Learning Japanese

The beginning of this week I started my first quarter of Japanese and I was wondering how many people here have learned or know Japanese at least semi-fluently. In four days I have had close to 150 words added to my vocabulary, and yesterday we started writing hirigana. My brain feels like it's going to explode.

 

What are some of the things you have done to learn and retain Japanese quickly? What made it harder or just didn't work?

 

I told Raven last night that it feels like when I'm in class that everyone else has computer brains and only needs to hear the info once and then can get up and have conversations. (Maybe they think the same of me, but I feel like I'm just BS-ing my way through it.) I can say the required words sufficiently enough, but the meaning of those words is completely lacking in my mind. For as much sense as it would make to me, I might as well be pulling out random words from the dictionary and forming them into sentences.

 

Has anyone else had this problem when learning Japanese (or any other foreign language)? How did you finally get past it?

 

~Sister Kyoya

Hey there!

 

I'm glad a fellow member is learning Japanese!

 

I studied Japanese on-and-off for six years now (though still not very good). I'm not taking any classes at the moment but I remember how hard it was in the beginning but once you get the ball rolling - meaning you have your alphabets down (Hiragana and Katakana) - it becomes easier because you're not constantly thinking about how to read but how to understand.

 

I find the easiest ways to remember is using flash cards (This works for vocab, verbs, alphabets, everything!) and review them at any free time. If you don't have that luxury of free time (I study them when I'm on the train. I'm on the train four hours a day, haha...) then at least make them and have them around. Just by writing them, you will remember it better. There are also a lot of Japanese apps to learn on smartphones nowadays if you're interested in having electronic flash cards for Japanese.

 

Another way is to record yourself saying each word and the definition of it. Play it over and over again until it becomes easier to remember. Listen to the Japanese word, pause... think, then reveal the answer to yourself.

 

There is an online learning program (I use for review purposes only) but it's a good program to use to remember vocab and alphabets. http://iknow.jp/ has a free trial or small subscription costs. Try it out and see if you like it!

 

One of the most important ones and I wish I did this more is communicate! Use your knowledge with your fellow classmates! The more you use what you know, the more familiar you will become with it. I'm sure you'll learn a lot from each other, too, as you practice with one another.

 

So here's my short list for you:

- Write, write, write repeatedly!

- Use flash cards

- Find Smartphone Apps

- Record yourself

- iknow.jp

- Communicate!

 

Good luck on your studies! Let me know if you ever need help with anything.

Back in 2009, a friend of mine gave me his copy of the Japanese Rosetta Stone program. I was really wanting to learn it before my trip in 2010 so I had over 11 months to learn as much as possible with it. I had heard great stuff about it and was excited about trying it out.

 

After 2 months of daily sessions on it, I gave up. It was completely maddening and I could not grasp it at all. And it's not like this was something I *had* to do! I seriously WANTED to learn as much as I could about it. But with NO English help in Rosetta ( everything is done in Japanese ) it was almost impossible to figure out how sentence structure was set up and how words were strung together. No matter what I did, I just could not make it work for me. So I dropped it.

 

I'd love to learn it sometime in the future but I'm not sure what system I could use that would make sense to me. More power to anyone who can make something work for them and learn Teh Moonspeak.

 

 

 

Billy

I went to one semester of japanese class with a friend of mine last september. We would usually chat about the stuff we learned in class when we drove to and from school, and would listen to the audio cd that came with our book. I agree with Nekopon, it's best to write it out by hand. I would make myself practice writing the hiragana characters just to make it sink in more. I would do this every day while I was at work, and would read over any notes I had in my textbook. Also practicing to say it out loud with a friend helped a lot too, especially for me as I trip over every other word I say

Sadly, we don't go to Japanese class anymore cause he moved away to a further distance from that school, but luckily I found out my current school offers it. Maybe I should convince him to continue learning it with me ^^

Hmm... I've always wanted to learn and there is a program in University that offers it here. Sadly, my schedule won't permit me to go to classes. I've been consoling myself with some apps. I like the Human Japanese app from Android. They have a free version you can try and if you want to learn more, you can get the full for a small fee. They have a version for the PC too I believe. I haven't had much time to study though since RL always intrudes so my knowledge of the language hasn't grown any better. You might want to give a look though.

 

And I agree with what Nekopon said,

 

So here's my short list for you:

- Write, write, write repeatedly!

- Use flash cards

- Find Smartphone Apps

- Record yourself

- iknow.jp

- Communicate!

 

Like they say practice makes perfect. My brother, who happens to know several languages , read lots of books in the language he was learning, watched TV shows, movies in that language. He also did a lot of workbooks and engaged in lots of conversations. I remember he even went on a month long exchange program where he went to Germany to immerse himself in the language and culture. Now he teaches it in University. So I guess it worked.

 

You probably know this already but watching un-subbed anime, reading untranslated manga and watching japanese news might help a bit. Also, you can try teaching Raven the words you learn so you can both learn while at the same time helping you retain it better.

 

Anyway, best of luck!

I can't say that I have too many tips that haven't all ready been stated, but to keep my skills okay (I'm a bit rusty from not being in classes for three years), I tend to watch unsubbed musicals, read untranslated manga, and play untranslated games.

 

I can't say I have many tips for getting started and getting over the overwhelming feeling from personal experience (I never had problems in language classes), but my friend and brother both use vocabulary flash cards when learning new languages and some easy to follow supplementary books.

I'm not taking any classes at the moment but I remember how hard it was in the beginning but once you get the ball rolling - meaning you have your alphabets down (Hiragana and Katakana) - it becomes easier because you're not constantly thinking about how to read but how to understand.

 

It's good to know that it will get easier. Unlike when I took French in high school, I have Raven here to help me study, but even then it still feels like he (and everyone else) can remember everything so quickly. So far it is really sporadic of what I remember and when, and with the sudden explosion in vocab I feel like my head is spinning.

 

It took me the better part of the week to figure out the best formatting for the flash cards, this is one area where my dyslexia gets frustrating and it has to look just right or it will confuse me like crazy. At least now I have the templates made up in Adobe Illustrator so Raven can use them to make more flash cards when I need them, saving me time I don't have. Along with my books came an 8 CD set so I can hear spoken Japanese outside of class, but even then I have a hard time differentiating one long phrase from another because it wasn't broken into the individual word segments first. An example is: Kore, watashi no meeshi desu. The interpretation of the phrase in the book is "This is my name card." even though I think the more direct translation is: "This, my name card is." Personally I would have much preferred to be taught the second version because with it sounding weird/not following English grammar rules it is actually easier for me to remember (based on what I remember from learning some French.) I would figure it out myself but after a week of Japanese I don't feel like I know enough to do that.

 

On the plus side there was a lot of phrases I recognized (but couldn't remember what they meant) when Raven and I were watching Hanamaru Kindergarten on Crunchyroll yesterday. I love that show, it's so cute!

 

 

There is an online learning program (I use for review purposes only) but it's a good program to use to remember vocab and alphabets. http://iknow.jp/ has a free trial or small subscription costs. Try it out and see if you like it!

 

Thank you for letting me know about this! I had never heard of it but Raven said he had seen a little of it but never poked around with it.

 

One of the most important ones and I wish I did this more is communicate! Use your knowledge with your fellow classmates! The more you use what you know, the more familiar you will become with it. I'm sure you'll learn a lot from each other, too, as you practice with one another.

 

This one I know all too well. Learning French was so much easier when I had someone in class to talk to and I got an A out of my first semester. Second semester she transferred to a second year class and I had no support whatsoever at home and utterly flunked it. So I have been excited but mortally terrified at taking this Japanese class and I told Raven that without the additional help at home, I knew exactly what the outcome would be. At least one of my strongest abilities is to easily hear and mimic the spoken words, even with the r's and l's that aren't really either, the n's that "fall off" before the sound is finished and even the tsu words are getting easier. I just need to get my brain to work so I can attach meanings to the words to not feel like I'm drowning in class, making me feel like this:

 

It was completely maddening and I could not grasp it at all. And it's not like this was something I *had* to do! I seriously WANTED to learn as much as I could about it. But with NO English help in Rosetta ( everything is done in Japanese ) it was almost impossible to figure out how sentence structure was set up and how words were strung together. No matter what I did, I just could not make it work for me.

 

That is exactly how I have felt this last week. At least we start out with Romaji as a segue into everything else, but having many entire phrases thrown at me with no explanation as to what makes up the structure of it, I can't seem to get my mind around it. One of the biggest reasons I wanted to take the class was I knew that learning on my own wasn't something I could do because I'm the kind of person who needs the why's explained. And as for spoken Japanese, it gets even more complicated as Miko Sensee said yesterday. So much of the conversation seems to be context sensitive, and without the context the person could be entirely misunderstood. Take kami for example. If I ask for a kami, do I want a piece of paper or a god? In English, certain parts of words are emphasized but it's not like that in Japanese. Instead words are spoken with lower and higher pitches. Kami (paper) starts with a lower pitch (the underlined part) and goes to a higher one. Kami (god) starts on a higher pitch and moves to a lower one. Another example we were given was hashi (chopstick) and hashi (bridge).

 

I like the book, workbook, and CDs I had to get for class, but I think they might be hard to use without the additional stuff from a teacher. I definitely looked into the Rosetta Stone software and it seemed better for someone needed extensive review only after they had the basics.

 

One thing I do find very funny is there is a guy in class named Billy, and I can't help grinning every time I hear Miko Sensee say "Bee Lee" during roll call. That's one thing I think is awesome is that she was born and raised in Japan but still has a strong accent even though she's probably in her 40s. I couldn't help grinning like a Cheshire cat when we were pronouncing random words in class and Yuki came up.

 

I told Raven that it would be awesome if they took Love Plus and made the girls teach Japanese step by step. I thought it would be funny if a wrong answer was given and the girls would pout. It sure would make learning a lot more fun with a real goal of getting the girl and learning at the same time. I still think they need a version with guys though...

 

I would make myself practice writing the hiragana characters just to make it sink in more.

 

We had to buy a special tablet for writing the Japanese characters on and use it most days in class. It is one of the parts I enjoy the most because I feel like I'm just doodling. Miko Sensee said that a lot of people use transcribing or copying the letters as a form of meditation and I can understand why!

 

I hope you have luck getting your friend to take the class with you again! It's really nice to know I'm not the only one who is or has worked on learning Japanese on the forums.

 

I like the Human Japanese app from Android. They have a free version you can try and if you want to learn more, you can get the full for a small fee. They have a version for the PC too I believe.

 

Raven pointed out that we have the PC version already and he has been using it off and on for a few months. After looking at the site I discovered that I can type in the Romaji and it will tell me what it is, giving me a tool to dissect the long phrases into understandable chunks. the only issue is the difference in Romaji spellings that are in my book and what my teacher uses compared to what the program uses. Sensee vs. Sensei or Doo itashimashite vs. Dou itashimashite but it's not too much to work around. LMAO! The 'bleeps' are i-ta-shi-ma-shi-te. Miko Sensee said if we can't pronounce it to just mumble "Don't stare at my mustache" because it sounds similar.

 

I think the apps would be great, but we don't have any devices that could use them.

 

You probably know this already but watching un-subbed anime, reading untranslated manga and watching japanese news might help a bit. Also, you can try teaching Raven the words you learn so you can both learn while at the same time helping you retain it better.

 

Anyway, best of luck!

 

I need to remember to finish watching Tiger & Bunny, the Japanese voice actors are totally hilarious! At the moment it feels like Raven is teaching me more than I'm teaching him... Although I scribble notes like crazy in class so I can tell him after school. I'll be so happy once I learn more written Japanese I have a chance to get my Kiyoteru Vocaloid to sing in his native language, although I doubt I'll attempt Country Roads again. Eventually I hope to reward myself with the Tokimeki Memorial games once I learn enough. Nothin' like some motivation.

 

I can't say I have many tips for getting started and getting over the overwhelming feeling from personal experience (I never had problems in language classes), but my friend and brother both use vocabulary flash cards when learning new languages and some easy to follow supplementary books.

 

The flash cards definitely help but personally I still have to connect them with pictures in my head. A little while ago I figured out how to differentiate between Denki (light), O-genki (health), and O-tenki (weather). All I have to do is to mentally turn the D in my head to think of a cover over a ceiling light, make a silly spelling change from ginko biloba to genki biloba, and remember that rain falling on a metal roof makes tinking sounds. Drawing silly doodles on the cards helps too. It's really slow going doing it this way, but I don't know how else to make things stick.

 

I really appreciate everyone's suggestions, having more resources to rely on make my schoolwork a much less daunting task. I want to do as well as I can on this especially since it is a two year course. I drives me batty knowing that there are a lot of DD sites, and even the Volks and Parabox sites that I can't read for myself, not to mention the books and other publications! I even have a bunch of normal sized sewing patterns saved on my hard drive that are completely in Japanese!

 

I can post my vocab list for the week if anyone is interested.

 

~Sister Kyoya

I've always wanted to, but found it pretty hard to do on my own. I wish I had the option for classes xD

 

Flash cards for hiragana really do help though. For me reading in a different language has always been the key for me to understand. I don't know why but if i can't read it, I'll never be able to speak it.

 

Also I hate that English speaks backwards from the rest of the world. It killed me when I was learning Spanish and is murder on me trying to learn Japanese.

No matter what I did, I just could not make it work for me. So I dropped it.

 

It's not you. It's Rosetta Stone. It's actually not very good. University of Maryland actually did a study on it, and people just didn't learn the language very well with it. Almost everyone in the study ended up dropping it in the end because they didn't feel like they were learning much and like it was taking up too much of their time.

 

My Japanese is quite terrible. But I live in Japan now, all Japanese neighbors and none speak English so... I'm forced into learning it.

I've been self-learning Japanese for 2 years now and I can say without a shadow of a doubt that Rosetta Stone bad at teaching you Japanese. However...It's not made to teach you Japanese. It's made to simulate immersion and increase your comprehension. When you look at it that way it's actually pretty good.

 

I would recommend that you not waste money on watered down hand-holding programs like Textfugu or rather short programs like Human Japanese and go for meatier, more serious resources like Tae Kim's Guide to Japanese Grammar or Japanese Lingualift.

 

Stay away from Textfugu altogether, actually. It's 50% fluff, 30% pictures and 20% content. It's absolutely not worth 120 dollars...and it's barely even worth the monthly charge.

 

iKnow is great for learning your kana but they are pretty pricey...but that's what you pay for a well made, pretty website. If you can stomach rote memorization (You need to be able to anyways if you ever want to learn kanji) you should check out realkana.

 

The number one thing that I can tell you: Do not....I repeat...DO NOT try to equate things to English parts of speech. If you do that you'll just end up curled up in the fetal position crying. Just learn Japanese...not how to speak English through a Japanese muzzle. I cannot tell you how many people I've seen freaking out over whether or not a certain word was a verb or a noun or the difference between tenses or something. It doesn't matter. Just like when you're speaking your first language, you don't need to think about those things unless you are trying to write a textbook or taking a test. (Even the JLPT doesn't talk about parts of speech. lol)

 

While you do vocab it definitely helps to picture the things in your head but you'll be doing yourself a disservice if you think like this: "ok...”土曜日”...Saturday!" Instead just picture the week's calendar in your head and think of where "Saturday" is in the week. Basically don't "think the answer" in english. "think it" in images. (You may notice that this is kind of what Rosetta Stone does.)

 

When you get to kanji try not to get overwhelmed. It's easy! Mnemonics and pictures and all that really just complicate the process and make you memorize more than you would normally need to. The notions that it's "Hard for westerners to learn" and that "Pure memorization via SRS* is a bad method" are really just complete lies made up by people trying to sell their own "NEW, EASY AMAZING KANJI METHOD". It's not exciting by any means...but it's not hard either. iKnow.jp has a decent method and a little farther down the road once you are confident with your kana and common particles you should check out readthekanji.com.

 

While on the topic of kanji I'll dispel a little myth about flashcards and SRS systems. You don't need to "learn" kanji. You just memorize them. There's nothing to learn about a symbol. Many people are a little confused by memorization. They often say "How can I learn if I don't know it!?" which...when analyzed a little make no sense whatsoever lol. A kana or kanji is simply a fact. There's no critical thinking needed. You're not trying to re-invent the wheel via kana. You're not trying to get to the moon with a kanji. Just look at it and guess. If you get it wrong...oh well. In a self study situation you're not being graded on anything. Getting things wrong is fine as long as you make an effort to remember the correct answer and maybe spend a little more time trying to recall it the next time that kanji comes up.

 

Lastly, getting used to the language takes time but it's not as hard as you think. Once you've learned enough particles and vocab it's as easy as watching TV. But never, ever, ever watch anime and pick up speech patterns from it. Unless of course you want to speak like a child.

 

I apologize for that text wall and for my tendency to ramble...but I hope this helps the OP or anyone else learning Japanese. I have no experience in a classroom setting but tons of experience in Self-Study...so this is definitely information skewed towards the self-study student.

 

If anyone has any questions about resources, methodology or grammar concepts feel free to ask me. I'm not fluent by any means but I have passed JLPT N4 and N3 and I have 2300 Kanji in my repertoire. I love talking about learning Japanese so I'm always willing to share opinions and help!

 

* SRS = Space Repetition System/Software

Here are a few thoughts that may be helpful:

 

*I'm not sure what textbook your class is using, but pick up a copy of Japanese The Spoken Language by Noda (Yale Press) if you're using something else. You can use or ignore the lessons themselves; the real gold in here is the detailed and technical grammar explanations (in English) that will help you understand Japanese grammar innately after a while. You have the vocab and basic sentences from class, so now you need the "why" to go with them. Here it is.

 

*Pick a romaji system that mirrors the Japanese writing system (which you will eventually learn). That is, long e is almost always ei, and long o is almost always ou. So, you have a sensei but never a sensee, and you may make an offer with douzo but never doozo. If you use the latter spellings, you'll only confuse yourself when you start writing in Japanese. (Why? The hiragana is どうぞ {do-u-zo} and not どおぞ {do-o-zo}. It also helps differentiate words that really are two o's like おおきい {o-o-ki-i} so that you don't misspell them with an ou.)

 

*Also pick a romaji system that makes it easier to get Japanese pronunciation down pat. I don't know about you, but for me it's harder to properly read "zitensya" and "husigi" that it is "jitensha" and "fushigi". Some textbooks are insistent on using the former because it "fits the pattern" of the Japanese syllabary better (e.g. there's a row of h-mora, so it must be ha-hi-hu-he-ho, not fu). It results in some awfully awkward-looking words, so I'd suggest you politely ignore it to make life easier for yourself...

 

*Install the free Windows Japanese IME if you haven't already done so, so you can type in Japanese for websites. Install the Firefox Rikaichan extension for when you're reading a webpage and need quick kanji lookups. There's also the wwwjdic online dictionary for when you don't have Firefox or can't install Rikaichan on a public computer. These tools will help you use the JP web.

 

There are other things that could be said, like incorporating the language into your day by listening to Japanese music and movies, but that's true for learning any language. Good luck! I'm sure you'll have a blast.

Many, many months (and two quarters of Japanese) have passed since my original post, giving me some hindsight on how I learn Japanese.

 

I kinda hate to admit it, but the sheer confusion, dread, and panic that was apparent in that first post kept up and only increased the longer I took the classes. Miko Senesei is a wonderful lady, but her class honestly would be best for someone who has already learned Japanese and just needs a very intense review. Unlike what I originally thought, it was only a one year course, not two. By the middle of the second quarter, our class was heavily into grammar and sentence structure and hardly any of the students knew what was going on. (My friend who stuck it out for the last quarter said no one understood better even then.) Through another class I was taking at the time, I realized that to do the required homework and study that Miko Sensei required everyday, I would have to study an additional 8 hours to get the bare minimum done (this does not include the other two classes I was taking that needed another 8-9 hours of studying/work).

 

It should be no surprise that all this stress would come back to bite me. Once the quarter was over and finals were done, I ended up having the worst emotional breakdown in about 15 years (and why I completely disappeared from the forums.) Three and a half months later I'm slowly able to start picking up Japanese again.

 

I'm really pleased that I can now appreciate how much I was able to learn and retain, but it was really hard seeing how quickly I was loosing my katakana (we never had much time to make it stick before being pushed into kanji). The dominating unsaid rule seemed to be "Don't ask why, just do/learn." I can totally understand that's how Japanese learn and many people can learn languages that way, but I'm just not one of those people.

 

After rereading the comments and suggestions posted earlier, I found it interesting that many people in this thread might have done well in Miko Sensei's class. She teaches based on auditory comprehension, while I'm a severely visual learner. Miko Sensei always praised my handwriting but couldn't understand why I was struggling so hard with connecting the words, meanings, and multiple pronunciations. Basically I simply did not have the luxury of taking the time I needed to connect the pictures with everything so I can remember them quickly and accurately. I'm still trying to figure out how to make sense of the kanji that have a ton of on or kun readings...

 

The ones that I could make picture associations with I still remember really well. (Just for the fun of it, here are a few examples, but please forgive me if they aren't perfect)

 

ですね。 roughly means 'isn't it?' I drew a goofy horse neighing at some apples (apples are things, and horses are interested in apples)

ですか。 roughly means 'aren't you?' drew some crows cawing at a guy on a park bench who wondered what the noise was all about (crows caw, and are interested in people)

 

おおきい　[large, big] doodle of an oak tree saying "Hi, I'm Oakie!" (because oak trees can get really big)

 

ひろい　[wide, spacious] a hero sized room (this was because the flash card game that we played in class had a picture of a big open room to represent this word so I figured it belonged to a super hero )

せまい　[narrow, not spacious] a semi truck is narrow

 

ゆうめい　[famous] Just from the sound of this word all I had to do was fill in the rest "You may... have my autograph" the picture of a fan asking a famous person for an autograph also pops up in my mind.

 

Sure a lot of this is silly and isn't the quickest way to learn a language, but as Raven reminded me earlier, there is more than one way to go about it. The worst way to learn a language is by not doing it at all (in my opinion.) Now that I'm not in classes any more, I have the chance to learn Japanese with Raven, something that the pace of the class didn't allow.

 

The more I figure out to learn Japanese on my own, the more I'm a bit boggled at how my Japanese textbook is organized... or not as the case may be. It's like a crash course of stuffing Japanese conversational phrases and grammar down your throat before you hardly have a vocab to work from. Earlier today I found a really good site that sorts kanji based on the level it is learned at, finally giving me a way to learn kanji that makes sense! I tried to compare it to the kanji in my textbook and workbook, and the book has kanji taken from all over the place simply based around what is taught in the chapter. Looking at it again, out of the first 50 kanji we were supposed to learn, half of them just seem like random ones taken from levels 1-3, despite the fact that level 1 has over 80 kanji. I also noticed that the workbook doesn't specify what ones are the on and kun readings, unlike most of the websites I've found... Trying to make sense of this book is maddening.

 

 

Now I finally know how to write Tamayuki's name in kanji! I don't think Dolly would appreciate being called kun, but that's why I'm not telling him. Tama will probably call him that anyway because it sounds so cute.

 

I've figured out that I need a really fun reason to learn Japanese, but also a way to do it on my own. Sure there is a lot of books out there to do that, but normally they aren't fun. When it comes to learning a language my brain can be pretty lazy. If I can copy and paste it on the computer into Google Translate, I often do (and yes it turns out badly.) So my solution to counteract that arrived in the mail a couple of days ago. I know a lot of people suggested learning (somewhat) from anime, and I have tried that and was left more boggled than anything.

 

Of course I had to start with Tokimeki Memorial Girls Side First Love (dating sim that is parodied in Ouran High School Host Club as Tokidoki Memorial ) since it was to be my reward for completing Japanese. Even though that wasn't the case, it really was a perfect choice. The entire instruction manual has furigana for all of the kanji, finally giving me a small bridge in figuring out kanji that isn't in my text book. I can play the game and get a feel for it even though I rarely know what's being said, but I can still start over and work through translating it. (This does have it's down sides, like accidentally deleting the one save I managed to do. ) Raven and I both got subscriptions to manga magazines that interest us that we can work on translating like workbook assignments, making the whole thing really fun. Even earlier today I realized that I finally have the means to translate the cooking directions for a microwave taiyaki maker we bought a couple of years ago.

 

If you already know hirigana and katakana but have no idea how to figure out the kanji meanings (if there is no furigana), here are the two sites I've found recently. They are immensely helpful!

 

http://jisho.org/kanji/radicals/ If you can figure out the parts of the kanji, this really helps find the word it means just by sight. (The numbers refer to how many strokes) Once you pull up the info page for any given kanji, it also has the printed and handwritten version of the kanji (hover the cursor over the large pic of the kanji) as well as showing the stroke order (the red dot is where the individual stroke starts), on and kun reading, and a bunch of other stuff.

 

http://jisho.org/words/ This is great if you know the hirigana, katakana, or English word (so much more helpful than Google Translate! ) but are looking for the kanji or simply the meaning.

 

http://quickkanji.com/index.html Here is the site that has the kanji sortable in quite a few ways. Personally at the moment the 'levels' makes the most sense to me since I hardly know any kanji.

 

Even though this has been an excessively long-winded post, I hope this offers more resources to those wanting to find their own way to learn Japanese.

 

~Sister Kyoya

Wow! That sounds like a crazy experience. I hope you are emotionally recovering.

I'm sorry you're class was such a poor experience There are lots of learning methods out there that might suit you better. If you like visual associations, mnemonics might be a great way for you to learn. There's a book called Remembering the Kanji (http://www.amazon.com/Remembering-Kanji-Complete-Japanese-Characters/dp/4889960759) that teaches the meanings of over 2000 kanji through mnemonics and story making. You break down the kanji into the basic components and master them that way, instead of just hammering them into your head. Here's a review site that supplements the book, and there's a discussion forum there too where people talk about other learning methods. http://kanji.koohii.com/

 

I used that book years ago, and it helped a lot! I also spent way too much time on those forums ^__^;;

 

 

Here's an excellent grammar guide that will teach you most of what you need to know http://www.guidetojapanese.org/learn/grammar

 

Here are two good flash card programs, Anki and Mnemosyne. You can make your own cards, and the program will schedule when to review them most efficiently. Mnemosyne has an easier layout, but Anki has many options and you can download sets of cards for it. You can use it for anything--words, kanji, even whole sentences

http://ankisrs.net/

http://mnemosyne-proj.org/

 

I'll stop here, I could probably go on forever about learning Japanese It was a major part of my life for years, but I had to put a cap on it to focus on university and then I swapped my Japanese study hobby for my art hobbies including BJDs. Feel free to message me if you wanna talk about Japanese though!

Wow, this thread is turning out to be very helpful! I've been considering biting the bullet and trying to learn a bit of Japanese recently, if only to be able to navigate dolly things easier. The problem is, I really want to improve my Chinese again first! While it might be interesting to learn both at the same time, I know from experience that doing so causes troublesome mixes when you're trying to speak one. Waah, everyone in kendo looked at me funny when I accidentally mixed Chinese with Japanese, for instance, and I won't start on the bad looks I got from my Chinese teacher when it happened the other way, although the Japanese teacher thought it was funny. Until I mixed Chinese with Japanese in her culture class, that is. And it all goes downhill from there when middle school French and high school Spanish start to creep in there as well! Waaaah!

But still, I want to learn both at the same time. I think I would have better luck with Japanese though, considering all the resources I have to help me learn it, compared to Chinese. But I hope I can adapt some of these resources toward remembering Chinese characters! I think that is one area where learning both might be a bit helpful.

My major in college was in Japanese—I lived abroad in Japan for a year and still keep in touch with my friends and family over there. I would consider myself semi-lingual, at least to the point where I can interview for professional jobs in Japanese.

 

I'm sorry to hear about your experience with your Japanese class! That sounds like it was going too fast for a lot of the learners; which is unfortunate, because easing into a new language is important.

 

As far as stuff to help, Midori is a great dictionary app for the iPhone/iPad and such; you can save words that you want to remember later on, and it has digital flashcards for all the JLPT levels!

 

Also, Tadashii Kanji Kakitori Kun for the DS if you have it. I used this in college to help my writing/reading, and it really helps you memorize hiragana/katakana/kanji!

 

The other thing I'd suggest is getting involved in a conversation group (if they have them in your area). It's a great way to meet new people and get awesome colloquial knowledge from people. You might want to ask around even if folks will converse with you online in Japanese.

 

Good luck! It's a really, really rewarding language.

i'm not fluent in Japanese but i find it hard to study for long periods of time if i'm not engaged in a "fun" way like Kyoya.

 

what helped me learn the casual and limited Japanese i have is pretty much the following:

 

Playing online games in Japanese-only language

 

I have a Japanese 3DS (NOTE: the 3DS is region locked but the original DS is not. so if you have a DS, you can just buy Japanese games and they will work - i know from experience. the original PSP is also not region locked; i own Japanese games for my US-purchased PSP)...anyway, I buy games aimed at children or preteens/teenagers for it. These games usually have a kana translation of any uncommon (or even very common) kanji accompanying the kanji. This way, as soon as you can read kana, you can begin to associate it with kanji.

 

Also, my hobby of researching and searching for sometimes fairly obscure Japanese dolls / figures / GKs / etc has resulted in helping me to learn kana and certain kanji.

 

Listening to, even if you don't watch it, Japanese TV shows or anime is helpful. Sometimes I have it playing in the background while I do other tasks.

 

to be honest though, my grammar and ability to choose the right particles and tenses for words and phrases is incredibly weak. this is where textbooks are unfortunately really essential. if you can't pay attention to a textbook, download an audiobook and listen to it. audiobook quality varies so you may want to pirate some different books to sample them and find one you like before spending actual money on one.

 

also, you will learn kana and kanji faster if you do repetitive writing or typing exercises daily rather than just repeatedly reading it or looking at flashcards, even if those methods help to some extent. likewise, vocal exercises of speaking it will improve your ability to formulate sentences faster than if you study only by listening.

 

sorry if some or most of this was already mentioned, i only skimmed the thread. usually when i have something that i want to be clearly translated into Japanese, i ask my friend who is fluent (he used to live in Japan), but i obviously don't want to rely on him or bother him every time i want to say or read something in Japanese. it would be nice to be fluent one day but i'm far from it. however, the above has certainly helped me so far.

 

good luck Kyoya, and everyone else with an interest!

Even though class was super crazy fast, I still really loved it when I could understand what was going on. It is a lot harder learning on my own because life just gets in the way, but I also feel like I have to be student and teacher all at once. I don't have much problem reading Hiragana and Katakana (there are a few I keep forgetting or confusing) but I know I often get very confused when the verbs change forms, and knowing when one word stops and the next one starts. The grammar seemed to be what we were just zooming through, and I have enough trouble with English grammar! I know I can learn it, but I'm having so much trouble going back and figuring out how to learn it slowly and well.

 

Not being able to go onto the third quarter makes me feel like I missed a huge chunk of how to learn and understand kanji. We were never taught how to think about the Japanese language, and I simply cannot learn something without comprehension because I won't remember. I know I need to go and learn the individual kanji, but I don't understand how to increase my vocabulary after that. With many of the kanji having many meanings and pronunciations, I really have no idea when what one is used and where. This was even an issue for me when I was taking the class.

 

A couple of days ago my first manga magazine subscription arrived. I was really shocked that it is 1 1/4" thick! I'm really glad to have a reason to work on my Japanese that I can work through section by section, but it's also really overwhelming. I've already looked through the whole thing and I find it interesting that it's not all printed in black like the translated mangas I have. I really did try to read through a lot of it because I can see how it is structured and work on my hirigana and katakana. I found that I can't read without saying what I'm reading so it works on my visual and auditory recognition. I actually found that really cool. The disheartening part for me is when there are chunks of conversation that are almost purely kanji except for the particles or the different verb endings. I think for me it really clashes with my dyslexia and throws my mind into minor chaos. I can see the kanji, I could even draw it, but I feel like I have no way of comprehending it. When this happens, it really reminds me of being in 5th grade and having to teach myself how to understand complex sentences. Sure I could read all the words no problem but I couldn't tell anyone what it was all about after I read it. If there was a comma thrown in, my mind would drop the first concept as it moved onto the second instead of joining the two. I'm sure it's pretty shocking to hear that for how much I write on the forums, and I fully admit that I overly abuse commas.

 

Is it a reasonable way to learn if I do my best to translate one of the manga chapters, take the individual kanji and other words and make them into flashcards? I'm just trying to find a small way to work on my Japanese as I also still try to get past the panic that still pops up when I think about studying. My thinking was that if I can take it out of the manga context and just learn it. That way I have a very high chance of being able to sit and read the chapter through and feel like I have accomplished something.

 

Yukamina- Thanks for the links! The Anki flashcard program should be really great once I can figure out how to use it right.

 

~Sister Kyoya

I have a Japanese 3DS (NOTE: the 3DS is region locked but the original DS is not. so if you have a DS, you can just buy Japanese games and they will work - i know from experience. the original PSP is also not region locked; i own Japanese games for my US-purchased PSP)...anyway, I buy games aimed at children or preteens/teenagers for it. These games usually have a kana translation of any uncommon (or even very common) kanji accompanying the kanji. This way, as soon as you can read kana, you can begin to associate it with kanji.

 

Woops, I didn't see that you wrote something before I posted.

 

Both Raven and I have original DS and I was so happy that Tokimeki Memorial Girls Side works on it just fine! The down side of it though is trying to decipher kanji when it is about 8 pixels high... There was one I never could figure out and because of that I had no idea what the person was saying.

 

I know I can learn through flashcards and often I enjoy the game of it. Yet I can't express how aggravating it is to me as an American, not knowing where to find the books, online games, online study tools, that are designed for grade school kids. I don't want to have to study like a grownup if I can learn it the same way that Japanese grade schoolers do. I like the cute pictures and all that sort of stuff that makes it uber fun, being older just means that I can learn it faster.

 

Another benefit of the manga magazine I wasn't expecting is how many different fonts and styles of handwriting are in there. It forces me to analyze what I'm looking at before I know what it is (some of the handwriting is bad) so in the long run it is easier to identify.

 

~Sister Kyoya

Is it a reasonable way to learn if I do my best to translate one of the manga chapters, take the individual kanji and other words and make them into flashcards?

 

i actually had some private tuition in beginner's Japanese for a while (i didn't mention this in my first post because it was several years ago now, and i was pretty much forced to stop because my health was so bad that i couldn't commit to taking lessons any more- so my Japanese has not progressed much at all since then), but i thought i'd bring this up now since my teacher would often make me translate 4koma manga panels as a practice exercise!

 

she was a very good teacher which is quite rare (private teacher does not equate to good teacher, and expensive group classes do not always equate to having good teachers either).

 

i've also been in a few group-classes when i was 19 or 20, and i learned slower and it was much harder to concentrate than being taught 1-on-1 was.

private tuition is more expensive, so i understand if that's not an option for you from that perspective, but for people like us who have minds that don't really respond so well to conventional or "adult" study, i think that we can potentially get more out of having private study lessons than going to group classes.

 

when it's just you and the teacher, as long as you don't have a person who is a bad teacher, you can ask them to go at the pace you are comfortable with or to tailor the lesson around things that will engage you.

i never actually asked my teacher to do this - she just asked me what my hobbies and interests were the first time i met her and, since she would make me talk about them in Japanese with her, realized that if something caught my interest it was easier for me to use it as a study aid. so she always tried to cater as much of the session as possible to something that would engage me and then tie in "adult text book" necessities when it was literally necessary that i know them because there is no way to cirbleepvent certain essentials of the language that you must know.

 

so, it's completely legitimate, but like i mentioned, you must still understand Japanese grammar and learn the correct tenses and use of particles as well as arbitrary things like formal and informal forms of speech, plus there are certain language mistakes that are considered to be huge social faux pas, and just like in english, you can say 1 phrase in multiple different ways to implicate different meanings.

 

even if you can read "fluently", you will not be able to write, speak, or understand fluently unless you also understand these things. obviously i can't do this beyond a beginner level (i'm trying), but you should be aware of how important it is.

 

on another note, i don't know if you noticed in the magazines (yes, they're crazy thick!) but if you ordered magazines aimed at a young enough audience, you'll see that in published manga aimed at young readers they usually have the same system that all my handheld games do: almost 100% of Kanji printed has a small "Kana" reading next to it. my friend i mentioned in my post above let me borrow his tankoubon of Yotsuba&! and i was able to read it thanks to this despite knowing very few Kanji.

 

by the way, my friend is fluent for nearly a decade now, and although he studied intensely hard in conformist ways (plus living in Japan forced him to learn due to being culturally immersed), he also would use the methods of consuming material aimed at children to supplement it (which is where i got the idea to play games for kids from).

 

Both Raven and I have original DS and I was so happy that Tokimeki Memorial Girls Side works on it just fine! The down side of it though is trying to decipher kanji when it is about 8 pixels high... There was one I never could figure out and because of that I had no idea what the person was saying.

 

if you can take a clear photo of any Kanji in the game you want a translation of (preferably in the context of the whole phrase or sentence!), i can ask my friend a favor to see if he'll translate it. he's very busy most of the time, so it would be "whenever i get the next chance to talk to him or hang out IRL" that i could ask him about it. i personally don't want to bother him every single time i need something translated or checked, but he's never turned me down when i do ask it since, well, we're long-time friends. so i don't mind if you'd really like to know.

 

also, if you learn the correct stroke order of Kanji (this is kind of like a grammar rule - most kanji are written in a specific order and certain number of strokes), sometimes you can search for the meaning of it on the web even if you can't copy and paste the character, simply by copying it (by writing it) in the correct stroke order:

 

http://kanji.sljfaq.org/

 

edit: there's alsohttp://www.sp.cis.iwate-u.ac.jp/icampus/u/edictionary.html

 

without learning stroke order the above URL may not be helpful but i'll provide it anyway!

 

i also really recommend the (English-language-released) DS game called "My Japanese Coach". it allows you to choose what level you learn at and how much Romaji, Kanji and Kana you view, and almost all of the learning exercises are done in the forms of games that require use of the DS stylus.

 

they have a lot of "minigames" that require you to write or copy Kana and Kanji in the correct stroke order, and learning stroke order seems very tedious but it's actually considered really important when learning to write Japanese.

 

Yet I can't express how aggravating it is to me as an American, not knowing where to find the books, online games, online study tools, that are designed for grade school kids. I don't want to have to study like a grownup if I can learn it the same way that Japanese grade schoolers do. I like the cute pictures and all that sort of stuff that makes it uber fun, being older just means that I can learn it faster.

 

i can either PM you or post here with a comprehensive list of all the "aimed at children" manga, TV, games, etc that i think might be helpful.

 

i have a renewed interest in improving my Japanese lately, so i also was going to ask my fluent-friend for his recommendations next time i talk to him. if you'd like it, i'm happy to try and gather all the resources i can find (or already know of but didn't mention by name) and share them since i might be doing this for myself anyway.

I want to learn it too. I wish you luck.

you must still understand Japanese grammar and learn the correct tenses and use of particles as well as arbitrary things like formal and informal forms of speech, plus there are certain language mistakes that are considered to be huge social faux pas, and just like in english, you can say 1 phrase in multiple different ways to implicate different meanings.

 

My frustration about the grammar is two fold. I still have a decent amount of trouble when it comes to English grammar, and Raven is forever having to correct my tenses in my novel/stories I write. I dunno, it just seems like my brain is weird in that way and just turns the info into a knot of spaghetti. I know I can learn it and that it is majorly important, but I am abysmally slow at remembering it well. The other issue was that Miko Sensei wanted us to get it down pat in two weeks and know it perfectly, but even in class other students were trying to have her understand that it didn't make sense. She is very much a 'just learn, don't ask' type teacher and most of her class always wanted to know why. It isn't students being lazy, it is just very conflicting learning styles. For me it might take me a good solid month with many hours of review to get it all sorted out and straight in my mind. That's always my biggest problem. For me to learn something and for me to feel like I know it solidly, it takes so much more time than it seems to for most people.

 

on another note, i don't know if you noticed in the magazines (yes, they're crazy thick!) but if you ordered magazines aimed at a young enough audience, you'll see that in published manga aimed at young readers they usually have the same system that all my handheld games do: almost 100% of Kanji printed has a small "Kana" reading next to it. my friend i mentioned in my post above let me borrow his tankoubon of Yotsuba&! and i was able to read it thanks to this despite knowing very few Kanji.

 

Part of the problem is I don't know how to find the stuff with consistent Furigana with it. Since I found the sites to help me bridge the gap when it comes to Kanji I just need to buckle down and work through translating some of the manga I like in the magazine. Having them arriving every month as well as getting an 'order in preparation' email from JList about two weeks before it gets here is a very consistent reminder to get my butt in gear.

 

also, if you learn the correct stroke order of Kanji (this is kind of like a grammar rule - most kanji are written in a specific order and certain number of strokes)

 

Learning the stroke order is one of the reasons why I find writing to be so darn fun. It's like a game in my head, like my pencil is learning to dance across the page.

 

i also really recommend the (English-language-released) DS game called "My Japanese Coach".

 

I keep forgetting that we have that game... When I tried to use it as I was taking my class, it was hard not to get bored with it because it was starting with things that I knew exceedingly well already at that point. Even some of the numbers drove me crazy because we had already covered what they were in Kanji but the game had them written out in Hirigana (if I remember right).

 

Yet I can't express how aggravating it is to me as an American, not knowing where to find the books, online games, online study tools, that are designed for grade school kids. I don't want to have to study like a grownup if I can learn it the same way that Japanese grade schoolers do. I like the cute pictures and all that sort of stuff that makes it uber fun, being older just means that I can learn it faster.

 

i can either PM you or post here with a comprehensive list of all the "aimed at children" manga, TV, games, etc that i think might be helpful.

 

If you still feel like doing this, I think it would be great if you posted any links you could find in the thread so other people could have easy access to them too.

 

Reading all this makes me nervous... I'm taking Japanese in high school and we've only begun using 'bow' phrases and starting to write our names katakana. What if the teaching style isn't for me? I really don't want to opt out, that's only the few highlights of my day!

 

So much of it really depends on the teacher. Unfortunately not all teachers are created equal, nor are students. I have to say that I have tons of social anxieties and being dyslexic doesn't improve the ease of it for me either. Those two things have always majorly impacted my ability to learn foreign languages in a classroom setting, where you are expected to speak it in front of strangers and manage to do it without stuttering or being so terrified that no one can hear you... and then you have to repeat yourself.

 

I think it is really great that you have a chance to learn Japanese in high school. I'd say some of the biggest things is to practice, practice, practice! I know, I know, everybody hates hearing that but if it's something you love it will still be fun! Use your written and spoken vocab whenever you can. Personally I'd use the greeting and other similar phrases with your friends and family (even if they think it is a bit strange.) Who cares what they think because it's an important part of your education. I was one of the weirdos in high school so even when I did normal things they were seen as weird, like dating the guy I'm married to. (I even had some popular girl pull me aside in a bathroom once because she couldn't wrap her little mind around the fact that the fat girl was dating the 'scary hairy' guy! When I told her that he was a teddy bear, she looked utterly horrified! In short, high schoolers can be royally stupid.) If Japanese is something that you could continue and enjoy through the rest of your life, don't take it for granted. You have the chance to learn it now, giving you all the more time to learn it.

 

One of the things that Miko Sensei shared with us was a free Japanese learning site www.erin.ne.jp where you can choose your native language to learn it in. She had suggested it as supplementary learning, but I still have no idea when she expected us to do that... Anyway, it's definitely a great resource because they have all sorts of ways to learn or start learning Japanese. In the "Develop Vocabulary' section they also have the pronunciations of the words. Personally I was a bit boggled at how identical locker and corridor/hallway sounded. I know with time that my audio comprehension will improve, but at the moment I can barely tell the difference. For those who register (it's free) don't forget to click on the "special download" button by your avatar to download a PDF with Hirigana and Katakana charts that also have pictures and example words with them. The down side being that there is no Romaji pronunciation for those who don't even have the basics down. If anyone is interested in one, I could write it up really easily.

 

The only small down side for me is that there isn't flashcards, and that's where I always have to start. I admit I have been slacking quite a bit in the last few months and still haven't done it and it's driving me crazy. Looking at the Erin site has really helped me remember that getting started at it again isn't as horrifying as going back to class. I still think about a lot of the time being able to send a letter to Miko Sensei someday all in Japanese to thank her. I may not deal with the classroom format well, but she is still a lovely lady and very caring. Even something as simple as that often is an easy reminder why I find that learning Japanese is important to me. Despite the fact that I listen to Japanese music much of the time, Raven and I watch subbed anime almost every day, I have my manga magazine arriving every month that I still want to understand, my DS dating sim that I'm guessing I'm doing ok at, and I try to read any Japanese that I can (Vocaloid dobleepentation, microwave taiyaki maker instructions & recipes, candy boxes, etc.) I feel like I'm still struggling because I don't have my flashcards to do speed reviews with it so I can learn when I'm wrong. It felt really great reading through the sample words on the Erin Kana charts and realizing that I remembered more than I was afraid that I did.

 

Here's a YouTube video that has a lot of great suggestions for learning on your own.

 

I was also looking up videos on how to actually use Anki. It's a great program but even Raven was having a horrible time making sense of the 'user manual'. Whoever wrote it doesn't know how not to bog basic steps down with all the advanced options you also have available. Durn programmers. I am still determined to make my flashcards with it, and if they are decent enough I'd be happy to share them here (downloading, installing, and using the program is easy. It's just making the cards that's somewhat boggling.)

 

~Sister Kyoya

If you want some real life flash cards and don't mind spending a little money for them, I've heard great things about these that White Rabbit sells. I'm thinking of picking up the Kana set myself, soon.

If you want some real life flash cards and don't mind spending a little money for them, I've heard great things about these that White Rabbit sells. I'm thinking of picking up the Kana set myself, soon.

 

I actually own the kana flashcards and I have to say they are really nice. I like the amount of vocab I'm learning.

I have a smart phone app that helped me soo much when i was memorizing the alphabet. It has a lot of cool features on it and there is also a free version of the app. But the verision that I have I believe cost $8.99. It was a little expensive but it really help me> I think it was called Human Japanese...