Job Discussion Forums

Jawful · Joined: 21 May 2006 Posts: 19

For me, this is a no-brainer, but I've been respecting the wishes of my employer on this issue.

I work at a normal Japanese kindergarten, hired directly and employed full time. In the interview they made their wishes clear, "you should only speak English with the students, in and out of the classroom."

I teach an eikaiwa-like, jumping around and using simple English words while playing games kinda lesson. One 30 min lesson per class per week. I love my job and I was teaching at an international kindergarten for two years before this so while this is simpler content, it's fun for me and for them.

Now I've been in Japan for 5 and a half years so I can speak Japanese fine, but my experience at the international schools made it easy for me not to use it with kids. What I don't understand most at my current job is the fact that I should also not use it with the teachers in front of the kids, and the teachers aren't supposed to use Japanese with me in front of kids. Basically they tell them "he doesn't understand so you have to use English"

Their idea is that if we can't speak Japanese, the kids will try harder to use English. But in reality the chatty ones don't care if you understand or not, they just keep talking. And I can't pretend I don't understand so I end up having half conversations with them.

They do use the English they know, especially what I've taught. Which is great. But I'm not convinced that would change if I spoke japanese around them.

But it drives me crazy to have to ask teachers to duck around a corner so I can talk to them. Or in the middle of a lesson when they don't understand my English, my hands are tied from just explaining it in japanese, even to the teacher.

In general I don't need Japanese to teach the lessons. In fact they work better without it sometimes. But I think it's wrong to be teaching little kids that foreign people cannot speak Japanese. I think it's better for them to know we can in fact. Instead we are portrayed as the "dumb ones" who doesn't understand. That's how it feels when they say bluntly "he doesn't understand" anyway.

And on a more selfish note, outside of class I would love to be able to just talk with them. I like kids and they are pretty funny sometimes. I wanna talk to them and want them to talk to me.

Sorry this is long but I just wanted to share my situation and hear feedback and/or similar situations. Also I'd love to know if their is actually benefit to playing dumb or its just an assumption that they want to believe. Before I continue next year I want to have a serious talk about this and if I have something to back up my view thatd be great.

nightsintodreams · Joined: 18 May 2010 Posts: 558

I understand exactly how you feel as i feel the same way. The idea of English only in the classroom is great, but why this has to extend to outside the classroom is a mystery to me.
Maybe im a cynic but i think its got more to do with the Japanese teachers' egos than anything else. What will the children think if the stupid foreigner who's only been studying Japanese for two years can speak better Japanese than the teacher who studied English for 6-10 years can speak English.

I even had a teacher tell the kids in Japanese when i was standing right next to him "This is ......... Sensei, he's a foreigner so can he speak Japanese?" the kids all replied "no" to which the teacher said "no of course not, so you must speak to him in English", all while i stood there like an idiot pretending not to understand. Yea thats a great life lesson for the kids i thought, teach them that all foreigners are stupid and come to this country without making any effort to learn the language. No wonder Japanese people freeze up and freak out when i speak to them, no wonder the lady at my local ramen restaurant continues to point at the price on the cash register like im some kind of monkey, even after ive spoken to her in Japanese. Come on, even if i cant understand Japanese, of course i can understand a bloody cash register you idiot, im not from the jungle!!!

In England we have ALTs occasionally for French, but never were we told this person cant speak English. Of course we were told to use French in the classroom though.

The other day i was at a cafe and i wanted to know if a drink contained coffee so i asked "kokonatsushokoratte wa kohi ga haiteru?" A pretty basic question i think you'll agree. The lady looked at me like i was talking in some alien language so i repeated the question again, she still didnt get it. So at that point i said "kokonatsushokoratte no naka de kohi ga aru?" to which she still didnt understand. At this point another clerk came over and understood first time. I tell my Japanese friends and teachers this story and they laugh their asses off, but also make excuses for her like "For Japanese, it is uncomfortable to talk to foreigners in Japanese" or "You must have startled her by speaking Japanese". O yes, of course my fault for being so insensitive as to speak the language of the country i am in.

I could tell you countless more tales such as this, and yet anyone who knows me can understand me fine. Also when i go to big cities people understand me fine and dont even bat an eyelid when i speak to them in Japanese.

I sometimes feel like thats just part of the Japanese view of the world, and heaven forbid if we shatter the precious belief that all foreigners cant speak Japanese.

Inflames · Joined: 02 Apr 2006 Posts: 486

My experiences are more with (young) adults but I really dislike these policies.

I'm sent to a university and my company has this policy. For one, some students take this as an indication they can disrespect the teacher and get away with it. One of my friends got student surveys that said the students were happy because he sometimes spoke Japanese and he was almost fired. My boss (who is a complete idiot and liar) told me I should explain everything in English, including grading and the attendance policy. Try explaining a complicated make-up exam policy to someone with a 150 TOEIC in English. They told me that if there's an issue with the class or a student, I should have this Japanese woman the company sends out every day come and speak to my class instead of doing it myself.

Jawful · Joined: 21 May 2006 Posts: 19

oneokbunny · Joined: 21 Feb 2011 Posts: 11 Location: California

I think this is the one part of my job as an ALT working with Interac that I don't like. I am not sure how much of it is Interac and how much of it is the BOE. We are told in training that the teachers (JTE) have guidelines for us and one of those is using no English in the classroom.

I have gotten in a bad habit of using a little Japanese during class. An example of how I use it... we were doing mock shopping and half the students were shoppers and the others sellers. So while the sellers ready themselves i turned to the other half of the class and said in Japanese that they were getting ready and 'shosho omachi kudasai' and they laughed and got a kick out of my using keigo with them. It set them in the right mood and even though when I yelled out that there was 1 minute left and the kids yelled out in Japanese about end of the day sales I still heard 'Do you have purple shorts?' in English.

I don't see anything wrong with it personally. If the kid or adult is into learning the language they will use it whenever they can. I did when learning Japanese. If not... using all the English in the world wont change that.

Though because I don't want to get in trouble with my company I want to cut back on the amount of Japanese I use in class. I have no problems at all with the teachers speaking to me... in fact I kind of wished one of my JTE used what English she knows to explain things to me ^^;;

Jawful · Joined: 21 May 2006 Posts: 19

Mr_Monkey · Joined: 11 Mar 2009 Posts: 661 Location: Kyuuuuuushuuuuuuu

It almost seems to me, in my more cynical moments, that the goal of many English programs in Japan is not for the student to actually learn English, but for the promotion of old-and-tired notions of national identity.

"We Japanese..." RAWR

In my more cynical moments...

Cool Teacher · Posted: Sat Nov 26, 2011 2:00 pm Post subject:

Inflames · Joined: 02 Apr 2006 Posts: 486

Jawful · Joined: 21 May 2006 Posts: 19

Cool Teacher · Posted: Sun Nov 27, 2011 2:12 am Post subject:

Jawful · Joined: 21 May 2006 Posts: 19

Rooster_2006 · Joined: 24 Sep 2007 Posts: 984

I have taught at a number of English schools over about the past three years in Asia, and I have noticed that many of these schools believe that we should be able to teach English under the following conditions:
1. In blocks of only 30 ~ 60 minutes per week
2. Using absolutely no L1 in the classroom, even when it is desperately needed
3. Not allowed to discipline students who are clearly out-of-line
4. Not allowed to give homework
5. Can give tests or quizzes, but of course there is no punishment/sanction if a student comes in and gets only 10% of the answers right
6. No access to a bilingual teacher who can give directions or aid in instruction using Japanese
7. Must teach classes with ridiculously varied ability, often even different textbooks -- kids with zero English knowledge grouped with kids who know hundreds of words and are good at phonics (quite frequent because the classes aren't grouped by ability level, but by age, or sibling classes)
8. Asinine textbooks like Let's Go that are not designed for Japanese learners (let alone EFL learners -- Let's Go is obviously biased towards ESL learners, not EFL learners), and worst of all, are wholly ineffective

And you know what? A school with policies like those simply can't expect the students to learn anything. Expecting a teacher to actually transfer any information, whatsoever, under those conditions is essentially like putting a boxer into a ring and telling him "you have to defeat your opponent -- but you can't use your fists, you can't play rough, and you only have ten seconds to finish the other guy off." It just can't be done.

So...you can either teach your own way in spite of the rules (get fired, or have all your students quit), or you can just go with the flow, make lots of corny jokes and have lots of sticky ball games, obey the stupid rules, keep your job, and get your paycheck.

Most English teachers in Asia end up just going with the flow and obeying, and just doing the best they can with the ridiculous rules. Many teachers, in fact, have cognitive dissonance regarding this, and quickly convince themselves that "this must be the right way to teach English after all" and those teachers manage to trick themselves to the extent that they are able to go home at night with a feeling of "satisfaction." In any case, there's no point in making a martyr of yourself -- someone will just come and replace you who will teach with the same, utterly ineffective, inane style.

My current English conversation school (and the ones before it back when I lived in Taiwan) is basically the model outlined above (it's a bit more tolerant of a couple of those points, but overall, it's the model outlined above). The boss is very nice, and I think her intentions are good, but honestly, I don't think the students learn very much.

Unfortunately, I need to get paid, because food, medical care, a roof over my head, etc. cost money. And I need a visa if I want to continue living here. So I'm just going to teach the way that my school has outlined. But once I get a better visa/status of stay and/or once I have an alternate way of making money, I will definitely move on. Because I am not too keen on "going through the motions" without actually producing any results as a way to make money.

Sour Grape · Joined: 10 May 2005 Posts: 241

Jawful · Joined: 21 May 2006 Posts: 19

Well I do see your point. In The case of kindergarten I can't help think it doesn't matter as much. They aren't shy to use English or make mistakes anyway and they regularly speak Japanese while throwing in the few English words they know.

But by few I really mean few. The curriculum is probably not more than 50 words for the whole year and a few sentence patterns. 30 min lessons for classes of 35 kids once a week just doesn't allow for high expectations. The goal is for them to have fun in English and with foreigners. This goal they outlined doesn't fit with the no Japanese rule. And the fact that the classroom teacher translates in Japanese so often shows that they don't want 100% English. They just don't want us to break from our roles.

I want to be more of a teacher, as in discipline and telling them what they should be doing, and just talk to them like everyone else does. And I don't think it will take away from their education. In fact I think I can add to it. That's my belief.