What program of study and classes would benefit me most as a teacher in Japan?

Teaching and living abroad is a wonderful way to do what you love and see the world. Japan is a difficult market without prior international experience. Get a degree in English with a teaching cert for desired grade levels. Teach state-side for two years. Apply to schools online. Additionally, you could skip the two year requirement and do that in a language institute in Japan. You will not get hired as a teacher at an international school in Japan without work experience. China, sure. Japan is much more stringent. Let me know if you have other questions. I have taught and lived abroad before.

Hi Cody,

My husband went to Japan and taught there for two years. I am from Japan. It will be extremely helpful if you have some Japanese language skills (even most of English teaching job does not require this). It will show how serious you are to get the teaching job in Japan and generally Japanese loves it. If you are very serious about the matter of language acquisition, you can try classes related Applied Second Language Acquisition which basically explains theoretical part of second language acquisition (which is learning English for Japanese speaker). Honestly, learning Japanese might be much more useful if you limit your market to be Japan ;)

By the way, my husband had no previous formal teaching experience/nor teaching related classes, but did some school tutoring at college (not even for language but for his major) and applied JET program and went to Japan to teach English. It is Japanese government program to fund young english speaker to come visit Japan to teach at public schools in Japan. Somewhat competitive but great program. You can also earn decent salary through the program while you are in Japan. If you ever be interested, here is the link.

https://jetprogramusa.org/about/

Good luck!