Making Friends In Japan

Elizaveta Pachina Alumni Experiences English is my first language, however, I studied Spanish throughout high school growing up in the Midwest and eventually received a Master’s degree in Spanish Literature. I learned to speak Spanish very well after becoming a high school Spanish teacher for eight years and then a principal for elementary and secondary schools for 26 more years speaking Spanish to new immigrant students and parents the whole time. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Rex P. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs or opinions of ITTT. In reflecting on the title question I first asked myself how Spanish had influenced me over the years. The first obvious answer was that I...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Teaching Ideas Japanese are known for being disciplined, dedicated, and hardworking individuals not only in their work but also in other aspects of their life like hobbies and studies. But why is it difficult for them to learn English despite their strong dedication, patience, efforts, and determination? This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Princess D. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs or opinions of ITTT. I’ve been teaching English in Japan as my part-time job for more than one year now. I have seen and handled students of different ages, backgrounds, language levels, and experiences. Most of them are university students and young professionals, and I couldn’t...  [Read more]

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Linda Dunsmore Budget and Salary Destinations The following guide will help you answer the question: How much can I earn (and save) while teaching English in Japan? You will also find information on the local cost of living in order to figure out how much to budget for when moving to Japan. Japan has been a popular destination for teaching English as a foreign language for decades. With the government-funded teacher placement program called JET, there are a lot of options for English teachers to find a suitable position all over the country. The cost of living in Japan has increased significantly in recent years which means it is no longer the top destination for saving large amounts of money in Asia. However, Japan still has...  [Read more]

Linda Dunsmore TEFL Information Teaching English abroad is one of the most interesting career paths one might take up. You get to move to a new country and even get paid for it! However, too many people are unsure whether teaching EFL is right for them. This article highlights 6 things you will miss out on if you don’t teach English abroad. When routine becomes a ball and chain, you know it’s time for something new. Moving to a new country to teach English is the perfect opportunity to discover a whole new world. Whether it’s cherry blossom season in Japan, Chinese New Year festivities in Taiwan, Christmas markets in Germany or the Carnival in Brazil - there are new experiences ahead of you on every corner! It’s not only large cultural...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Alumni Experiences Japan is well known for its unique culture, and history. As an island nation, it was isolated from the rest of the world until the mid-19th century when the country had to open itself to trade with western powers of the time. It was then when the English language made its way into the Japanese educational system. English spread quite rapidly, as the government saw the new language a way to catch up with the west. And, in 1873 English became the language of instruction in universities. However, due to various political reasons including the establishment of a standardized Japanese language system the urge to learn English had declined. Today in modern Japan, English is widely spread throughout the country, and...  [Read more]

Mark Crocker TEFL Information As the very essence of teaching English abroad involves leaving behind your friends and family and the social life you have been used to, it is inevitable that many newly qualified teachers have some concerns about making new friends once they head overseas. However, just like the many thousands of teachers who have gone before you, you will find that making the decision to leave home is actually the hard part and everything else will soon fall into place. To help set your mind at ease, we have put together 5 top tips for making new friends while teaching English abroad. Most TEFL certified teachers who head overseas will start their new job soon after arrival, and this is usually a great place to start making new...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Teaching Ideas Japan is an island nation and is a recognized homogenous society with a very small percentage of foreign permanent residence and more than half of the adult population lacks the necessary skills to speak English proficiently. Because of this, English as a Second Language is in high demand with young learners being a focus group in Japan. English is taught in the school environment during nearly all of a child’s primary education years, but this, unfortunately, doesn’t translate to a proficient English-speaking Japanese population. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Payton P. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs or opinions of ITTT. Children as young...  [Read more]

Laura Payne Destinations TEFL Information The Japan Exchange and Teaching (JET) Program is not the only means to teach English in Japan, but it is one of the most popular programs out there both for aspiring teachers and those who wish to pursue other fields. I first joined this program a little over a year ago. In the short time since then, I've gained incredibly valuable experiences through my work as an Assistant Language Teacher (ALT). Local prefectural governments and larger government bodies, including Japan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, manage the JET Program. They hire ALTs from English-speaking countries all over the world to increase Japan's international understanding at the level of local communities. Japan is an...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Teaching Ideas Arranging seats in your classroom can be an important task, though it may not seem like it when you first are thinking about it. There are so many different options when it comes to how you can arrange seats. There is the full circle, semi-circle, giant square, U-shape, grouping tables in several desks, two desk pairs all facing forward, or the single file rows facing forward, just to name some of the many you can choose from. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Brandie K. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs or opinions of ITTT. All of these arrangements have good and bad points to them. The circle is good because it is easy for all the students to see...  [Read more]

Amanda Stern Destinations Alumni Experiences Are you planning on teaching abroad, but worrying about how you can get involved in the community and leave a memorable impression on the locals? Language barriers may make this seem like a harrowing task, but fear not, the following is a list of a few jumping-off points for those planning to take the plunge into their new community. Celebrating multiculturalism in a community is a worldwide phenomenon, even for unassuming towns. In our rural port-town in Japan, we have multiple events throughout the year to promote understanding and celebrate the various cultures and people who have made Japan their home, temporarily or forever. These events included Filipino traditional dance...  [Read more]

Linda Dunsmore Alumni Experiences American and German Augsburg, Germany 26 Bachelor’s of Science in Management Yes. Growing up in Europe with a German mother and an American father I had the opportunity to travel around Europe and the US. After studying Mandarin, I also spent some time in China. San Diego, California Being able to explore the world and making use of my foreign language skills in Chinese. I was concerned about the language barrier, especially in China where English is not widely spoken. Even though I studied Mandarin, I was worried that my language skills wouldn’t be good enough to be able to live in China and get by alone. However, everything went very well and I was able to improve my Chinese language skills immensely during...  [Read more]

Amanda Stern Destinations Teaching Ideas Foreign language learning is a massively rewarding undertaking; going from stilted greetings to lively conversations can make you feel like a multi-million lottery winner. Of course, it’s also quite intimidating to start the learning process. In your home country, it’s simple to find a spot in a classroom with a native speaker, or for those who are more intrinsically motivated, self-study may be a viable option. You’re most likely here because you’re interested in teaching abroad, and may feel intimidated by the future language barrier. Fear not, learning a foreign language abroad where you’ll be immersed in the language is the best situation for quick absorption of vocabulary,...  [Read more]

Andrew Lynch TEFL Information One of the biggest challenges facing any teacher wanting to work abroad is ensuring they become TEFL certified. Securing the qualification will open up the door for a wealth of fresh opportunities around the world, finally giving you the chance to live out your teaching dreams in a new country or continent. But now that you’ve finished your TEFL course – now what? With the coursework out of the way, now is the time to start putting together your plan for how you can use your new certificate. We’ve put together a list of essential things to do in order to make the most of your long-held ambitions. Thinking about, and actually moving to, another country are two completely different things. It involves a huge...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Teaching Ideas Stories provide a natural and relevant context for the exposure to English language and storytelling built on the children’s innate capacity for fantasy and imaginative play, making it an essential aspect to be integrated into language lessons. Beyond just language skills, students are also able to acquire critical thinking skills such as predicting, hypothesizing, categorizing, sequencing, and inferring meaning through various storytelling activities. Stories are also used to enhance children’s concentration skills and develop moral and emotional intelligence by teaching students to empathize with the characters in the story. Storytelling can be extended to include activities for children to retell, act out,...  [Read more]

Linda Dunsmore Destinations TEFL Information Many women around the world are eager to start a new career in teaching English as a foreign language. Whether it’s straight after graduating from college, in their mid-20s or 30s or later on in life, women from all backgrounds are intrigued by the thought of living and working in a different country abroad. However, many of them feel reluctant and ask “Is it safe for single women to teach English abroad?” The answer is: Absolutely - and here is why. You might be surprised to hear that around 60% of all English teachers abroad are women. In fact, there are usually between 500 and 5,000 foreign teachers, men and women, living in many major cities across Asia, Europe and Latin...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Alumni Experiences There is no doubt that it is the Information Age people are currently living in. And it is cannot be ignored that online education is one of the fastest growing teaching and learning methods in recent years due to different reasons and needs, which takes the advantages of the Internet and save both teachers' and learners' time and energy that has been spent on the distance and traffic. Among that, ESL online learning gets a great acceptance from the ESL learners. And here is a discussion about the advantage of ESL online education. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Xue L. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs or opinions of ITTT. Compared to...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Teaching Ideas “Who wants to play a game?” I would ask my students this question whenever I start a lesson. The resounding answer would always be, “Me!” In all my years of teaching, I have yet to see a student refuse to play a game. Games are effective teaching tools because it makes learning interesting and fun. I can tell you more reasons why games are good for teaching. Now let me give at least six of them. Firstly, games make you practice a lot. As the saying goes, ‘practice makes perfect.’ In everything you do, whenever you play a game over and over, your mind gets better at it too. For example, when students play ‘Boggle,’ they have acquired many three- and four-letter words by playing numerous times. When...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Alumni Experiences Cultural sensitivity is important to bear in mind as we all face situations daily: whether in our working environment or on a personal level. Within the Western English speaking world, we can see that there is the presence of a dominant culture (such as European American, or Western Culture) and a secondary culture (such as African, Chinese, or Eastern European culture). It is always important to bear in mind that while the English language may be widespread over the globe, the differences in culture even between people living within the same country has a profound effect on how interactions take place. In the environment of the classroom, the same examples can be seen. Whether the students are of the same age...  [Read more]

Federico Riva Destinations TEFL Information Alumni Experiences Hello everybody, Liza here and I'm super happy to welcome you to this ITTT live session. It's a bit of an unusual time to meet because my sessions are usually on Tuesdays and today is Saturday. Anyway, I'm super happy that you could make it. Today's session is going to be slightly different because we are going to talk with my good friend about teaching in China. I know that many people are interested in this topic, so stay tuned because in a moment he will join me to talk about working in China and stuff like that. If you guys have any questions, feel free to ask them via the comment section. As for the timing for today, we are going to talk for...  [Read more]

Federico Riva Destinations TEFL Information Alumni Experiences Hi guys, my name is Linda from ITTT, nice to see you again. If you can see me and hear me just say hi in the comment section, it would be really nice. Yeah, back this week with another exciting topic, how much money can you really make teaching English? Very interesting topic as we all need to know how much money we can make if we want to go and teach English abroad. I'm also going to cover how much money you can make when you teach online, so very important topics that we are covering today. If you are listening to this as a podcast episode, thank you so much for the download. As you might know we always turn our live sessions into podcast...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Teaching Ideas Children learn fast, that is a fact. Learning a language is their natural skill, which they are born with. We all have gone through that process. There is no teacher needed to teach a kid how to speak, there is no teacher needed to teach a kid how to pronounce e.t.c. Mothers and fathers are not teachers, but they teach their kids how to speak, or maybe kids learn by themselves? In my opinion, communication is one of the very basic needs, which comes naturally. Children need to talk to their mothers, fathers and other people who are around them. Speaking is a result of listening and observing – in this case, family members. Kids learn from people in their environment, that is why it becomes so popular to hire a...  [Read more]

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Federico Riva Destinations Alumni Experiences Welcome to another live session this week and we're on at a different time this week. Usually we're a little bit earlier, but we have a special guest today, and that's because she's based in Germany. So we had to change the time a little bit. I’m Linda from ITT, you've probably seen me before, if you've watched us live and I’m here with Brit today. Hi Brit! Hi, thanks for having me, and painting your time to meet my schedule, and thank you so much for getting up early.I know it's early in Germany right now. just have my coffee and I’m good to go.That's awesome,where in Germany are you exactly? so I’m based near Trier, which is along the border with Luxembourg. So very close...  [Read more]

Federico Riva TEFL Information Hi everybody, thanks so much for tuning in. It’s Linda here from ITTT with my morning coffee, because if you've watched me before in one of our live sessions you will know that I am in South Korea and it's currently 10:00 a.m. on Friday morning. So I'm having my morning coffee and I'm going to have a chat with you guys. If you can see me and hear me, please drop a hi or something into the comment box, I would really appreciate it. As you may or may not know, at ITTT we go live twice every week, me on Fridays or maybe Thursdays depending on where you're watching from, and my colleague Liza she goes live every Tuesday. Actually Liza went live on Tuesday and also on Saturday last week because she had a really...  [Read more]

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Federico Riva Destinations TEFL Information Teaching English in 2021. A few people have told me about their teaching journey already, so keep letting me know what your plans are in terms of teaching English abroad or teaching English online. Somebody said they're interested in teaching online, so that's really cool. Someone new has just joined us from Laos, hi there. We have Margaret who is also teaching online, very cool. I’m going to talk a little bit about teaching English online in this presentation. Juliana says hi, I think you've watched before as I recognize your picture, thanks for tuning in again. It's really good to see new faces and old faces in our TEFL family today. I have prepared some visuals that I'm going to...  [Read more]