We developed a new variational method for tensor-optimized antisymmetrized molecular dynamics (TOAMD) for nuclei. In TOAMD, the correlation functions for the tensor force and the short-range repulsion are introduced and used in the power series form of the wave function, which is different from the Jastrow method. Here, nucleon pairs are correlated in multi-steps with different forms, while they are correlated only once including all pairs in the Jastrow correlation method. Each correlation function in every term is independently optimized in the variation of total energy in TOAMD. For $s$-shell nuclei using the nucleon-nucleon interaction, the energies in TOAMD are better than those in the variational Monte Carlo method with the Jastrow correlation function. This means that the power series expansion using the correlation functions in TOAMD describes the nuclei better than the Jastrow correlation method.