Communication & Relationships

Hi There!

This week was a fairly normal week as Sports Day is over and summer break is on the horizon!

I am going to spend this update writing mainly about the relationships between the English teacher (me) and my Japanese colleagues, along with some of the struggles that both sides face!

Sorry, but no photos this week - I will have some to post for the next week!

Communication can be difficult...

As I have written before, it can be challenging to work in an environment in which there is lack of ability to communicate. I think I just started to realize this past week how difficult the working environment can be when you cannot speak the same language as the other people in your environment.

It has not been a huge deal for me, but I can see that for many people, this can lead to issues. And even though it might not be a big deal for me, it has come up as I deal with some minor issues within certain classes.

I have mentioned before that, generally, how things work is that in a particular grade one teacher will come up with a lesson plan, print out that lesson plan and all the other teachers in the grade will follow it.

For third grade, however, there is no written plan but the first teacher is a strong teacher, so they lead the lesson which gives me an idea of how the lesson should work for the other classrooms.

The struggle has been, though, that I teach third grade with that first class on a Tuesday afternoon, then Wednesday morning I have three fifth grade classes before I go back to third grade to do the other two third grade classes later that day.

For the first third grade class that I teach on Wednesday (the second out of three, overall), the teacher takes more of a passive role and often defers to me to lead the lesson.

The issue can sometimes be that because I last taught third grade the day before and had some other lessons in between, I can struggle to remember how we carried out the initial third grade class the prior day.

The last third grade class of the day is similar, but the teacher takes a much more active role. But she will sometimes refer to me to figure out in what order the activities should go or how we should run the activities.

So, this brings up the communication point. If you and the other teachers communicate 100% effectively, I could just go to the first teacher and ask if she could write down the lesson plan notes on paper, then that would help save me from having to take my own notes and try to remember how to carry out the lesson the following day.

But, given the language barrier, this can be tough and you have to be careful about managing the communication. While you might be able to state what you want, given the language barrier, you might not be able to deliver the request with the proper finesse.

I did end up talking to the teacher and, using some English and some Japanese, we were able to figure out a solution.

Even though we seemingly reached a solution, you still have to be very careful with the communication to not come across negatively and even do some follow-up to express appreciation to the teacher.

This would be something that you might not worry about that much if you were able to both speak the same language 100%.

Similar scenarios sometimes arise for other grades. From time to time, there is teacher behavior that is difficult to read - are they acting a certain way because of me, or because of the class, or because or something else?

I ended up talking to another teacher about a few minor things. You can imagine that certain conversations might be difficult even if you speak 100% the same language. When you do not, they can get even more difficult.

This brings me to a few points.

Goals driving our interactions...

The first being that you want to try to leave your teachers in a better place than they were at the start of the year. To me, I think this means increasing their confidence in teaching English but also trying to adjust any behavior that might come off strangely to the English-language speaking teacher (myself).

For example, in one class, a teacher does not do a clear "closure" of the class.

Usually, for most classes, what will happen is that at the end the teacher will declare that the lesson is now over and then usually will turn it over to me or to the students to say goodbye. The students will say goodbye and then I will say goodbye, or vice-versa.

With one teacher, though, classes would end somewhat unclearly - the teacher would leave the room and I would be left wondering if I should still stick around, head on the the next class or go back to the staffroom. If I did either of the latter, would that come off strangely to the teacher?

Closing class this way can cause you to question yourself - did something happen during class that the teacher was upset about? Am I doing something wrong? Or did something happen in the past between us to cause this?

So, introducing a clearer closure at the end of class (similar to what other classes do) was one thing I suggested to hopefully prevent any weird feelings in the future either with me or future English teachers.

But friction can arise from past behavior...

Another point I thought about is that sometimes foreign English teachers do not have great work habits and this may create friction with their Japanese colleagues.

In my program, and in many across Japan, most of the English teachers are just out of college or university and this might be their first job. And it can be a difficult job emotionally and culturally, especially if you are early in your working career.

I have thought a lot that if I was younger, I might have struggled a lot with this job. There is a lot about yourself that you do not know and also due to the language barrier, there can be work situations that happen that can be difficult to figure out. Such as the one I mentioned earlier.

But, as I am a bit older, I feel that I can more easily process some things and usually assume that what is happening around me more than likely does not have anything to do with me. Even though it sometimes can.

The lack of English is difficult...

Also the job is somewhat isolating - as I mention, in my situation, no one else at my workplace speaks native English, so you really cannot express your true feelings or thoughts. Or get explanations about why certain things happen.

You can have many basic, factual conversations, but anything involving feelings or things that need to be corrected can be difficult. This can be tough for English teachers to handle, especially if they are earlier in their working career.

Which brings me back to work habits. I have experienced and also heard stories about other teachers who take advantage of their situation, such as leaving work before their scheduled time or taking time off last minute. While back in the USA, taking time off last minute is usually frowned upon, it is even more so discouraged in Japan.

Behavior that breaks these social rules can lead to tension between English teachers and their Japanese counterparts.

I write the above to say that negative stereotypes may arise about English teachers. And these stereotypes can influence how the Japanese teachers relate to the English teacher. It is something that the English teacher may need to battle. And the English teacher might not even be aware that they are battling them on a daily basis.

Certainly there are cultural factors at play here (I have heard that Japanese people can take a little longer to warm up to outsiders), but their past experience with English teachers can also influence current behavior.

I feel that this can be confusing to new English teachers coming in - their colleagues can treat them in odd ways, perhaps coldly at times, and do not know why it is. It may not have anything to do with them, though, but rather something a predecessor did.

So, I do feel that it is important as a foreign English teacher to go out of your way to "warm up" relationships between you and your colleagues. You can also do this by doing things not normally expected of the English teacher, like helping take out the school trash, assisting with school cleaning and working hard during events like the Sports Day.

I have also thought that as a foreign teacher, it is important to listen for the squeaky rolling wheels of the school push cart - when you hear that, normally someone somewhere needs help lifting or moving things around.

Going out of your way can go a long ways.

Until next time,

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