Job Discussion Forums

[alexcase]

Why are there so many bad native speaker English teachers in Japan? As someone who has taught in 6 countries, I must say that the general level in Japan is probably the worst I have known.

[Glenski]

Where else have you taught? What were the required credentials there?

Where have you seen the bad teachers in Japan? High school? University? Eikaiwa? ALT or full-time solo teacher or PT teacher?

Except for university jobs and international schools, there aren't many required credentials for teaching in Japan. A vanilla BA is often the minimal "credential", and it doesn't have to be in a teaching field.

[alexcase]

I'd say accepting people without any kind of teaching certificate or experience is certainly a factor (although why they need to when the conditions in Japan aren't so bad is another question), but there must be more to it.

[matador]

Glenski makes a good point; what are the 6 countries you have taught in and what were your experiences there? With this info we can make more of an accurate comparison.

For what its worth, I have taught in UK, Germany, Hong Kong, Shanghai, Tokyo and Fukuoka. About 70% of this was/is biz English; the rest is children, university and adult classes.

[alexcase]

For what it's worth: Turkey, Thailand, Spain, Italy, UK (three times), Japan. My question is not Is...? though, my question is Why is it/ could it be so?

[Glenski]

alexcase,
You still have not answered the question. In what capacity have you seen bad teachers here?

Let me clarify.

Were they in high school as ALTs, PTers, or direct hires?
Were they in university, junior college, or senmongakko (as FT or PT direct hires, or as ALTs)?
Were they in eikaiwa, international schools, or business schools?
Were they private lesson tutors?

Also, what do you mean by "bad"?
Drunkards?
Poor educators?
Sex maniacs? Chile molesters?
Bad grammarians?
Poor linguists?
Lazy?
Slovenly?


Help us here. Your questions are far too vague, so all you can get are uncoordinated vague replies.

[womblingfree]

[markle]

I think that there are just a lot more teachers period.

Japan is a fairly affluent, stable, country with fairly mediocre requirements to become an English teacher. The European countries need to/can afford to have higher standards The Gulf countries can also afford to be picky.
Japan has a huge market which is pretty neatly segregated between the professionals in the tertiary sector (with a few in FT highschool sector) and the rest in everything else.
My guess is that you don't work in the tertiary sector....

I'm curious, as someone who has spent a lot of time in Thailand I wonder how you come to the conclusion that there are more bad teachers in Japan? Seriously, the scariest people that meet all of Glenski's 'bad' teacher criteria I came across were in Thailand.

[Glenski]

[quote="womblingfree"]

[matador]

OP: I am interested in your Spain, UK and Italy experience. In general, how would you compare/contrast the EU EFL vibe to that of Japan?

Did you do summer school in the UK?

[alexcase]

I should clarify that none of the places I have worked have had a short supply of incompetent teachers, Japan really does seem to be worse- and I don't think it is just the eikaiwa schools either. I have worked part-time in senmongakko here and spoken and read a lot about working in universities, and although the level of experience, qualifications and knowledge of Japan is obviously a lot higher I don't get the impression that the level of teaching skills is.

If the schools in Europe can offer less money, no accomodation etc. etc. and still demand a better standard of teacher- why is that?

[J.]

Yes, one does wonder why other places can demand higher qualifications. I suppose, in some cases, especially with owners of some private language schools, the owners don't really know what qualifications to ask for. You see advertisements all the time that ask for a laundry list of qualifications sometimes including a Master's, which leads me to believe that the employer is just trying to get everyone to apply, regardless of their qualifications and then will try to "pick the best". Perhaps they will have an age or appearance or gender preference that might even supersede other qualifications. There's a lot of hiring of young and "attractive" candidates as schools can market them on their energy and physical appeal.

As long as the schools in question care more about getting students to sign contracts on the dotted line than about what they deliver after the fact, they will almost certainly be taking the short term view, rather than worrying about any quality product. They also tend to treat employees as disposable commodities, knowing that many will become dissatisfied with the way things are done and leave soon. This doesn't make it very useful for them to search very hard for the perfectly qualified candidate. They just want someone who will be able to attract the next fresh crop of students.

Some students are not very serious about learning; they consider their English classes to be more a hobby. In those cases they are looking for "teachers" with amiable, interesting personalities rather than many teaching skills. Of course the more serious students in the classes will eventually become dissatisfied and drop out. They will probably look for another kind of classes. The students that stay at the school are those who are satisfied with the product provided. Unfortunately for the schools, the numbers of such students seem to be dropping, but the schools haven't yet understood that they need to get better teachers to retain these students.

[markle]

[Glenski]

[womblingfree]