During a recent math class at an elementary school in Aichi Prefecture, Kamila Tamy Tida Miyamoto, 31, a Brazilian school assistant, pointed to the textbooks of Aika and Ayumi, second-grade Brazilian students who enrolled this year, as she explained concepts to them in Portuguese.
Currently, 35 non-Japanese students are enrolled at Nisshin Elementary School in Hekinan, Aichi Prefecture, comprising 10 percent of all students. Aika and Ayumi¡¯s class has four other foreign students.
Amid an increase in the number of non-Japanese children living in the Chubu region ¡ª a manufacturing hub where many foreign workers are hired ¡ª the Hekinan Municipal Government in October started dispatching a non-Japanese school assistant to each of the seven elementary schools in the city.
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