Taught by Japan’s
real classroom teachers.
Not a tutoring service. Not recorded video lessons. Every teacher has spent years face to face with children in Japan’s elementary and junior high schools — and here, each one becomes a hand-picked homeroom teacher who walks alongside your child.
Meet the teachers, by name.
Our principal and our teachers all appear under their real names. You should know exactly who is with your child every week — this is a school with faces you can see.
Tatsuro Hoshino Founder & CEO, NIJIN Inc.
Founder and CEO of NIJIN Inc. He created the online school NIJIN Academy, which has welcomed more than 1,000 students to date. As a JICA overseas volunteer he spent two years in Guatemala, made 5,000 friends there, and came home fluent in Spanish. His method for making public education “portable” has been recognized with the Prime Minister’s Award of Encouragement and other honors. His dream is to bring about world peace through education.
Nike-sensei Japanese language
Qualifications & experience
Registered Japanese Language Teacher / 4 years teaching Japanese language in junior high school / teaching license in Japanese language for junior and senior high school
A word for parents
I want to add more smiles to children’s days.
Loves traveling, anime / Speaks Japanese
Aotari-sensei English
Qualifications & experience
3 years teaching English in junior high school / teaching license in English for junior and senior high school
A word for parents
Let’s use Japanese to open up your child’s world.
Loves traveling overseas / Speaks Japanese, English
No-chan-sensei Student support
Qualifications & experience
1 year as a school social worker (supporting children of foreign nationality) / 2.5 years living overseas (Africa) / experience teaching Japanese online
A word for parents
More than delivering words, I help hearts grow.
Loves days out, cooking / Speaks Japanese, Swahili, English, Luganda
More teachers are joining all the time. If you’re a teacher who’d like to work with us, visit our careers page.
Only the chosen few take a homeroom.
This isn’t a lecture hall of a hundred children, and it isn’t a faceless video. Because the group is small, a teacher catches the exact moment your child thinks “I did it.”
They came through a very narrow door.
Still in the classroom
These are teachers who face children every day in elementary and junior high schools across Japan. What they bring isn’t textbook knowledge — it’s knowing the moment a child’s heart moves.
About 2% get in
Roughly 2% of applicants are accepted. We take our time looking at character, the ability to hold a real conversation, and how a person sees children. We choose for quality, never for numbers.
Japanese-language specialists
Our team includes Registered Japanese Language Teachers and other qualified specialists. A child starting from zero Japanese is paired with a teacher who can quietly support them along the way.
The learning doesn’t stop once they’re hired. Through Jugyo Terrasu, one of Japan’s largest teacher communities, they keep training — sharpening the ability to talk with children, more than the technique of teaching them.
This is the kind of teacher your child gets.
😊 The character we look for
- ✓Never rushes to the right answer, and values the conversation
- ✓Respects a child’s own initiative, and knows how to wait
- ✓Spots the small “I did it” in every single child
- ✓Never laughs at a mistake — finds it interesting, together
🤝 So this is how we walk alongside
- –Listening comes before teaching
- –We watch how the child is changing, not the score
- –Even after class ends, we greet them by name
*TOMODACHI JAPAN teachers bring the culture of NIJIN Inc. — conversation and warmth first — straight into learning Japanese.
When class ends, there’s still a place to be.
A metaverse campus
There’s a campus your child can drop into long after the lesson is over. Some children come by after school just to see a teacher or catch up with a friend.
Clubs, small talk, lunch together
The relationship doesn’t end at the lesson. Clubs, chatting and eating lunch together are what turn Japanese into a language your child has a reason to use.
Run by a team you can trust
TOMODACHI JAPAN is operated by NIJIN Inc., honored with the Prime Minister’s Award of Encouragement and the Kids Design Award. A school you can trust your child to.
Get to know your child’s teacher.
Register and you’ll be first to receive teacher profiles, the school brochure, opening news and invitations to trial sessions. Find out in detail who could become your child’s homeroom teacher.