes. You are also less likely to have to work on the weekend.
Assistant Language Teaching (ALT)
At this point you might be asking, can’t I just teach adults? And my answer is, not easily. It’s possible to find teaching positions where you teach adults, but usually that’s only evening and weekend classes and you likely still have to teach kids during the day. So, if you don’t want to work with little kids but are looking for something easy and don’t mind if the pay isn’t great, become an ALT. ALT’s (assistant language teachers) usually get contracted between a couple schools, and are the English speaking person in a junior high or high school English class. You don’t have to lead any classes alone so it’s pretty easy, but it can be kind of boring and repetitive. The only problem is that now English classes are also mandatory in elementary school (they didn’t used to be), so this strategy is slowly becoming less viable.
JET
What about JET? JET is the government run program that places ALT’s at highschool's around the country. It pays the best, but at the same time I don’t really recommend it. It really depends on you as a person and what you want to do in Japan, but JET teachers only get sent to the middle of nowhere. I know they say there is a chance to get a big city, but I wouldn’t count on it. Why? Because big cities don’t need the help of JET to get English teachers. Enough people want to come teach English in Tokyo that they can use ALT companies to get English speakers in classrooms for way cheaper than through JET. But rural towns in the middle of nowhere? They need JET. For me, this meant I never considered the program. I wanted to live in Tokyo or Osaka and was not willing to compromise. Some of the JET towns don’t even have a train, so if you don’t have your driver’s license or can’t easily get one within Japan that’s another thing to think about.
How I Found a Job
When I first started looking into moving abroad, I knew I really wanted to experience living somewhere different and was set on Japan, but I had no idea how to make it happen. I didn’t have enough money to study anywhere to get a student visa, the working holiday visa for my country was only 6 months (renewable once, but that visa length makes housing and getting a bank account more difficult) and I wasn’t sure if I’d be able to get anything other than teaching English anyways without speaking Japanese (mostly true), so I applied for English teaching jobs on GaijinPot and LinkedIn.
The big company’s consistently post jobs on GaijinPot and JobsInJapan so you can apply any time, but you never know what you might find on LinkedIn so I recommend checking it out as well. I ended up with an interview at AEON, which I applied to on GaijinPot, and the International Kindergarten I ended up taking the job at which I found on LinkedIn.
I had two interviews for each company and received an offer from both. I chose the kindergarten because I wanted to have a consistent class throughout the week, and because I knew the school location before I got there. For AEON, I would have found out my school after I arrived in Japan after training.
After getting the offer, I had to wait for my Certificate of Eligibility (COE) to arrive which took 6 months (insane amount of time, usually it’s 1-3 months), then take the COE to my local consulate to get my visa. Luckily than only took about 10 days, and then I was off!
If I Hate It, Am I Stuck?
One of the biggest things holding me back was the fear that making the decision to come teach English in Japan was going to be a mistake. There were so many reasons, including (but not limited to) the below:
- I already had a job in my home city, quitting to teach English would be terrible for my career
- What if I hated it but spent all my money to move to Japan and couldn’t find a job again back home to fund my return
- What if future employers saw English teaching on my resume after I had already worked in my chosen field and thought I wasn’t committed
- Just emphasizing the general idea of what if this is career suicide
- What if the kids didn’t like me
- What if I got fired
- What if I hated teaching English
- What if I ran out of money while in Japan
And something I didn’t consider but apparently should have, what if I arrive and within 3 months the whole country shuts down for 3 years due to a global pandemic? Evidently, literally anything could go wrong.
But I knew I wanted to go.
If you’re on the fence, I want to assure you that you are never stuck. For one, if you start working at a certain company and you really don’t like it, you can always quit. Quitting doesn’t mean you lose your visa! So if the environment really isn’t working for you, you can change jobs once you arrive. Whether it’s to another English teaching job, or something else entirely. I eventually moved back into Project Management and now work at a Digital Marketing company, so you don’t have to fear being tied to any specific company or industry once you arrive.
And you can always go back home. Japan isn’t for everyone, but you’ll have no idea if it’s for you unless you try. And I’d rather regret doing it than regret not doing it, so take the leap! You can always make the money back or find a new job, but you can’t get your time back.
Who Can Teach English in Japan
If you are from a native English speaking country and have at least a bachelor’s degree, you can teach English in Japan. If you are missing either of these things, it will be more difficult.
To get sponsored from out of country to teach English, you need to be a native speaker with a degree. However, if you are not a native speaker but have a high level of English, it’s still possible to get a job if you are already in the country.
For example, if you get into the country first on a different visa (for example, the working holiday visa), you can apply for English teaching jobs and maybe still get one. This approach is easier if you are willing to have a rural placement, but I know non native speakers who got jobs in Tokyo as well. And if you get one of these jobs and have a degree, you may then also be able to change your working holiday visa to a work visa even if you are not a native speaker.
If you don’t have a bachelors degree, you will not be able to change your visa off of the working holiday visa. So if you are planning to stay in Japan longer by teaching English, make sure to get a degree first, or else come to Japan as a student and get your bachelors degree here!
Do I Recommend Teaching English In Japan
In short, yes! Once I found a decent company, I actually had fun teaching English in Japan. I wouldn’t say it’s a great long term option—the pay is generally poor and there are very few, if any, opportunities for advancement. But for a couple years, teaching can be a great experience and give you the opportunity to live in and travel Japan that can be very difficult to get otherwise.
And in the end, teaching English brought me to Japan, and I can honestly say that moving to Japan was the best decision of my life. It wasn’t and hasn’t been easy, there were a lot of uncertain times, some tears, but the life experience I’ve gotten from moving across the world is more valuable than anything I’ve ever done. And I love Japan. I get to travel and explore a place that I actually want to be every day. It’s an incredible feeling, one that was absolutely worth all the risks.
If I have you convinced and you’re ready to take the plunge and are thinking of moving to Tokyo, check out my Top Neighborhoods to Live in Tokyo to get a head start on that apartment search! Or if you’re interested in more of my story and how I decided to live abroad, read my story to get a better idea. Or if you’re already teaching English and are looking for your exit strategy, stay tuned!
Until then, wander on friends✨
