Non-English subject teachers

Hi!

I'm curious to know if anyone knows anything about foreign teachers in Japan teaching subjects other than English or another foreign language in secondary school; in particular any of the natural sciences (biology, physics, chemistry) or mathematics.
For instance, I heard that it is very hard to be hired to such a position, teaching anything but English - is this true?

If you are a qualified teacher then it is possible to find work in the international schools, which there are a lot of in the major cities. I hear they have recruitment fairs for international schools in the States and other countries fairly regularly.

Otherwise, if you don't speak Japanese how would you teach a subject other than English to Japanese high school students?

In my prefecture there is one public junior high school that teaches all of its subjects in English. The only thing is that they are all taught by Japanese teachers that speak English.

So while Japanese isn't "necessary" to teach the class, all other aspects of the job, basically everything that is not actual class time, will require Japanese ability.

Also, I have had friends that have taught other subjects in high schools in Japanese. They were hired as English teachers however and that was their primary job.

The biggest hurdle is that you will have to become a licensed teacher in Japan to be allowed to teach in a public school. They only seem to make exceptions for ALTs by classifying them as Assistant teachers which means they technically have to have a licensed teacher in the room with them when they teach.

It seems your best chance is to look into private schools that are not required to, but prefer to, hire licensed and qualified teachers.

Ah, I meant a foreign teacher who speaks Japanese and is qualified for the job. I should have explicitly stated that, sorry!

So... the chances of a qualified Japanese-speaking but foreign teacher getting to teach in a Japanese school.

At Japanese public schools the teachers are "koumuin" or civil servants, and as far as I know only Japanese nationals can become koumuin.

At a private school it may be possible, but as long as we are talking about native speaker level fluency in both spoken and written Japanese. The kinds of schools yllwsmrf talks about would be quite rare- generally it is easier for the schools to hire Japanese nationals, so that is what they do.

Why not teach at an international school? From what I hear the pay and benefits are far better than at ordinary schools.

From a very quick internet check in which I'm not sure is reliable, there seems to be quite a few school teachers who don't have Japanese nationality (mainly Korean nationality, meaning that they probably spent their whole life in Japan). A poster suspects that as far as teaching is concerned, our government must have made an exception to accept foreign nationality holders to public schools.

Apart from this of course, there are many foreign professors teaching non-language-related subjects in universities. An example is Professor Christopher Szpilman. Older brother of the "pianist" featured in Polanski's movie, he now holds a British nationality but is fluent in Japanese and is a specialist in Japanese history.

However, I've never heard of teachers for senior high school students and younger, who mostly grew up in a foreign country.

I know a few foreigners teaching their subjects (mostly business-related) in English at universities, mostly at graduate (daigakuin) level. That's quite different from teaching at a high school though, whether in English or Japanese.

In that case I would guess that your chances to teach anything other than English are slim.

My prefecture hires foreign teachers for public high schools but it is extremely rare. Of the 80 public high schools there are exactly 4 foreign teachers and they all teach English.

Theoretically you get a job as an English teacher and then become licensed in another subject if you really want to teach that in High School. However, your best chance to teach in Japan may be to widen your search to include Universities.