On TEFL in Japan, in English （英語で日本の英語教育を語ろう）

My name is Kirtz, and I'm an English teacher at a junior and senior high school in Japan. I started writing on NOTE in January this year (2023), and have been writing on my thoughts about English education and my own practice.

I have been writing for over six months and have accumulated a good number of articles, so I am going to start something I have wanted to do for a long time; that is, to post my articles in English.

To start with, I would like to explain how I came up with the idea of posting in English.

Learning about English education in Japan

After graduating from a Japanese university, I entered the TESOL program (Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages) at a graduate school in the U.S. without any teaching experience. After two and a half years of graduate school in the U.S., I returned to Japan and took up a position at a junior and senior high school.

After starting my teaching career, I was always busy with my daily teaching and other duties. As I prepared for my daily classes, I felt the need to learn more about English education in Japanese junior and senior high school.

This is probably a common experience for TESOL graduates from overseas, but there are many things that I learned in TESOL that cannot be directly applied to English education in Japan, due to environmental restrictions, differences in needs, etc. In such a situation, I felt that I needed to learn more about English education in Japan. Therefore, I came to want to learn more and more about teaching methods that are appropriate for the English teaching environment in Japan.

However, I was too busy with my daily life to participate in any study groups and academic conferences, so my main source of information was books and other forms of publications.

Maintaining and improving my own English proficiency

On the other hand, I am also keenly aware of the need to maintain and improve my English language skills after completing my graduate studies abroad. I would like to expose myself to various forms of English, such as movies, videos, radio, and books, but the reality was that I could not find the time to do so on a daily basis.

There was a time when I read a lot of foreign books related to English education in order to kill two birds with one stone: updating my knowledge on English education and learning English myself. On my days off, I would go to large bookstores such as Maruzen and bought many books on English education written in English. (In most cases, those books are extremely expensive...)

However, as is often the case with TESOL graduates from overseas, the contents of such books are not always directly applicable to English education in Japanese junior and senior high school. In order to improve your own teaching skills and to provide better English education to the students in front of you, it is best to learn from books written in Japanese by Japanese English educators.

Killing two birds with one stone

I suspect that many English teachers in Japan have the same problem.

I want to read books written in English for my own English study. At the same time, I want to learn about English teaching methods that are as directly related as possible to teaching the students I have in front of me right now.

And I don't have the time to do both of these things.

If only the magazine 「英語教育」 (大修館書店) were written in English. If only 「アルク選書」 were written in English. 

I am sure there are many English teachers who think like this. I can't help wondering why such magazines and books are not available in the market.

If not in the market, make it yourself?

If it is not in the market, I can make it yourself. I have always had this thought. However, I am not confident in my English ability to write in English. I mean, I believe that if I put in the time and effort I can write something worthwhile, but I don't think I can find the time to do so in my current life.

Recently, however, a turning point has come for me: the development of AI translation and the advent of ChatGPT. By making full use of these, I can write in English without spending too much time and effort.

Therefore, I have decided to start posting English education-related posts in an English version, making full use of AI translation and other means. Of course, I expect to have some effect on my own English learning in the process of translating them into English.

I have actually had this idea in mind since I started posting on NOTE at the beginning of this year.

I will continue to post at a reasonable pace, and eventually I would like to be able to compile them in some form.

Basically, I am just doing this for myself, for my own learning. But if there is anything that can be of any help to someone, that will be great. If you find this useful, helpful, or inspiring in any ways, I would be happy to have your comments and reactions.