Cram schools are extremely popular in Taiwan; they are private academies that host tutoring and classes in the afternoons and evenings, after students are dismissed from their regular school. This is especially popular among the urban upper and middle classes, and is seen as necessary to ensure a child will perform well in school and score high on their college entrance exams. The college entrance exam is especially important in Taiwan compared to America, because the score determines what majors (and thus career paths) are available to a high school senior. Admissions are generally much less holistic than in the United States. A major component of cram schools is English classes. This is also seen as very important for getting a high-paying job in Taiwan, or if parents are hoping their children will apply to western universities. As a result, there is a massive market here for English teachers. While foreigners hired by a Taiwanese company in any other field besides teaching may wait months for their work permits, foreigners hired by cram schools can get theirs immediately. The demand is so great that, any native English speaker, even if entirely lacking teaching experience, can be paid a higher salary than what a typical Taiwanese teacher might make. This creates an entire community of young foreign expats who teach English during the day to enjoy a relatively high quality of life in Taiwan.
Sometimes this subculture can perpetuate racism and ethnicism. It's been harder for my American roommate (adopted from China) to find a job, because many families are eager for non-Asian appearing teachers. My Filipino friend with fluent English was told by his boss to lie to the parents at the cram school to say he was from the USA. White privilege exists here too, and I have had more requests to teach, tutor, and even just play with children than I could possibly ever agree to. Taiwanese society extremely values prestigious degrees, evidenced by politicians doing a Masters degree from NTU specifically to enhance their campaign (and sometimes get caught in scandal for plagiarizing their thesis). The ease of obtaining a Taiwanese work permit is highly influenced by how highly ranked the applicant's alma mater is.
Many of my Masters program classmates are part-time English teachers, usually paid under the table. I had the opportunity to experience this life when one of my friends was sick for a week and needed a substitute. I taught kindergartners, 2nd graders, and 5th graders, in classes of 20 students each. After the fact, I learned that it is actually illegal to teach kindergarteners English in Taiwan because of an often ignored law, created out of concern that bilingual education would be detrimental to young children's Chinese. The kindergarteners actually had the best English of all the classes, but they were also the hardest to keep under control. They asked me why Teacher Alexandra's hair was so long and messy. A 2nd grader asked me if I was a boy or a girl, and another asked if I had a baby in my belly. It was interesting that the kids all struggled with sounding out words, because this concept doesn't exist in the logographic Chinese language (just like verb tense and capitalization). When taking a spelling test, if they couldn't remember a word they would simply leave it blank, even if I pleadingly encourage them to guess at just the first letter.
I see this even in my university classmates here--they often leave entire questions blank on exams! Apparently giving your best guess aligns more with American pedagogy. I've also noticed way more group assignments in my Masters classes here, even group essays. Here it is normal that only one person from the group might actually deliver the presentation in front of the class, with other team members being responsible for preparing the slides. Overall, willingness to speak in class is on the floor among Taiwanese university students.
Upon entering the cram schools where I taught English, usually on the second floor of a tall building on a bustling street, everyone takes off their shoes. All the students and teachers then put on house slippers (of course the 2nd graders' slippers were all over the classroom by the end of a board race game). I am so inculcated in the Taiwanese culture of taking off shoes (in schools, offices, temples, cafes, some restaurants, absolutely all homes), that now when I watch American TV I am horrified to see them walking in their own homes in shoes or even sitting on the couch in shoes!
For all of the classes, I also had a Taiwanese co-teacher who was mainly responsible for grading and discipline. Some would not hesitate to yell at or lightly hit the kids to maintain classroom order. Getting bad grades could also precipitate being yelled at by the co-teacher. If I needed help separating the students for a game or activity, I was amazed that the co-teachers would always separate the kids by gender. They would rarely pair boys and girls together. On a separate occasion, my friend's parents had asked me if my own parents weren't worried about me hanging out with boys growing up. They wanted to know if prom, like they saw on American TV shows, was real.