Japan’s first school dedicated to the use of sign language is now open in Tokyo and teaching about 40 students. It’s the effort of a nonprofit organization called Bilingual Bicultural Education Center for Deaf Children. Japanese sign language has long been unofficially used by deaf people in
Japan to communicate because the focus has been oral education. Until last year, the education ministry had rejected requests to use of sign language and the BBEC had to ask for donations at fundraisers and over the Internet.
