Obligatory First Post

This is Chris and Tessa's blog chronicling their 1 year adventure in Japan as ALTs (Assistant Language Teachers) teaching English in Japan. We wanted to start this before we left to give everyone an idea of what we are doing to prepare before we leave. I think I'd like to start out by answering some FAQs. As of yet, we are still in Seattle prepping for the move. We will be most likely be leaving on Friday, March 27th, but plane tickets have not yet been bought. Our contract will have us employed from April 1st 2009 to March 31st 2010. We still do not know exactly where we will be living, but it is likely to be somewhere in the Kanto region, perhaps Mito or Ibaraki. We will be working 4 days a week in a Japanese Junior High, and one day a week at an elementary school. At the Junior High we will be basically the in-classroom English native-speaking support for a Jappanese teacher of English (whose knowlege of the English language is not necessarily great). At the Elementary school we pretty much create our own curriculum and teach it as we will. We are contracted out to the schools by a company called Heart Corporation. As of yet Tessa and I know little to nothing of the Japanese language. Tessa and I will be living together (as we have for the past year and a half) in what will likely be a tiny apartment no bigger (maybe smaller) than a dorm room. That is some of the basic cold information, I will post more of my thoughts, feelings, ruminations, hopes, and fears later.