Contemporary roles of foreign English teachers in Japanese public secondary schools: An exploratory study
Title: Contemporary roles of foreign English teachers in Japanese public secondary schools: An exploratory study
Abstract
This study discusses the roles of Native English Speaking Teachers (NESTs) in contemporary Japanese society through existing literature, and the results from questionnaires. Ever since the largest wave of NESTs started to work in Japanese public secondary schools in 1987 their roles have never been satisfactorily specified. NESTs are officially employed to offer students opportunity to improve their communicative ability. However, their roles are shaped by complex professional and societal factors. Professionally, they are part of a long chain of authorities starting at the government level through MEXT (Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology), and down to the Japanese Non-Native English Speaking Teachers (NNEST) they teach with. Socially, forces stemming from Japan’s social history and rapidly evolving contemporary society mould their roles. This dissertation discusses the responses of 171 NESTs and 28 NNESTs under the paradigm of a changing society that aims to maintain traditional practices out of touch in the modern world. To assist Japan in achieving its ‘internationalisation’ goals it is suggested that the continued separation of NEST’s assistant status should be modified to that of an English teacher of equal status.
Category: 2015 Thesis, Thesis
