Where exactly in Taiwanese law does it say that teaching kindergarten as a foreigner is forbidden? Or is there a prohibition against teaching English to kindergarten kids? I’m trying to look through the Taiwanese legal code for specific articles or statements that explicitly state the illegality of this activity. Does anybody on this forum know where that specific piece of law is or can you help me find it?
If you have a credential to teach at kindergarten, and have a work right or open work permit, and are directly hired by a kindergarten, you can teach English in integrated ways at the kindergarten.
Ahh so kindergartens cannot provide work permits for foreigners. The articles 6 to 12 there is a lot of text here trying to find specific parts that forbids foreigners but I do not see it. Article 12 states the usual types of people who can’t teach (convicts, mental ill, people who have had contracts terminated but it doesn’t prohibit foreigners explicitly unless I’ve read it wrong. I ask because I was a buxiban teacher in Taiwan last year I’m back home now but I am investigating how illegal it is, seeing the legality from the legal code itself. I don’t remember ever being issued an educare certificate I just had an ARC.
Ahh I see, I don’t think I had a specific work permit for kindergarten but the fact was it was teaching english to kindergarten kids and that is specifically prohibited by Article 13 which makes what I was doing illegal along with the contract I had which contractually obliged me to teach kindergarten.
Side note: When I first arrived in 2008 I specifically asked a manager at HESS if teaching kindergarten would be illegal for me (because they advertised for foreign kindergarten teachers). The response: “It’s a gray area.” I declined the offer and went elsewhere.
You can’t legally agree to do something illegal. Or to look at it another way, you can agree to do it, but the agreement will be void and therefore unenforceable. See Civil Code Art. 71, plus official interpretations of labor/employment law on the MOL’s website.
When I was (cough) teaching in kindy once it was suggested that I teach English in “integrated ways”, and I was handed a textbook, for teaching children four years old, that contained words about insects such as ‘drone’ and ‘pupa’. Also in the text was the immortal line in English (also for four-year-olds) “the colors of the wings are most luminescent in the mating season”.
If one were to work at a (genuinely, not ) English immersion kindy, would that be legal? I’m assuming you have the proper educare credentials and an open work permit. And what are the proper credentials? My state licensure in TESOL and Mandarin both allow me to teach ELL and Chinese to K3-12. Does that carry over to teaching any preK in Taiwan?
Disclaimer: I don’t actually want to be around snot-runnung, not potty-trained three year olds for the rest of my life, but I have toyed with the idea of trying to teach kindy curriculum strictly in English just to see if I can save a handful of Taiwanese children from the mind numbingly worthlessness of the Taiwanese English classroom. (I’d want to be working with someone who’s credentialed in Montessori or something with 100+ years of evidence of efficacy, but even if I got a Montessori certificate, would I legally be allowed to use that along with an open work permit in an English-only Montessori environment? This is a grey area and the above posted laws don’t really answer that)
The proper credentials were discussed in one of the other threads.
As for your properly bilingual kindergarten, how is it exempt from the ECECA? Under the Act’s regulations (separate document, quoted in the “long answer” post linked to above), foreign language classes are illegal for any kindergarten (no matter how qualified the teachers are). If it’s not registered as a kindergarten but is a de facto kindergarten, it can be deemed an illegal kindergarten and therefore shut down.
If a business is exempt for some reason, great, but which business, and how?
Do you know where this law is? I know people have been saying this for at least a decade, and I’ve just always assumed it’s true, but where is the actual law that says “no English immersion classes at all in Taiwanese kindergartens”
Edit: I’ve dug through all those posts a few times now and there really doesn’t seem to be any specific language against English immersion, only explicit “reading, composition and testing”. What four year old is doing composition? And what qualifies as “reading”?