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Learning Japanese • 日本語の勉強 |これはOTです| ゆっくりしていいぞ！
- Thread starter Resilient
- Start date
What did you use for studying? Thanks in advance.
Also congrats to Zero for passing the N1. \o/
Honestly, i started reading manga i couldn't get in english/portuguese... after three years studying on intermediate to advanced levels, you'll be probably failing on fluency so you need to fix that up
There are some japanese podcasts you can try too, i used ひいきびいき on Podbean, which talks about several subjects in a beginner friendly way... they even had an episode on overwatch!
How's everybody doing? After not doing much for some time, except for Anki of course, I have started reading some manga! I tried some light novels first, but I couldn't quite get into them. So I'm alternating between One Piece and Detective Conan. It's taking me about 15 minutes per chapter, I'd say, and, though it might not be surprising, I'm finding Conan to be a lot easier to read. It's probably because it has less contractions/slang and more kanji.
This podcast has some casual language andinteresting themes including gaming, restaurants, daily lives, technology, a lot of stuff
I'm still working through WaniKani, Bunpro, and a little Duolingo. I'm on level 6 of WaniKani and progress still feels pretty good. I'd really like to try to read some simple manga or children's stories to challenge myself though, and start to get more familiar with grammar and sentence structure. I saw お早よう and really enjoyed it. I found I could actually pick out lots of the dialogue (I was still using English subtitles so my brain might've been cheating). I should push myself to practice listening too since I find my brain quickly gets better at parsing the sentences, and the listening questions in Duolingo are always my favorite.
There's an absolute beginners book club on the WaniKani forums, which you could join.
We're reading one page a day.
The new book has just started on Feb. 1st, so you still can catch up easily.
oh that's pretty cool. I see the books are 小学生2年 level, is that kanji or is it all hirigana?
It has Kanji and for Kanji above the level there are Furigana.
EDIT: There also are more advanced book clubs:
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どうも。That's exactly what I was thinking of.
Is there easy phrase to say that in Japanese? I just searched around on jisho.org and ドンピシャ looked fitting.
EDIT: I talked to someone taking Japanese as an elective in university and he was recommending trying to include writing with studying. Are most people in this thread doing writing too? I could see it helping a lot with remembering but it'd add a lot of extra work to what I'm doing currently.
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I guess I'll do an update.
Level 54 in wanikani now, while the fast level speed is ok, the massive reviews are an exercise in perseverance when they clock in at an inconvenient time. I'm traveling this weekend, and my friends better understand that when the new level hits on Sat night, I'm locking myself in whatever room I'm in and focus for two hours.
Learning the kanji the day before the new level hits helps a lot. Before I leave on this trip I'm going to learn the vocabulary early too just in case.
Recently got Yakuza 7. Found out it was a bit too hard still to be on that level. If only they let you press a button to continue the conversations rather than auto timed it would make all the difference, speed reading it is hard. I'm going to shelve this for another day.
Tried playing Yokai 4 again. Every time I replay the first hour, it feels easier to understand. It wasn't hard at all to understand a lot of it and it wasn't a struggle.
I'm debating on getting animal crossing on the switch when it comes out. I have the game on the phone in japanese and it just doesn't grab me, even for practice. I'm just deadly bored.
Plan is to finish WK by the end of this month, and then go through Bunpro while having more time to read and play things in japanese. WK has been so intense in study/reviews that I haven't had time to do much of anything else.
Level 54 in wanikani now, while the fast level speed is ok, the massive reviews are an exercise in perseverance when they clock in at an inconvenient time. I'm traveling this weekend, and my friends better understand that when the new level hits on Sat night, I'm locking myself in whatever room I'm in and focus for two hours.
Learning the kanji the day before the new level hits helps a lot. Before I leave on this trip I'm going to learn the vocabulary early too just in case.
Recently got Yakuza 7. Found out it was a bit too hard still to be on that level. If only they let you press a button to continue the conversations rather than auto timed it would make all the difference, speed reading it is hard. I'm going to shelve this for another day.
Tried playing Yokai 4 again. Every time I replay the first hour, it feels easier to understand. It wasn't hard at all to understand a lot of it and it wasn't a struggle.
I'm debating on getting animal crossing on the switch when it comes out. I have the game on the phone in japanese and it just doesn't grab me, even for practice. I'm just deadly bored.
Plan is to finish WK by the end of this month, and then go through Bunpro while having more time to read and play things in japanese. WK has been so intense in study/reviews that I haven't had time to do much of anything else.
メルシー
Got two one-shots to translate for Akata by the end of march, and I'm meeting the head of IMHO later this month who should have something for me as well. They're both small so the money isn't that great compared to what I did for Casterman but hey, gotta start somewhere...
I have a couple of random questions from Conan.
The first one is: 「お化けや妖怪は、TVや漫画だけにして欲しいね…」. This sentence comes right after the character says something along the lines of "It makes no sense to believe in monsters/ghosts in this day and age". I don't understand why there's ほしい there at the end.
The second one comes from example from this sentence: 「僕は、一応 … 人数分の懐中電灯と、」. I have seen 一応 used like this a few times, am I right in thinking of it as an interjection, something like a "let's see" in English? In this case I guess it could be more literally seen as "briefly", though there's been some other sentences where that translation didn't seem to fit particularly well.
The first one is: 「お化けや妖怪は、TVや漫画だけにして欲しいね…」. This sentence comes right after the character says something along the lines of "It makes no sense to believe in monsters/ghosts in this day and age". I don't understand why there's ほしい there at the end.
The second one comes from example from this sentence: 「僕は、一応 … 人数分の懐中電灯と、」. I have seen 一応 used like this a few times, am I right in thinking of it as an interjection, something like a "let's see" in English? In this case I guess it could be more literally seen as "briefly", though there's been some other sentences where that translation didn't seem to fit particularly well.
I just got to level 3 on WaniKani and I feel like I might be close to hitting a wall. In itself things went fine, about 7 days per level which seems to be a okayish number from what I gather, but I'm at a point where many Guru comes back for review and I fail most of them ( except Radical but I guess everyone find radical to be the easiest part to learn/remember ).
On one hand I'm tempted to use the Self-study quiz feature on Flaming Durtles set to guru ( and/or use kaniwani ) as a way to better remember those kanji & vocab, but on the other hand I fear I'll simply get the review right on Wanikani just because I was "lucky" and had it in a quiz on flaming durtles the same day or the day before, which I feel kind of kill the actual purpose of Wanikani / SRS.
Any advise ?
On one hand I'm tempted to use the Self-study quiz feature on Flaming Durtles set to guru ( and/or use kaniwani ) as a way to better remember those kanji & vocab, but on the other hand I fear I'll simply get the review right on Wanikani just because I was "lucky" and had it in a quiz on flaming durtles the same day or the day before, which I feel kind of kill the actual purpose of Wanikani / SRS.
Any advise ?
1) The てほしい is to indicate one's wish. Literally "I want monsters and ghosts to stay in TV shows and manga [where they belong]"
2) 一応 can be tricky, but tbh in most cases it's not a big deal to just ignore it.
In this case 'let's see" can work i.e. "Let's see... I've got torchlights for everyone".
If you look at the strict definition in Japanese : 十分といえないが、最低限の条件は満たしているさま。
They also say that it's close to とりあえず.
Basically, in your sentence it implies that some more material would be welcome, but hey, at least they've got flashlights.
Thanks! I have been kind of ignoring 一応 in these cases so far, but I figured I should ask. I still don't think translating ほしい as "want" works in this context; it feels like it should be more "monsters and ghosts should stay in TV/manga [and not in real life]", which I guess is close enough.
Can you post the sentence before that one? Maybe that'll shed some light.
Sure, here it is:
Thanks. Think of it the way Kurita phrased it in brackets. It's something like "Leave monsters to the TV, where they belong". The thing with てほしい is that it expresses a wish/want for someone else to do it. As in, scientists, fiction writers, TV producers, etc. The whole nuance of the sentence could be summed up this way, I feel: "I just wish they'd stop with this nonsense and kept it for fiction instead" (again, Kurita's "where they belong" is very good).
てほしい can have this implied nuance of "I'm fed up with this", or "gimme a break" sometimes. It certainly feels that way here.
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Sorry for the dp, I just wanted to share this nice contraction reference on WK which I thought could be useful.
I wouldn't worry too much about stuff staying in Guru too long. I'm only level 7 but I find it's pretty common, especially for special case vocab or rendaku'd vocab, to get it to Guru to just later get it knocked down again. That's part of the spaced repetition where eventually it'll start to stick. I don't think it's completely wrong to study outside WaniKani either but it can throw off the system. Something getting to Guru when it didn't really merit it shouldn't be too much of a problem though since it could quickly get knocked down again.
I gotta say, it feels pretty good getting the first few enlightened kanji. There were also some tricky vocab that I wasn't sure I was remembering right that I got to Master. I need to practice speaking more though. Whenever I tell someone that I've been studying Japanese they want to know what I can say. Duolingo is some help for that.
私はりんごです。
So is there a technique to improve your speaking skills if you don't have a partner to practice with?
Something similar to.....shadowboxing :P?
Something similar to.....shadowboxing :P?
Listening to radio/watching talk shows (so basically, non-scripted stuff) is a great way to pick up the flow and oral quirks of the language.
My speaking skills dramatically improved this way.
They posted a message today saying they just released a beta update that fixes Google Images searching. So I guess it's normal that it doesn't work with your version if you use the last official version.
Status update. I posted in this thread like, I don't know, a year ago? I'll try to be more active in the future.
Anyway, I've been at it since October 2018, but that was with a four or so month break last summer, so realistically I've been studying actively for about a year. My life is such that I have a reasonable amount of free time to spend as I like, so I can get in a solid hour or two every day, maybe three or four on the weekends, plus I have plenty of little breaks to do SRS stuff during my day job which probably adds up to another four or five hours a week. 20-25 hours a week sounds about right. I started down the traditional route and went through both Genki books, supplementing with NHK Easy News and the Ask Graded Readers (up to and including all the N4 level ones). More recently, I've been doing WaniKani (level 22 at the moment and desperate to get off the SRS train but I'm riding this one to the last stop) and working through Tobira, plus listening to the Pimmsleur lessons on my commute to shore up what I learned from Genki and to get in a little listening and speaking practice. I made it through the first couple of chapters of Tobira fairly breezily (vocabulary being the major stumbling block), but lately I've found myself completely burned out on textbooks so I'm stuck in chapter 8. So instead I started reading よつばと! and have been doing a chapter a day. Again, the vocabulary keeps kicking my ass, but I seem to have the grammar down fairly well so even if I have to look up words, there's a reasonable flow to my reading. And eight chapters in, I can already feel the increase in momentum from having seen the most used vocab a bunch of times. I got all 14 volumes on my Tokyo trip a couple of months ago plus 10 volumes each of Slam Dunk and Bakuman, so I'm not about to run out of reading material anytime soon.
The thing that I'm struggling with most right now is listening (and by extension, speaking). I can make out the individual words just fine and have a reasonable feel for the flow of a Japanese conversation, but 1) I keep finding my vocabulary severely lacking, and 2) after a sentence goes on for nine or ten words, I'm done and it can take a couple of sentences before I get back into it. It's more than a little frustrating, but hey, I've been studying for a year. Reading will definitely help with the vocabulary problem. I'm not going to add more SRS to my study routine because that sort of rote memorization just bores me to tears (which is why I try to get most of my WaniKani reviews done during work: fight boring with boring). As for listening, I can only hope that with time and plenty of input, my brain at some point stops shutting off if the sentence isn't all neat and tidy like in a textbook. I've been looking into visual novels with full voice acting, but haven't really found one that suits my tastes enough for me to trudge through it. Maybe Steins;Gate, but it seems so full of very specific vocabulary that it wouldn't be very effective for me right now. I've also started favoring Japanese movies and TV shows (and anime) when I'm watching something just for pleasure. I still watch that stuff with English subtitles, but I've found myself picking up a fair bit through the audio. It's not exactly active listening, but I'm sure it can't hurt. It's how I learned much of my English early on, after all.
As for my goals, short term I want to start transitioning to playing Japanese games in Japanese. Animal Crossing is the one I'm really looking forward to, given how often the previous entries have been recommended as good starter games for Japanese learners. Longer term, I'm aiming to take the N2 test in December. N3 would be more realistic but I like a challenge, and honestly, N2 doesn't seem that far off so long as I can find the discipline to finish Tobira and start working on N2 grammar by the summer. Listening and vocabulary will be the bigger stumbling blocks. And the fact that I hate taking tests. But hey, pass or fail, at least I'll know where I stand, and what areas to focus on next.
Anyway, I've been at it since October 2018, but that was with a four or so month break last summer, so realistically I've been studying actively for about a year. My life is such that I have a reasonable amount of free time to spend as I like, so I can get in a solid hour or two every day, maybe three or four on the weekends, plus I have plenty of little breaks to do SRS stuff during my day job which probably adds up to another four or five hours a week. 20-25 hours a week sounds about right. I started down the traditional route and went through both Genki books, supplementing with NHK Easy News and the Ask Graded Readers (up to and including all the N4 level ones). More recently, I've been doing WaniKani (level 22 at the moment and desperate to get off the SRS train but I'm riding this one to the last stop) and working through Tobira, plus listening to the Pimmsleur lessons on my commute to shore up what I learned from Genki and to get in a little listening and speaking practice. I made it through the first couple of chapters of Tobira fairly breezily (vocabulary being the major stumbling block), but lately I've found myself completely burned out on textbooks so I'm stuck in chapter 8. So instead I started reading よつばと! and have been doing a chapter a day. Again, the vocabulary keeps kicking my ass, but I seem to have the grammar down fairly well so even if I have to look up words, there's a reasonable flow to my reading. And eight chapters in, I can already feel the increase in momentum from having seen the most used vocab a bunch of times. I got all 14 volumes on my Tokyo trip a couple of months ago plus 10 volumes each of Slam Dunk and Bakuman, so I'm not about to run out of reading material anytime soon.
The thing that I'm struggling with most right now is listening (and by extension, speaking). I can make out the individual words just fine and have a reasonable feel for the flow of a Japanese conversation, but 1) I keep finding my vocabulary severely lacking, and 2) after a sentence goes on for nine or ten words, I'm done and it can take a couple of sentences before I get back into it. It's more than a little frustrating, but hey, I've been studying for a year. Reading will definitely help with the vocabulary problem. I'm not going to add more SRS to my study routine because that sort of rote memorization just bores me to tears (which is why I try to get most of my WaniKani reviews done during work: fight boring with boring). As for listening, I can only hope that with time and plenty of input, my brain at some point stops shutting off if the sentence isn't all neat and tidy like in a textbook. I've been looking into visual novels with full voice acting, but haven't really found one that suits my tastes enough for me to trudge through it. Maybe Steins;Gate, but it seems so full of very specific vocabulary that it wouldn't be very effective for me right now. I've also started favoring Japanese movies and TV shows (and anime) when I'm watching something just for pleasure. I still watch that stuff with English subtitles, but I've found myself picking up a fair bit through the audio. It's not exactly active listening, but I'm sure it can't hurt. It's how I learned much of my English early on, after all.
As for my goals, short term I want to start transitioning to playing Japanese games in Japanese. Animal Crossing is the one I'm really looking forward to, given how often the previous entries have been recommended as good starter games for Japanese learners. Longer term, I'm aiming to take the N2 test in December. N3 would be more realistic but I like a challenge, and honestly, N2 doesn't seem that far off so long as I can find the discipline to finish Tobira and start working on N2 grammar by the summer. Listening and vocabulary will be the bigger stumbling blocks. And the fact that I hate taking tests. But hey, pass or fail, at least I'll know where I stand, and what areas to focus on next.
Can anyone give me tips/training/advice/studying regimens for kanji? I'm finding that as I go through Genki, my ability to fully "memorize" kanji is limited by my (lack of) consistent studying habits and methods. This is especially tricky for me when it comes to not only being able to recognize kanji, but being able to recall and then write them (and is this even necessary?). I briefly thought that the Heisig method might be the way to go, and maybe it still is, but it seems more logical to me not to skip the actual meaning of the kanji since I'm already several chapters into Genki 1. If anyone has any arguments to the contrary, I'd be happy to hear them.
Side note: I've just started using WaniKani but I can't really judge its effectiveness due to the time limitations embedded in the service.
Side note: I've just started using WaniKani but I can't really judge its effectiveness due to the time limitations embedded in the service.
only thing that worked for me were manga without furigana and lots of writin/reading... Kanji is a matter of frequency and use once you get past N4 level
Yeah I love bunpro, it's been my primary source of grammar study (using the links to more extensive texts for each grammar point for more nuance) but the Android app is janky. When you get the review session going it's fine but I often find I have to go into a menu and back out to get it to update the numbers properly, etc.
It's definitely had that "early access" feel where almost every time I log in I get pleasantly surprised by a bunch of really nice additions and QOL improvements. Worth getting in on the discounted $30/y price, if you think an SRS system is good for you.
The WaniKani app used to work really well, it also supported most major userscripts.
I started using WaniKani and I'm finding it really helpful. Does it generally have a decent reputation?
I'm a little confused about #6 below in terms of how it breaks down dramatically. I get the "borrows the textbook" bit, but the "tomodachi ni" at the top is throwing me off.
Also, when adding "Kara" to the end of sentence, do you maintain the verb tense established in the preceding sentence?
I'm a little confused about #6 below in terms of how it breaks down dramatically. I get the "borrows the textbook" bit, but the "tomodachi ni" at the top is throwing me off.
Also, when adding "Kara" to the end of sentence, do you maintain the verb tense established in the preceding sentence?
友だちに教科書を借りました
I'm still really new but I'd read that as "I borrowed a textbook from a friend". に is a loaded particle, and I'd usually think it would mean in/at, but it can also mean by/from. Since there's no は indicating the subject I assume it's the speaker. Someone please correct me if I'm wrong though, I'm still really new with grammar, and vocab,... and all of it. :D
I had a friend mention that it helps thinking of Japanese like Yoda talks. Does anyone actually read that as "From a friend, borrowed a textbook, I did"?
I guess my assumption that you'd just say "tomodachi no textbook" to indicate that, no?