For recent grads, there are 3 roads into teaching in Japan but “eikaiwa” is the most heavily traveled road.
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. These organizations employ thousands of teachers throughout Japan and can be found in practically every single city in Japan irrespective of size. There are literally tons of private English schools dotting the country side. All of them carrying out the task of teaching English to the Japanese.
What You Need to Teach
In order to get a job teaching English in Japan, you will need to be a college graduate from any field – (sorry but 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.Most work weeks will be 5 days. Don’t expect weekends off. Saturdays are usually work days. 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. Expect 2 weeks of paid vacation and most national holiday off. 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.
You should expect roughly a 40 hour work week. Each school is different but you can expect roughly 20 to 25 actual teaching hours per week with the rest being office hours. Most schools also will provide you with health insurance or subsidize it. 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. Make no mistake at the end of a typical day, you’ll know you worked. All in all when all the hours get counted, your typical teacher works about 40 hours per week.
Huge chain schools, mentioned in the previous paragraph, all have fixed curriculums. What this means is that you’ll be using their textbooks and other teaching materials. For those who don’t have a lot of teaching experience it’s a helpful in reducing stress (there already is quite a bit in adjusting to the culture and learning the language etc.Creative types will probably find it a bit stifiling.
Students assigned to a typical teacher schedule will probably be of all ages. Literally from a mere 5 years of age all the way up to 75. Some schools deal specifically with children like Amity and Peppy Kids Club. Other large chain schools like Gaba cater to only adults or adult private English lessons. Because of the competitiveness of this industry, most schools cater to all ages. Student wise, you can expect a healthy dose of children and young professionals like office ladies and salary men as they’re called to make up the bulk of who you teach.
All most all of your large chain schools will provide their respective teachers with some kind 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. Not to mention it’s also quite expensive. 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.
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