Japan: Joshua Hinojoza
Program: GHJ English Teaching Internship, Summer
Major: Finance
What is the moment you are most proud of?
The moment I am most proud of is becoming lead teacher for three sessions. The lead teacher is the teacher that is chosen to lead all teaching activities for the day, and directs 10+ teachers, and 50+ students.
Describe your internship, research, or fieldwork and how the experience helped advance your career or studies.
This internship helped me develop professionally by tremendously improving my work ethic, soft skills, communication, time management, planning, and public speaking. My work ethic needed to be high on long days where we taught from 8am-3pm so I developed an ability to push past feeling tired. Also, as a lead teacher I had to make sure the activities we did were planned according to schedule and make any fixes along the way if needed. As lead teacher, you instruct groups of teachers and students, so my ability to feel more relaxed in front of others has definitely improved.
What did you learn about yourself or the world because of your experience?
I learned that money isn’t my number one priority, it’s having a life full of rich experiences like this one.
How did your identities impact your experience? What advice would you give to students with similar identities who are considering a similar experience?
Being Latino made my experience amazing because growing up in a Mexican household, the way of living is very different compared to the traditional Japanese way of living, so I had lots of culture shock, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Speaking Spanish allowed me to be able to speak Japanese more easily because the languages have similar ways of pronouncing words.
This internship helped me develop professionally by tremendously improving my work ethic, soft skills, communication, time management, planning, and public speaking
How were your program academics similar or different from taking classes at UW-Madison?
The program academics were lectures given for the TEFL certification. This material was all completely new to me as a finance major who had never taken an education class before.
What challenges or barriers did you face as you prepared to go abroad and/or during your time abroad? How did you work through them?
During my time abroad, the main challenge I faced was feeling exhausted after teaching. During teaching, teachers are expected to have high energy and speak loudly with students for multiple hours, so by the time the session is finished, I felt drained every day, so I started to make it a priority to get more sleep and that made things better.
How will your experience benefit you in the future? How might it affect your future career or studies?
This experience has opened up my perspective. I can see myself working in another country besides the U.S. now and I would like to study abroad in Japan or a Spanish-speaking country.
What is your advice for someone considering your program?
Definitely do it! This has been an absolutely eye-opening experience that I wish everyone got the chance to try. The friendships you develop with your fellow teachers are amazing, the beautiful sights you get to see in nature, the amazing foods you get to try, the knowledge you gain from everyone around you, the professional development you gain as a lead teacher, and everything you learn about yourself are things I can’t express how grateful I am for.
What is a custom, food or tradition from your host country that you are taking forward?
Tonkotsu ramen is phenomenal, so I’ll definitely be seeking it out back in the U.S. I also want to carry forward the custom of saying “thank you for the food” and waiting for everyone’s meal to arrive before eating. And definitely speaking Japanese, I want to continue improving so that I can come back someday and see how my experience compares when I’m able to communicate more confidently.