Kobe Bilingual School

KOBILS stands for Kobe Bilingual School and reflects our desire to create an English school that encourages English/Japanese bilingualism among children in Japan. We provide courses for Japanese children who are growing up in Japan and whose parents have a wish for them to be bilingual, for returnees who have lived in an English speaking country and are returning to Japan, for graduates of other international schools, and for mixed race and native English speakers. While the majority of courses are immersion English courses, we also provide Japanese classes in our full-time courses and for native English speakers who want to improve their Japanese. Our programs cater to children and young people from age 0-18.

In addition to promoting bilingualism, we also encourage children to enjoy learning. If children enjoy learning, believe they are good at it, and know how to do it, they will become successful lifetime learners. KOBILS helps your child make maximum progress by providing courses at their level regardless of their age, and encouraging progress, self-assessment and goal setting. That’s why we say at KOBILS, children can enjoy “lots of learning, lots of fun”.

We want KOBILS children to be SKILL-ful. KOBILS fosters the qualities of Strength, Kindness, Inquisitiveness and Independence, and Lifelong Learning. By focussing on these qualities, we believe children become ready for all that life throws at them. Children and teachers work together to make positive learning goals and think about the steps they need to take to achieve those goals. Children are encouraged to ask why and to want to gain more knowledge throughout their lives, whilst always being considerate of those around them.

This is Kobe Bilingual School’s mission: to help children develop as useful members of society who are proud of themselves because they are meeting their full potentials. As a kindergarten and afterschool program we have been doing this since 2008. From April 2017 we are extending our kindergarten program at Aza-Takamaru, Tarumi, Kobe to offer a full-time bilingual education to children from ages 3 – 12 with the opening of our new elementary school in Momoyamadai, Tarumi, Kobe.

The majority of time is spent in English immersion as this is the minority language in Japan; however the school also uses the Japanese Kokugo program at the same grade level as children would use at Japanese shougakko, and schedules important cross-curricular discussion time in Japanese too.

KOBILS also offers a Japanese as a second language curriculum for visiting international students, so these children can continue their learning in English as they would in a regular international school, but also make the most of the opportunity to learn Japanese and about local customs while they are staying in Japan.

KOBILS offers a hybrid of a local and an international education, taking Scotland’s Curriculum for Excellence (CfE), blending elements of Japan’s curriculum (especially in Kokugo, social studies and ethics), with awareness of the US, Australian, English and Finnish curricular to make a very specific KOBILS curriculum for local and international children.