Need a mentor for a nonnative English speaking teacher
Posted: 02 Apr 2010, 13:02
Hi,
My name is Miyuki. I came back to Japan one year ago after I finished MATESOL in 2008. I taught Japanese as a second/foreign language for a year but I don't have any experience in teaching English in any setting.
I want to be a nonnative English-speaking teacher in Japan and I need a lot of questions about it. Though my professor was encouraging us, the international students in our program, to teach English in the direct method, I still feel there are some challenges about whether we can maintain and improve our oral communications skills in an EFL setting, whether it is a realistic profession in terms of our incomes if I am not fully bilingual, or whether there are chances to be hired as a teacher for the direct method in Japan. Some of the administrators in an private language schools says that even when they have native English-speaking teachers they still need to hire some Japanese L1 teachers. However, there is some kind of a fixed HR strategy that they hire native English-speaking teachers and some Japanese L1 teachers who are good at explaining grammar but incline to use English in classroom in public sector. I feel this is how they share and distinguish the territories between them. So a nonnative English-speaking teachers could be called an "imperfect teacher" if we do not work really hard on our oral communication skills and ability to explicitly teach grammar in order not to be said, "We don't need you because we have Mr. John from the United States and Mr. Yamada who teachs English grammar ten years in Japan." Whether or not I use the direct method, I still want to teach some aspects of spoken language, academic writing, and grammar.
Though it'll be gratefull if I would find a teacher who are successful as a nonnative English-speaking professional, I'd appreciate it if there would be some native English-speaking teacher who can be a mentor for me.
Thank you,
Miyuki
My name is Miyuki. I came back to Japan one year ago after I finished MATESOL in 2008. I taught Japanese as a second/foreign language for a year but I don't have any experience in teaching English in any setting.
I want to be a nonnative English-speaking teacher in Japan and I need a lot of questions about it. Though my professor was encouraging us, the international students in our program, to teach English in the direct method, I still feel there are some challenges about whether we can maintain and improve our oral communications skills in an EFL setting, whether it is a realistic profession in terms of our incomes if I am not fully bilingual, or whether there are chances to be hired as a teacher for the direct method in Japan. Some of the administrators in an private language schools says that even when they have native English-speaking teachers they still need to hire some Japanese L1 teachers. However, there is some kind of a fixed HR strategy that they hire native English-speaking teachers and some Japanese L1 teachers who are good at explaining grammar but incline to use English in classroom in public sector. I feel this is how they share and distinguish the territories between them. So a nonnative English-speaking teachers could be called an "imperfect teacher" if we do not work really hard on our oral communication skills and ability to explicitly teach grammar in order not to be said, "We don't need you because we have Mr. John from the United States and Mr. Yamada who teachs English grammar ten years in Japan." Whether or not I use the direct method, I still want to teach some aspects of spoken language, academic writing, and grammar.
Though it'll be gratefull if I would find a teacher who are successful as a nonnative English-speaking professional, I'd appreciate it if there would be some native English-speaking teacher who can be a mentor for me.
Thank you,
Miyuki