How frequently can one get home?

[jaybee]

Thanks Alex and Ical Pete for your thoughtful replies to my previous questions: just one more. I've searched in vain on this forum and elsewhere for detailed descriptions of day-to-day hours and working conditions. Obviously these will vary from country to country and school to school. But are we generally talking 9-4 Mon-Fri? Are weekend usually free? Are term lengths similar to those in the UK? Are there such things as half-terms?
Yes, overseas adventure is the whole point, but I want to know how much free time I might have in my country of choice, and how often (subject to air fares, of course) I might be able to get home during a school year. I WANT to do this... but I know I'll be homesick.

[Loulou]

You haven't mentioned where you come from and where you would like to go (maybe you have and I haven't seen it?) but the answer to your question would really depend on that.
For ex, if you come from England and are going to teach in France it would be fairly easy to go home even for a weekend! And yes, the jobs would be from Mon-Fri.
It also depends on what type of school you are planning on teaching in. If it's a government school for children then there are school holidays usually from 10 days to 2 months (summer holidays) but if it's a private language school it will depend on the country and how many weeks holiday they accord workers. Here, in France, you have 5 weeks holiday in the year but in the governmental school system the children (and the teachers) are on holiday for 16 weeks in the year!

[jaybee]

Thanks Loulou. I'm in the UK... and would love to teach in France but I gather that's far from easy for a newbie. so I'd probably end up in China!

[Alex Case]

Here's details on the schedule of one job in China:

http://www.shane-english.com.cn/yingwen/teaching2.htm

The holidays might be on there somewhere too.