Rosetta stone.

[Hyan]

So you're saying you failed at the class? Just because that method doesn't work for you doesn't make it an ineffective method. And no furigana isn't just limited to kids. It is not a burden either, that method worked extremely well for me and others.

I can't imagine trying to learn it without associating it to anything (ie meanings)

I was the best of my class because I had some prior knowledge but that doesn't mean crap.

The method works but is, like was said, inefficient and ancient. But when people don't know of anything better, they'll just keep hitting their head at the wall.

Heisig's method is extremely simple. You attach a familiar (ie. English) meaning to a kanji, which may or may not be similar to one of the possible meanings the kanji may have in Japanese (that's not important). You start from the simpliest kanji and create stories for them that match the meaning given to it (by creating images in your mind that help you recall the letter later) Each new kanji is formed of previously introduced kanji, which make up the 'story' for it. That way it doesn't matter if the kanji takes 20 strokes to write or five- it's just as easy to learn. You don't mix up kanjis with similar writing styles, because you Recognize each line, each dot in it.

And when you can Recognize the 3000 kanji, at that point you don't even need to learn kun/omyomi. You study vocabulary like you would study for any language with alphabet. You don't need romaji, you attach a spelling/meaning to the kanjis you recognize and thats it, you know the word. Over time it becomes even easier because you can already guess the spelling based on the previous compounds you've learnt. You can actually read Japanese on the interwebs and translate compounds you don't recognize using firefox add-ons, fast and simple. You turn the word into a flash card, put it in your deck and never forget it again.

And how hard is this? I did it for 2 months this Spring and learned to recognize 1100 kanjis. First 5 minutes per kanji, later 2 minutes, made no difference. 70% success rate for new cards, 90% for mature cards. All 1100 of them. An hour a day, 20-25 new kanjis.

It's so easy it's laughable what some people go through to learn them. After few months of preparations, studying Japanese is like studying any Western language (with a different grammar structure). Internet has made studying the language so easy it feels like cheating.

[altwight]

Well I have a friend who can practically read/write JP and can speak about 50% of it.

With those books would it be difficult to learn on my own? Of course I can ask my buddy for help every now and then.

Edit: By not too distant future I mean 1-2 years. (Speaking in a long term generalization)

[Tyche]

I was the best of my class because I had some prior knowledge but that doesn't mean crap.

The method works but is, like was said, inefficient and ancient. But when people don't know of anything better, they'll just keep hitting their head at the wall.

Heisig's method is extremely simple. You attach a familiar (ie. English) meaning to a kanji, which may or may not be similar to one of the possible meanings the kanji may have in Japanese (that's not important). You start from the simpliest kanji and create stories for them that match the meaning given to it (by creating images in your mind that help you recall the letter later) Each new kanji is formed of previously introduced kanji, which make up the 'story' for it. That way it doesn't matter if the kanji takes 20 strokes to write or five- it's just as easy to learn. You don't mix up kanjis with similar writing styles, because you Recognize each line, each dot in it.

And when you can Recognize the 3000 kanji, at that point you don't even need to learn kun/omyomi. You study vocabulary like you would study for any language with alphabet. You don't need romaji, you attach a spelling/meaning to the kanjis you recognize and thats it, you know the word. Over time it becomes even easier because you can already guess the spelling based on the previous compounds you've learnt. You can actually read Japanese on the interwebs and translate compounds you don't recognize using firefox add-ons, fast and simple. You turn the word into a flash card, put it in your deck and never forget it again.

And how hard is this? I did it for 2 months this Spring and learned to recognize 1100 kanjis. First 5 minutes per kanji, later 2 minutes, made no difference. 70% success rate for new cards, 90% for mature cards. All 1100 of them. An hour a day, 20-25 new kanjis.

It's so easy it's laughable what some people go through to learn them. After few months of preparations, studying Japanese is like studying any Western language (with a different grammar structure). Internet has made studying the language so easy it feels like cheating.

Sounds more like a bastardized method of loci.

[Sylvrdragon]

It makes sense to me. It sounds similar to the method they teach people to memorize lists; you make a story out of it. Something about the human brain remembers stories better than just straight data or algorithms etc.

[Ksandra]

ITT: there is only one method that can be effective for all people.


If that was better for you hyan then more power to you, that doesn't make the other method ineffective.


I memorized Kanji as their meanings too, but didn't have to deal with any story stuff. I also didn't really mix them up, there's a method to kanji, and once you learn the method then it's simple to notice the patterns.

I'm not saying that way is bad btw, I'm just saying it's silly to bash one method just because you prefer another.

[Kerberoz]

It's best to use multiple methods and sources to learn a language. Combine RS (mostly just for vocabulary) with traditional English-->___ textbooks, books written in that language, and movies/TV/spoken interaction, if possible.

[Teorem]

When I took Japanese my freshman and sophomore years of college, we were also using the Yookoso! books. I still keep the textbook (it was the first edition, a few years old when I took the class), but I'm honestly not convinced it was *that* amazing of a text. Lately, I've been looking into other textbooks (a sibling of mine is expressing interest in learning the language) including the Genki series which seems to be a little better received. Japan Times is publishing a new edition of Genki in September, and I'm hoping it's a worthwhile buy.

Classes were a great tool for helping set the foundation of the language because they forced you, on a regular basis to devote time (for me, 9AM every day for the entire semester plus labs) to the content and get exposure working with the other students and the native-speaker instructor, even if it was in a more sterile classroom setting with more-or-less canned dialogues to practice. It's certainly possible to do this on your own, but most people are too lazy; having your grade at stake for the class was good motivation to at least make a regular effort.

You absolutely do get *plenty* of practice with writing and reading in a classroom setting, assuming your instructor cares in any way. I have plenty of graded (down) worksheets where my instructors would meticulously correct my strokes and point out inconsistencies. They were quite strict on proper written form, which is feedback you're not as likely to get on your own.

That said, I've also played with other resources and they're valuable in their own ways. Pimsleur was a good jumpstart for conversation, and I'm hoping the Heisig series is worth it (if I ever actually get through it all). I was considering picking up Anki and looking for the Japanese language packs but haven't gotten around to it; lately I've been playing with Heisig's RTK iPhone app and the JSENSEI app instead. I haven't done enough reading yet to see how good the quality of the Anki flashcard packs were in general (and whether they were going to cost even more on top of the application's cost), although I do like that it's content-agnostic and could be used for other things besides Japanese or language acquisition altogether.

[miokomioko]

I'm all about subtitled films featuring modern casual conversation (no old samurai flicks).

[Hyan]

ITT: there is only one method that can be effective for all people.

If that was better for you hyan then more power to you, that doesn't make the other method ineffective.


I memorized Kanji as their meanings too, but didn't have to deal with any story stuff. I also didn't really mix them up, there's a method to kanji, and once you learn the method then it's simple to notice the patterns.

I'm not saying that way is bad btw, I'm just saying it's silly to bash one method just because you prefer another.

I'm bashing it because it's worse. That's all.

Yes, you can learn using it, so it's better than nothing.

To the OP here's my advice. Get this book:

http://www.ramenfanatic.com/wp-conte...i-1-heisig.jpg

Bookmark this website: forum.koohii.com (their stories are much better than some of Heisig's examples).

Download Anki (google it), download Heisig's deck, go through it every day.

While studying to recognize the kanji (to give you an edge later on) introduce yourself to the grammar (google tae kim's guide to grammar). Take it easy though- the basics are hard to grasp, but once you do, the rest is easy.

After going through the first book (2000 kanjis) download vocabulary decks. At some point (as early as possible) it'd be a good idea to start reading native material. It's tough but it'll be regardless of how much you try to prepare yourself. Multiple methods like Kerb suggested. It'll be hard to produce the language even if you understand it so yeah, classes can help with that.

[Darus Grey]

Anki + heisig's method for kanji + tae kim's guide to japanese (grammar) is absolutely fantastic combo. It's hard to not learn using them.

Best advice in the thread imho, anytime I've taught JPonry this is the exact method I used. Also well not all methods are best for everyone, Heisig's method is the most consistently effective for most people.

There used to me a time when we actually taught students how to properly use mnemonics to study and retain information. Now a days people act like it's fucking magic. Shit worked for thousands of years and it still works today.

[Hyan]

Best advice in the thread imho, anytime I've taught JPonry this is the exact method I used. Also well not all methods are best for everyone, Heisig's method is the most consistently effective for most people.
.

Yeah, what I'm saying is "if this doesn't work, Then try something else". The odds are it does work.

[Silenka]

If you want to learn 2 year's worth of Japanese and travel there and speak properly you pretty much need to take classes - with native speakers teaching, if possible. Textbooks and CD programs will teach you words, they will NOT teach you fluency and cultural appropriateness in mannerism, and in most cases, word. Japanese, as a language, hinges on levels of politeness in speech and knowing when to use which level. Books are, in my experience, TERRIBLE at teaching this aspect, which is absolutely crucial for learning the language properly and not behaving like a stupid foreigner. The layers of subtlety in the language and how you will be expected, as a foreigner, to act in Japan (vs how you SHOULD act in Japan) are things that should not be underestimated and really can't properly be conveyed through books.

I tried teaching myself for years when I became interested in the language when I was 13. This failed miserably, because even though I was really interested, I didn't have anyone to correct my mistakes and tell me what the appropriate usage was for many words and phrases. Japanese grammar gets quite complicated in some aspects, not having a teacher to smooth over those aspects is just asking to learn it wrong. Writing, I will say, is fine to learn by yourself, as hiragana/katakana takes repetition, and kanji is just reading/writing it over and over again as well. There are many books and resources that might be good for that. I would advise to start learning writing asap, but for speaking, definitely take classes.

Although, sometimes classes can be a crapshoot as well, so it's important, if you're going to invest the time and money into them, to make sure they are worth taking. The classes I took at community college before moving on to Ohio State were awful. The teacher was not very good at teaching, he was constantly subverted by the weaboos in the class, and overall I didn't learn much - what I learned didn't stick well, either. It was only after moving to OSU's Japanese program that I found out how little I really learned. Here we are taught by native speakers using the Japanese: The Spoken Language/The Written Language books. At first I thought these books were awful (they teach writing too slowly and in a haphazard fashion, imo, and the spoken book has a stupid form of romanization, aka not Hepburn), but over time I grew to realize that they are very effective at teaching, much moreso than the other textbooks I had used (especially Genki, which is horribly cluttered and all but ignores politeness levels).

Really, I have gone through all three stages - teaching myself (bad idea with this language), going to cheap classes (better, but still awful, will depend on the programs you have available to you though), and taking university level classes, which honestly is the closest to immersion you can get without going there if you're taught by native speakers who are truly interested in and good at teaching. If you're lucky enough that there are good community Japanese classes near you (or ambitious/well-off enough that you can take some at a college), by all means take them if you are serious about learning the language well enough to be taken remotely seriously in Japan. Otherwise, I wouldn't even bother.

The #1 book I would recommend for aiding anyone in Japanese is this one by Jay Rubin. It's a fantastic book that can really help smooth over the more difficult/obscure points of Japanese if other explanations aren't working for you, such as usage of wa/ga and transitive/intransitive. It's quite funny too.

[Ksandra]

Silenka makes a good point. when I took classes it was at a university. In the two years I had two teachers both who were native speakers. I guess the way Uconn does it (or did it, since that was about 10 years ago), is they got international students to teach a lot of the language classes.

Both my teachers were graduate students here to get linguistic degrees. So they weren't even like "japanese born but been her for 30 years". Both were really excellent about making sure we had a lot of conversations with native speakers. There was a small group of japanese international students, and every month we met up with them at the student union (per class requirement) and talked with them for a few hours. Haha, our class was small so my first year teacher was shocked when she learned most of us had never had any japanese food (Connecticut didn't exactly have a huge asian population, when I left I only knew of 1 japanese restaurant and it was expensive as fuck, might be different now). So everyone came to my apartment one weekend and our teacher made us a bunch of food hahaha.

No way in hell would I have had my speaking fluency I did (my vocab sucks now from lack of practice, I know how to form the sentences still I just don't remember most of the words ; if I tried on my own.

That's with any language. If you want to speak, you really really should put yourself into a position where you can talk with native speakers.



[edit] on a random note, a few years later I happened across my second year teacher who was still at school. I guess he didn't want to leave America so kept finding ways to keep taking classes 'cause he couldn't get a work visa or something. He said he was probably going to hid out when his student visa expired lol.

I wonder what ever happened to him...

[Viq]

My school, University of Ulsan (울산대학교), has a program similar to what Ksandra described with her Japanese teachers. I am involved in a program where the school pays me enough to cover tuition, dorms fees and a little pocket money in exchange for teaching conversational English classes. The deal remains available as long as I am a student here. At least three nights a week I go out with my students, and outside of class they are all super enthusiastic about being my Korean tutors. In essence the school is paying me to study here, gives me about a dozen free tutors a semester, and expects me to do little more than chat with college kids for 6 hours a week in English. If Ksandra's teacher had anything similar to this going, I don't blame him for not wanting to leave.

[Necronus]

I'm bashing it because it's worse. That's all.

Yes, you can learn using it, so it's better than nothing.

To the OP here's my advice. Get this book:

http://www.ramenfanatic.com/wp-conte...i-1-heisig.jpg

Bookmark this website: forum.koohii.com (their stories are much better than some of Heisig's examples).

Download Anki (google it), download Heisig's deck, go through it every day.

While studying to recognize the kanji (to give you an edge later on) introduce yourself to the grammar (google tae kim's guide to grammar). Take it easy though- the basics are hard to grasp, but once you do, the rest is easy.

After going through the first book (2000 kanjis) download vocabulary decks. At some point (as early as possible) it'd be a good idea to start reading native material. It's tough but it'll be regardless of how much you try to prepare yourself. Multiple methods like Kerb suggested. It'll be hard to produce the language even if you understand it so yeah, classes can help with that.

So your advice as well as the agreement of others inspired me to get the Kanji and the Kana books from this dude. I read reviews suggesting that he totally phoned in the Katakana section of the Kana book, but that the Hiragana was just as good as his Kanji book.

Anyway, I went through the Hiragana section (even though I did have prior studies of it, I've always had trouble with ones like wa/re/ne and a few others) ... I'll admit, his stories and choices for keywords begin to cross well into the absolutely rediculous, but I'll be damned if they don't stick.

Of course, if I ever get to the point where I am fluent, I hope I'm not forever seeing images of the 7 dwarves, uncle sam, and dogs flying though the air attached to a boomerang (seriously, this dude smoked some strong stuff when he wrote this)

[Franzer]

So not to jack the thread, but I have a question. My parents have recently decided in their just about to retire years, that they want to start learning spanish. They live a little outside our city here, so continuing education and on site university classes won't work for them. I have heard mixed reviews on rosetta stone, and my language teachers always hated them. Is there another audio learning program I could suggest to them that might be to their benefit?

[Hyan]

So your advice as well as the agreement of others inspired me to get the Kanji and the Kana books from this dude. I read reviews suggesting that he totally phoned in the Katakana section of the Kana book, but that the Hiragana was just as good as his Kanji book.

Anyway, I went through the Hiragana section (even though I did have prior studies of it, I've always had trouble with ones like wa/re/ne and a few others) ... I'll admit, his stories and choices for keywords begin to cross well into the absolutely rediculous, but I'll be damned if they don't stick.

Of course, if I ever get to the point where I am fluent, I hope I'm not forever seeing images of the 7 dwarves, uncle sam, and dogs flying though the air attached to a boomerang (seriously, this dude smoked some strong stuff when he wrote this)

Lol seriously, later on in the first RtK I just skipped most of his crazy story examples and used kanji.koohii.com for the user-made stories which are much better and to the point. Mostly because he expects us to make up our own stories after a while though and I'm too lazy to do so.

Don't worry though, the keyword will slowly phase out when you start learning actual compounds and stuff.

Now that the thread got bumped I might as well post an example of a difficult kanji made simple:

環

That thing right there is a kanji with a name"ring" given to it. To you it may look like a bunch of nonsense but in reality it consists of few different keywords you'd have already learned when you got there:

Jewel, eye, ceiling, mouth and scarf. So actually all the parts the kanji consists of are already familiar to you. Now it's just a matter of making up some silly story that combines all the old keywords and the new one.

Since the previous kanji was 還, "send back", which is basically almost identical (jewel swapped with road), we can use these two together to make up some shit about lord of the rings or something.

" Together with the next kanji, the keywords spell “send back the ring”. First we have a jewel. Next we have the great eye of Sauron searching for the fellowship hiding under the many ceilings during their journey. The fourth and fifth primitives are the mouth of Gollum always mumbling “My preciousss”; and Pippin's scarf! Placement: the eye appears at the top similarly to how the Great Eye of Sauron is perched atop the Dark Tower."

Few minutes of imagining the story in your mind and some flashcard repeats for the next week and you'll never forget these two... And you won't confuse them with other similar looking kanji because each have their own unique stories.

[Necronus]

Kanji Stuff

This reminds me to ask something I've been meaning to look into for a while, but kinda kept forgetting to look up. What kind of settings would you recommend for web browsers (I use Firefox at home and ::ugh:: IE7 at work). I've fooled around with settings before to rather unimpressive results. Basically I like the size and fonts for English, but as in your post above, those Kanji are so squished that even if I knew every Kanji ever, I bet I'd still have a hard time reading them.

So basically, how do I make Kanji, Kana, and hell even Hangul (which also tends to look like smush when people type in it on my FB) readable without screwing up English.


Edit: Oh, and one other thing. At least on IE here at work theres that little search thing built into the bar. Is there a way to get that to show Unicode characters (I work in computers, why don't I know this) there? I went to copy/paste the Kanji you typed and of course it appears as a square up there until I hit enter to search, where it appears correctly in the main google search bar. Thanks.

[Hyan]

All I could think of was zooming in/using a lower resolution, lol.

Since you're using FF I recommend this add-on for the future. It's incredibly handy for figuring out compounds later when you can recognize the kanji. Being able to actually read stuff instead of having to use inferior romaji to study is a massive help.

[Necronus]

All I could think of was zooming in/using a lower resolution, lol.

Since you're using FF I recommend this add-on for the future. It's incredibly handy for figuring out compounds later when you can recognize the kanji. Being able to actually read stuff instead of having to use inferior romaji to study is a massive help.

Oh man, text Zoom blows pretty bad tho, makes the English look like those fonts old people with 7 inch thick coke bottle glasses use. Ok maybe not that bad, but its still bad. IE definitely seems to be more limited but I only use that at work. FF on the other hand I messed around with font settings at home, but changing the size seemed to do nothing.

Neat add-on btw, I'll try it when I'm home.