Ah yes, let's go back to the beginning. After a very long plane ride which spanned two days I finally arrived in Omiya, Japan. A very nice town about 1/2 an hour north of Tokyo. Little did I know that the next week was going to be one of the busiest and most intense I have experienced hmm, maybe ever. There were 17 of us at training and we lived in pretty tight quarters, needless to say we all got to know each other pretty well.
It was Saturday night and we had just finished our first full day of training, a little tired, we headed out on the town, first to a beer garden and then to kareoke. I think it was fitting that the first night I actually go out in Japan was spent at kareoke, could it have been any other way, I think not.
At training we learned a lot of techniques for teaching English, anyone that thought that just being able to speak the language qualifies you to teach is sadly mistaken.
*side note: I noticed about a week after arriving at my school that some of my higher level students understood English grammar better than I did. My immediate reaction was to run home and brush up on prepositions, and the like. I soon learned that was pretty standard and that all questions grammar related should be directed to the Japanese teachers at the school. After all, they actually had to study the language, they didn't grow up just 'speaking' English.
As intense as it had been, I was happily surprise by how much fun I had when I started teaching and I had made some incredible friends in the process. One last thing about my training experience. Lawsons. The convenient store that is truly convenient. Countless breakfasts were purchased there and the occasional beer was consumed right outside the entrance doors. And the food, well, much better than the standard US 7/11.
Ah yes, let's go back to the beginning. After a very long plane ride which spanned two days I finally arrived in Omiya, Japan. A very nice town about 1/2 an hour north of Tokyo. Little did I know that the next week was going to be one of the busiest and most intense I have experienced hmm, maybe ever. There were 17 of us at training and we lived in pretty tight quarters, needless to say we all got to know each other pretty well.
It was Saturday night and we had just finished our first full day of training, a little tired, we headed out on the town, first to a beer garden and then to kareoke. I think it was fitting that the first night I actually go out in Japan was spent at kareoke, could it have been any other way, I think not. 
At training we learned a lot of techniques for teaching English, anyone that thought that just being able to speak the language qualifies you to teach is sadly mistaken.
*side note: I noticed about a week after arriving at my school that some of my higher level students understood English grammar better than I did. My immediate reaction was to run home and brush up on prepositions, and the like. I soon learned that was pretty standard and that all questions grammar related should be directed to the Japanese teachers at the school. After all, they actually had to study the language, they didn't grow up just 'speaking' English.
As intense as it had been, I was happily surprise by how much fun I had when I started teaching and I had made some incredible friends in the process. One last thing about my training experience. Lawsons. The convenient store that is truly convenient. Countless breakfasts were purchased there and the occasional beer was consumed right outside the entrance doors. And the food, well, much better than the standard US 7/11.
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