About Me

Hello there! I am Teacher Julia, and I love almost everything Japanese. From cuisine, to history, to J-entertainment, I was inspired by this love to pursue learning the language myself and now to hopefully being able to share that love with my students. I am specifically interested with Japanese entertainment, such as music, dramas, and theater; which I engage heavily in through online spaces. My research interests in Japanese linguistics are focused on wakamono kotoba (language of the youth) and am knowledgeable in slang in Japanese. I also have artistic pursuits that I can connect to my language learning, such as fashion and doing nail art. My favorite past time is taking care of my 8 dogs! As a teacher, I would say my strongest point is that I remember all too well what it is like to be a student — so it is my personal philosophy to not be strict at all and cultivate a stress-free learning environment. Even as a person, I am generally very chill about things so I want my students to be chill as well, and have fun learning the Japanese language.

Regarding my accolades, I have a Bachelor’s degree in Linguistics (Japanese) under the University of the Philippines Diliman. I also studied in Kansai University of International Studies as an exchange student. Prior to my undergraduate studies, I also applied to a handful of universities in Japan and got positive admission results from Waseda University and Nagoya University, and have certifications from short courses from Toyo University. I am well-versed in several Japanese language education techniques through my different classes across different highly accredit universities that offer these, because I thoroughly enjoy learning along the way. Because of my relentless pursuit of learning the language, I managed to pass N1 on my first take of any JLPT ever. It was a longstanding goal which I was glad to see through, and hope I can guide my students towards the same path of achieving their goals.

Most of my work and job experience so far has stemmed from teaching, where I started my career as an intern as a speech-language therapist. Here, we act as “teachers” and even call our patients as students, because what we did as treatment and therapy was not much different from how a teacher would conduct lessons. I also worked as a private tutor under a company, where I taught students of all ages from elementary to university students, under almost all subjects except Mathematics. In my university in Japan, I also experienced being a teaching assistant of English to Japanese students, and Japanese to international students. It was a fun experience that taught me, perhaps even more than I have shared with my students. In all instances, I usually handled either a class or individual sessions. Recently, I attended the 40th Philippine Nihongo Teachers’ Forum (PNTF) held by the Japan Foundation in Manila for current and aspiring Japanese educators. There, I had the opportunity to learn from veterans in the field and was able to share my perspective as a student of Japanese as well. As for my other work, I also do freelance translations and subtitling, as well as interpreting to and from Japanese, English, and Filipino.

All in all, despite my entire journey with learning Japanese, I believe I am still very far from concluding it, if I ever will. For me, learning a language is a constant process that requires effort and energy, but most of all, love and passion for learning! I wish to share the same with my students, as I consider myself a student of the language as well. In my classes, we will focus on speaking and using the language in reality, which may not be easily accessible if you do not have people to practice with. I am also still trying to improve my Kanji everyday, so we can learn Kanji together! I believe it is one of the most difficult parts of learning Japanese. Lastly, I really hope to be able to enjoy this journey with my students together without putting too much pressure and creating a chill and fun learning environment where we can all be ourselves free of judgment, as we strive towards a common goal of learning!