Kanji and Japanese aren’t the same. At least that is how I see it in my head, for better or worse. It is very odd to see it that way so it takes some explaining.

One day I plan to learn Chinese after I learn Japanese. Since kanji is from China originally and the Japanese incorporated into their culture way back a long time ago many of the kanji seem to still be about the same. So it is actually helping with both languages to learn kanji therefore, to me, Japanese is not synonymous to kanji.

If you want to go SAT test with it. Japanese is kanji, but kanji is not necessarily Japanese. So the two are kind of separate, well at least enough that it can help make Japanese easier.

For simplicity sake we will say Japanese is made up of 3 alphabets.

• Hiragana which is phonetic sound for native Japanese words
• Katakana which is the phonetic sound for foreign words, most of the time
• Kanji which is a character that associates a meaning to it

Generally we see kanji as this hard nut to crack because it can have several readings to the meaning. When you combine the kanji in certain orders the original meanings might have almost nothing to do with the word, but the reading is what matters. Basically lots of circular logic that kills your head when learning. While it can be a pain there is hope.

The article title says Kanji Makes Japanese Easy, but all I have described are the complications. So what I want to say is its not really that bad. Learning the meaning of the kanji can go a long way which is why Hesig’s book Remembering the Kanji is so popular and used so much. Because at the end of the day those kanji mean something.

The best way for Kanji to make life easy is to realize that Kanji have a meaning and when you are lost and confused you can use that to your advantage. Lets look at some examples.

私は魚を好きです

The above is a sentence that is kanji and hirigana. The kanji are 私, 魚, and 好. Roughly I, fish, and like. So we can probably infer that the sentence means I like fish, right. Well yes. That is what that sentence is.

Now the next thought is, well not all sentences are going to be that easy and short. I know, but that doesn’t mean you cant try to infer meanings of sentences and pick out parts of sentences to try to better understand things.

One sentence that helped me realize this was this one.

アンは詩を書くのが好きだ。

I still don’t have any idea how to read this sentence properly I always seem to mess it up. However, I know that there is poem, write and like. Along with those plus さん I know that someone likes to write poetry.

And here is another example of looking at kanji meanings and getting the sentence.

秋が好き。

秋 is autumn and 好 is like so the inference is liking autumn.

Another great thing about kanji is it helps shrink the size of what you read and get words in an easier understanding way. Look at the following both the hiragana and the kanji.

Hiragana: わたしのはははえいごはなしません。

Kanji: 私の母は英語を話しません。

The first thing I see is a ton of kana and it kills my eyes for a moment. After that I see the 3 は. After that I have to sound out the sentence and try to figure out the words and manually separate them since there are no spaces like in English. The kanji is what allows you to have those “spaces” because the kanji can be your words so there aren’t any need for spaces per se.

Also notice that the only things that aren’t kanji are particles and conjugations. This lets you be able to break the sentence into words easily and is the true power of kanji which makes reading Japanese a lot easier.

There is one final thing to look at and take note of. While the above is true there are times where picking things out isn’t so easy. Lets see why.

彼の自転車は青い。

This sentence says the bicycle is blue. However, without knowing that 自転車 means bike then this sentence will leave you stuck until learn what it is. So kanji is not a silver bullet to Japanese, but it can help a lot especially as a beginner.

Finally, there are many words that have the same “spellings” in hiragana but mean completely different things when seeing it in kanji. Take kanji for example here are two meanings.

Sentence Hiragana: いいかんじ
Sentence Kanji 1: いい感じ
Sentence Kanji 2:　いい漢字

The hiragana sentence is the same as the others, but without content you don’t know which. Kanji 1 is “Good feeling”. Kanji 2 is “Good kanji(Chinese character)”. So kanji is definitely beneficial when trying to figure out what is being said. As you learn more vocab kanji helps you keep it straight. Plus the more kanji meanings you know there are quite a few kanji readings which will miraculously fall into place all of a sudden. 誰 (だれ) or who was one of those which just fell into place.

Conclusion

Basically when it comes down to it learning Japanese is all about approach. Learning Kanji separate from grammar and vocab can have different outcomes. I like to think it makes things easier. Since starting to focus more and more on kanji it has sped up my learning Japanese to the point some of the manga I have is getting easier to read without looking everything up.

So remember the 4 key components to kanji making Japanese easier are:

• Meanings of Kanji can help you to figure out sentence meanings
• Kanji helps you to find ends of words and beginning of new ones for an easier time reading
• A lot of times kanji is only used for words whereas particles and conjugation are in hiragana; and katakana is foreign words or pop-culture spellings.
• Kanji is used to distingiush words to help figure out context since many words can have same spelling/phonetic sounds

keeping those in mind learning kanji is a very beneficial thing to do from the get-go. Also of note is that the AJATT method has you learn kanji meanings first using Remembering the Kanji. So this definitely isn’t an idea out of left field.

As a note these are my observations from my learning Japanese for the last year and half along with thoughts from others discussing this very thing. So please give your opinion too about your experiences in learning kanji along with Japanese

Here are the entries for this December Blog Matsuri. This was a lot of fun and I learned a lot. I definitely think you should check each of them out.

Joshua Zimmerman
Entry: Robot School Girl Horror
Description: This one creeped me out and got me excited, not that way, at the same time. I love robots and always get excited to see them. I was creeped out that they were turning them into school girls. There is a youtube video to watch too.

Just Another Day in Japan
Entry: Toilet Technology
Description: This is the exact reason I wanted technology as athe topic. I was after anything especially not so seen parts of Japanese technology. Funnily enough there was a conversation in my Japanese club once about toilets in Japan.

Lonelee Planet
Entry: Top 5 Japanese Gadgets from Thanko
Description: Thanko is a Gadget company and apparently they come out with some very interesting gadgets. Lets just say for one part nekomimi is going to sound awesome again.

Gakuranman
Entry: Omoshiro Zakka – R2D2 Soy Sauce Bottle
Description: This isn’t exactly technology, but I am a huge sucker for Star Wars especially droids so since droids are technology it is ok this time. Though looking at the picture it seems like it could get a little messy.

NihongoUp Blog
Entry: The digital camera that started it all
Description: I really liked this one post. I am a huge fan of photography so when I get to read/see history on the digital camera I am all over it. What is funny is the megapixel rating that it has. Never imagined it would be that number.

Maz
Entry: Karakuri (Part 1)
Description: This was an amazing entry. This is a side of the Japanese culture I had never even had a hint of knowing existed. Definitely give this a read, and watch the youtube videos. Imagine wooden robots.

Jamaipanese
Entry: 5 Japanese Robots
Description: Oh we have some more robot goodness here. These are as creepy and really show how far we have come with technology as humans. I will say I am an ASIMO fan, but after seeing the ApripPoko I don’t know anymore. However, the security guard looks a bit too happy to be one.

Muza-chan
Entry: 7 Reasons Why Japanese Trains Are Different
Description: While I am not a huge fan of trains, because of not so fun experience with them, I will say after reading this when I go to Japan I will probably not feel as bad about it. Seeing the different types and views of them I can see why people can be enamored by them. The first picture would make me nervous as a worker though.

Through Eyes From Afar
Entry: A Pinch of Salt
Description: I have got to give mad props on creativity of this one. When I think technology I think mechanical. Here is a good post on chemical technology/science. I will say second picture makes me wonder about whether I really like salt or not.

kirai
Entry: Manicure Machine
Description: This takes vending machines to a whole new level. I’ll just put it that way. The internals actually look kind of neat.

Japan Sugoi
Entry: Japanese Suima Automated Baby Crib
Description: I am living in the wrong country to be lazy in. Japan seems to make some cool stuff for those that want to be lazy, at times. I might have to import one someday if I have kids. Though can you tell me is it made out of wood or wood like plastic?

EDIT: Sorry I missed one I feel horrible about it, but here it is.

chottomatte.net
Entry: RIKEN Next-Generation Supercomputer, Kobe, Port Island
Description: I loved reading this especially since I am a programmer. I love computers. I especially want one this big.

Be sure to stay tuned for next months matsuri at loneleeplanet.

Yesterday was JLPT day and I did fail it. Whether it is graded that way or not I am not sure. However, I failed it in my opinion. That being said I would not trade the experience for anything in the world. I am going to include some picture of the trip too so not so much reading all at once.

My World of Japanese
Lets look at my world of Japanese first. I take a class at local community college and am president of the Japanese Language Club there. On the side I go to our local city Japanese Language Club meetings once in a while. As for study I watch hours of J-Drama and anime along with trying to follow ajatt with SRS and generally having fun with learning. Also if you read here much you know I blog about the Japanese Language too, like grammar for example. I realize now how small my world is.

My JLPT Experience

Kanji Section
This I found was more of a misnomer because only about 2/3 of the section was actually kanji, which I rocked it hard, it was my best section. The last 1/3 of that section was more vocab than kanji, which is why I call it a misnomer. My biggest problem was I didn’t understand the instructions to well so I had to guess at what was going on. Since I sat in front of the classroom I could watch while they organized all the test answers sheets and saw I guessed mostly right on the instructions. Unfortunately my old nemesis vocabulary stepped in and struck me down, I have a huge problem remembering words. At the end this was my best section and I didn’t do so hot on it I think.

Listening Section
I utterly failed this section. I have a problem because of my ADD when I hear too many words in a conversation I get bored and my mind drifts. Well while that didn’t happen per se. The listening section had WAY to many words.

Essentially the listening section was a recording and the instructions before they started the CD said “We are now going to start the test”. Well to me that means staring at number one. It took me about 2 minutes to realize they were starting on example 1. All words on the CD where in Japanese and probably only half of the CD by the end pertained to actual questions. So 3/4 of the way through that section I had heard to many words and couldn’t concentrate anymore. I now know a new problem to overcome.

I think this was an important section because it really re-enforces that there is a lot of Japanese to pay attention to listening wise.

Grammar Section
Grammar part was the second hardest part for me. What I found quite interesting was the grammar that I knew I am 90% sure I got right. However, there was a LOT of grammar I had never even seen before so it left some to be desired on my ability to answer these questions. I had to go with the best educated guess I could make.

What I learned

As I said before I failed this the JLPT in my opinion. However, it doesn’t bother because I had a great experience taking it. In my post “The JLPT CAN be Used to Measure Proficiency” I mentioned that it is all about the approach. I went in and didn’t take the test to pass it because it needed passing. I took it to measure skill passing didn’t matter all that much to me, would be nice though.

The biggest thing I learned is what I have been trying to avoid admitting to myself for a year now. That is I am using my Japanese class as a crutch to learning Japanese. I should be using it to compliment my learning Japanese. Instead I am putting my efforts into the class as my primary study method. I need to get back to AJATT and have class be secondary, but still pass the class.

I now realize more that I have a LONG way to go. In my little world I have seen a lot of Japanese, but have had no real effective gauge of exactly how much there is to learn. The book I use isn’t exactly the best at helping to show how dumbed down it is. Taking the JLPT has provided me a way to breakout of the normal day life and into another world of the Japanese language and prove to me I have a long ways to go still yet.

Final Thoughts and the Future

One thing I really enjoyed about the trip was getting to meet other people, in person, outside of my area that are learning Japanese too. It was a lot of fun to hear about there experiences, study techniques, and backgrounds. It was really cool to hear how many people were excited about Japanese, and to see how many nerds were there too, I include myself in that one.

I recommend everyone take the JLPT if you are learning no matter what level you take, just remember how you approach it. I’ll take the JLPT next year too, except i’ll go up one or 2 levels. My study habits need to change and will. And overall that is why the JLPT was a win for me because now I know how low on the skill level I really am where and what I need to improve. All is not lost and there is a bright future ahead in learning I am actually more energized after yesterday than anything else.

Have you taken the JLPT before and what was your experience like?

The title is a bit misleading, but serves our purposes as a starting point. First I want to bring up that I am an Eagle Scout in the “Boy Scouts of America” and strongly believe in the values, skills and life lessons I have learned in Boy Scouts having been in it for almost 20 years now. Now that you have a bit of perspective of why I am writing this lets look a bit into “what” scouting is about.

What is Scouting

If scouts could be summed up in a couple a few sentences I would have to say it is a program that offers youth an opportunity to learn about the world and interact with others from people their own age to adults. Skills in outdoors, communications, and leadership are developed over several years of interaction with all types of people and through the school of hard knocks. It helps prepare young people to better prepare themselves for the future by presenting similar situations to them that they would come up against later in life.

To illustrate how Scouting can better prepare you for the future i’d like to call on a personal example instead of trying to rely on some abstract explanation. In scouting you must serve in a leadership role be-it a small group or the whole group. I served a few terms as the senior youth leader in which I had to plan and run the meetings and delegate accordingly. This involved more paper work and co-ordination than anything else. I had to make sure I found who could do what and helped to co-ordinate so they could do what they needed, usually teaching something. This is not unlike running a company you spend more time doing administrative tasks over what your business actually does.

So how has this helped me for the future. Well the easiest example would be that I am currently helping to start a Japanese Language Club at my local college and it is mostly paperwork and coordinating with people to make sure we are doing things right. I can easily step into this role and fulfill it because of the direct benefits of Scouting.

Hopefully that helps you gauge an idea of the benefits of scouting. So lets move on.

History of Scouting in Japan

Pre-World War II

The first Boy Scout Troop was formed in Japan in 1909 at a school, but quickly disappeared when the teacher left that school. Many more troops sprang up here and there accross japan for the next 13 years, but there was no real guiding force behind them. In 1922 Boy Scouts of Japan was officially formed and became a true organization. Scouting in Japan came to be noticed by the public after the Great Kanto earthquake in 1923 when Scouts help to rebuild, and the statesman who was incharge of the rebuilding process was able to bring word of Boy Scouts to the general public during his travels around Japan.

World War II

Scouting almost died during World War II and shortly there after during the occupation as former military personal were scrutinzed and not given much lee-way in what they could do. Later though things relaxed and Scouting flourished in Japan once more with membership growing to 80,000 members in only a few short years.

Today

SAJ celebrated its 75th Anniversary of founding of the National Scout Association in 1997, and hosted the second Asia-Pacific Regional Top Leaders’ Summit Conference in Gotemba and Tokyo.

Scouting in Japan has grown steadily and established an eminent place for itself in social education for young people. The aim of the Scout Association of Japan is to help young people become responsible humanitarian citizens, who can appreciate and practice loyalty, courage and self-respect in an international perspective. With the support of volunteer leaders, the Scout movement in Japan provides fun filled, challenging programs, with an emphasis on developing each young person’s character, health, abilities and sense of service to others.

The Scout Association of Japan is a non-political, voluntary movement, with open subscription. The geographic structure of Japanese Scouting is the Council, generally conforming to prefecture boundaries. Japanese Scouting also exists abroad, in communities with large native Japanese populations, such as Amsterdam, Netherlands and Singapore.

Earlier I said the title was a bit misleading. I say that because Boy Scouts of Japan re-named to Scout Association of Japan, and abbreviated as SAJ. SAJ then opened the doors to the girls/female youth in all Sections in 1995.

Structure of Scouting Program in Japan

The United States as 3 sections to it. Cub Scouts, Boy Scouts and Venturing, with venturing being a bit of a side thing more than an integral part. However the SAJ has 5 parts to it.

Beaver Scouts
This is for the youngest group. It mostly exists to form new relationships with others and have fun learning basic skills and team work. A couple of activities might be basic arts and crafts to visiting the zoo with fellow Beaver’s.

Cub Scouts
Cub Scouts is for the bit more mature so might extend activities to include more complex arts and crafts along with camping skills at a basic level and start to introduce them to things they will come accross in Boy Scouts.

Boy Scouts
At this point the scout has a basic understanding of camping skills and other related skills along with the ability to participate and accomplish things with others. So now starts the path of learning leadership and further develop camping skills beyond setting up a tent and eating.

Venture
This is more advanced part of scouting where you will take everything you have learned and usually start to lead larger groups of people in various activities as you work towards Fuji Scout. You learn to deal with all kinds of people as by this age many people have matured to a point where attitudes are easily distinguishable. Along with all this you will probably start participating in activities going beyond just camping in the woods from white watering kayaking to Extended Backpacking trips, or even Mountain Climbing, via cliff faces.

At this level you work towards Fuji Scout which is the highest rank in SAJ equivalent to Eagle Scout in the United States. As I understand it not many Scouters are able to earn the rank of Fuji Scout much like the rank of Eagle where only 2% of all total scouts earn Eagle Scout. I read somewhere that as of 1998 only 3000 people had earned Fuji Scout. I was unable to find information that I could read regarding total numbers of scouts in Japan.

Rover
This level is a personal growth section where one grows through service to scouting, their family, and their community.

Scout Motto, Promise/Oath, and laws

The scouting program in Japan is broken up into 2 distinct parts. Cub Scouts and “Regular Scouts”. Cub scouts are your elementary age kids (Beaver and Cub) while Regular Scouts are Middle School to High School aged (Scout, Venture and Rover). Each level has a motto which is something that is quick and meaningful that you should try to do everyday. The promise, or oath, which is something that you will strive to do in life. And laws which you should follow to be the best you can. I’ll list these now.

Scouts

Motto

• Be prepared

Promise

• On my honor, I promise I will do my best to do my duty to God/Buddha and the country, and to obey the Scout Laws, to help other people at all times, and to keep myself physically strong, mentally awake and morally straight.

Laws

• A Scout is
  1. Faithful
  2. Friendly
  3. Courteous
  4. Kind
  5. Cheerful
  6. Thrifty
  7. Courageous
  8. Thankful

Cub Scouts

Motto

• Always, Be in High Spirits

Promise

• I promise to behave honestly and steadily, and to follow the pack laws

Pack Laws

• Cub Scouts
  1. Obey
  2. Look After Themselves
  3. Work Together
  4. Help Younger Ones
  5. Do Good Deeds

Ranks

Each rank builds on each other and are merit based. You must earn the ranks they are not awarded based on age. Here they are in order.

1. Tenderfoot (Tenderfoot)
2. 2nd Class (Ni-kyu)
3. 1st Class (Ikkyu)
4. Chrysanthemum (kiku)
5. Fuji Scout (Comparable to Eagle Scout)

Noteable Scouts

• Ryutaro Hashimoto, the 82nd and 83rd Prime Minister of Japan
• Yukio Hattori, the fifth president of the Hattori Nutrition College, commentator on the Japanese cooking competition program Iron Chef
• Soichi Noguchi, Japanese astronaut
• Makoto Raiku, mangaka (Zatch Bell!)

Conclusion

There is much much much more detail I could go into, but I think this is a good overview to go beyond the general boy scouting is for youth explanation. The basic structure and purpose is important to understand to really understand what scouting is about. There is one thing to remember though, at the end of the day beyond all the politics beyond all the bickering that may happen; at the end of they Scouting is about one thing and one thing only helping the youth of today become good responsible adults in the future. That is a truly noble and great goal for all.

I am pleased to say I have a free 1 month SuperPass I can give away to someone. So what are the benefits of the Superpass?

• SuperPass is $29 a month (or less than $1 a day)
• $1 one week trial
• With a membership, you get access to unlimited live online teachers.
• In class, you can interact with your teachers / classmates. There are PowerPoint presentations, whiteboarding, note-sharing, polling, and more.
• Hundreds of SuperPass classes, thousands of teachers, tens of thousands of students / peers.
• SuperPass is like an “all you can eat buffet for your brain”
• SuperPass is convenient, higher quality (because students rate and review all the teachers, so you can choose the best teachers available in the world), and live.
• For the shy folk: You don’t necessarily need to have a webcam / microphone, a lot of people just join classes to watch.

Now that you know what it is it is time to get the superpass. However, it isn’t so simple as leave your name and get it. Tiny bit more complicated. So here are the rules.

1. Leave a comment, with your valid e-mail
2. In that comment tell us a goof you made while learning or speaking japanese. Something funny or serious. Though if serious explain why it wasn’t good

This will run until the end of September so October 1 or 2 I will take all the e-mails and pop them in a random selection application and have it decide between the entrants. You can enter up to 3 times, but it has to be with 3 different comments.

That is it.

Now the why. I like learning from other people’s mistakes good and bad so I figured this would be a fun way to share our experiences and goofs with the Japanese Language. I will start with one I made as an example. This is what I said in class.

私は日本人を食べます (I eat Japanese people)

Oops. This was early on and I was trying to roughly say I eat Japanese food. Needless to say my teacher, whom is Japanese, did a double take.

So I leave the rest to you. What are some mistakes you have made.

Khatzumoto finally released the much anticipated, by his readers, Quick Reference Guide to AJATT. As an avid reader of his site and practitioner of AJATT, with my own twist, I was excited to be able to buy this and give it a look.

As a note, like he does, if you read his whole site you don’t NEED this guide. However, it is for those that need a bit more of a helping hand than what the main site offers.

To start it is broken into say 12 bookmarked sections for you to read. The first 24 pages are more precision instruments of things to understand about the AJATT method to get you started in why the how works. The other 22 pages are the how to do AJATT in solid action steps. Where Khatsumoto clearly explains what to do.

This is for sure a Quick Reference Guide. I would also like to say it is a companion guide to the AJATT site itself. It more clearly defines the goals of the main site and compliments the main AJATT site. While you should be certain to read the main site the QRG fills in a couple of holes along the way.

One thing that troubled me about the main site is it explained a lot of theory but the atualy doing was left a little dry and took a lot of inferring to figure it out, however it was very possible. Sometimes though a precise description just helps a lot and the QRG provides that.

Another benefit to the QRG is the diagrams. The main site provides some really weird hard to follow diagrams, but the QRG provides a simple visual representation of the order in which you should learn things. Personally, I think the order should switch the kana and the kanji, but at the end of the day to get to the sentences, which is the bread and butter of AJATT, you need to know them both so to some degree following the pure AJATT method it doesn’t really matter. Back to the main diagram It was pretty exciting to see it as the order in which to learn things; originally while it defined was also abstract enough to potentially make it hard to grok.

The best part I like is the second half of the book. The action lists’. After reading and failing and reading and trying and reading and succeeding a couple of times with the main site I was able to figure out each of the action list steps on my own. The QRG goes ahead and lays it on out what you should do and in order too.

Overall the QRG is pretty solid e-book for the AJATT method and if you just aren’t quite able to understand the AJATT site as fast as you want I would recommend buying the e-book. Again at this point the only thing I would change is swapping learning the kana first before the kanji so you can get some use out of the kana while you are on the few months long journey of learning the kanji. So other than that one minor thing get it if you want it. I think it is worth getting since it helped me to re-enforce my thoughts on a few things that I was shaky on understanding.

If you get it let me know what you think of it.

Most books for learning are horrible for the long term learner of Japanese.  There are several things to take into account when trying to learn Japanese, or any language for that matter, from fluency level to resources, and even how you learn.  I want to discuss the importance of learning written language and how most American books put out to learn Japanese are counterproductive.

Most people whom want to learn another language, generally, would like to reach a pretty high level of competency in their target language.  There is some debate, usually by lazier learners, about whether you need to learn the writing system at all if you just want to speak the language.

I propose to you if you want any level of competency learning to read and write in Japanese is essential.   Why you may ask, well for the obvious so you can understand things in Japanese.  Once you reach a certain level your English to Japanese dictionary is going to be useless and a hindrance to your Japanese.  You will get to a level where you need to use a monolingual dictionary to really get hold of words you don’t know.  Besides the best way to practice Japanese is to use it as much as possible because you can’t always speak it so reading and writing in Japanese is very important to further your learning.

At this point you are bored and are wanting me to get to the point I am sure.  Well America sucks. Well American books for learning Japanese sucks that is.  I hate to buy a car before I can test drive it for a minute or two, same with books, so I like to go to Borders and Barnes and Noble to look at their language sections, which are pitiful to say the least.  While I was looking through books that promise to take you from beginner to intermediate I noticed something horrible, they used little to no Hirigana or Katakana. It was mostly romaji.  Here are a few pictures I shot of them close to the back where the kana should have been because to be intermediate you need to know kana.

Notice that there is VERY little if any kana on these pages.  I was taken aback at this because if you don’t have kana then how can you be effective with your new language.

The next argument is “It is easier to learn with romaji and we can just use Kana later so its all good”.  My answer is “why?” why is it easier? Is it because you aren’t comfortable with kana? is it that you don’t know kana? (if not visit my kana in 2 weeks post) I mean lets be honest if you don’t ever use hirigana or katakana while learning what makes you think you are going to be fine when you are no longer learning?  Romaji is a crutch for you if you stay using it for too long and should be done away with as quickly as possible.  And even more important moving from kana to Kanji is even more important, but kana will do for now, at least.

One thing I see in class and in talking to others is people spend a lot of time sounding out the words in kana because they don’t know them well enough to read them because they don’t practice enough. Practice is one of the key things I hear people don’t do enough of, especially with Katakana. However, I have seen the reverse true. I recently went to an anime organization meeting and showed the JLPT study paper I had to a person who studies Japanese and knows more than me. They died when they saw hirigana, not good. As a kind of test tell me how easily you can read the following in reverse if not very well you need to get studying if good keep doing what you are doing.

I also want to note another important reason to learn kana.  Sounds will become more natural when speaking.  With romaji we still want to use English sounds and you will become more dependent on those thus increasing any accent you have.  However, once you finally break away from romaji and associate the sounds with kana and not letters with kana you will start to speak a bit more naturally as you hear others speak since you no longer are depending on the English equivalency of the kana.

To sum up how are your books hurting you? Well they aren’t using kana or much kanji to teach you they are using romaji.  This hurts because if you go through a whole book without learning either when you go to a website from japan guess what.  You aren’t going to know anything.  However, if you do know kana and some kanji when you go to Japanese  sites you are going to understand some of it.  Let me tell you this is VERY motivating.  I randomly went to docomo website and could make out parts of the site to be able to register.  It allowed me to really feel that I have been learning Japanese and not all my learning was in vain. By having the book only use kana when doing Japanese it forces you to use kana whether you like it or not.

So what is the solution.  Investigate books.  Take a look at the bok you are about to buy or are looking at buying.  How much kana does it have it? none, put it back.  Some keep it in hand but keep looking.  A lot, buy it.  The more you use kana the more comfortable it will be to use and the more you can do with it.  I can’t really look at to many books since my book store selection sucks, but the best bok I have seen so far is the Genki series.  While it has flaws it does meet the converstion from romaji to kana as the primary Japanese communication, and as a note the book is from Japan.

The most ideal book would be as the book teaches you something be it kana or kanji it no longer uses the crutch but uses what it already taught you.  So after it shows you how to do hirigana.  No more romaji where hirigana is.  Same with Katakana and Kanji.  I wish the genki books would do it with kanji too as I rely on the furigana way to much and use it as a crutch, though I am working on not doing so.

So what do you think?

This is a presentation my teacher asked me to do. In this post I am going to write out the whole presentation and walk you through the slides instead of just posting the slides. At the end I’ll have the slides to download too. This is probably going to be long as it is about a 20 minute presentation so typing it out makes it quite long.

This is a how to learn presentation. Often times people don’t learn how to learn so they get stuck in a a situation where they just do the same old thing over and over that so many people do and fail. I am hoping to give you some resources and tips to help you not run into that situation.

I want to start out by saying that I am generally a lazy person. I want to do the least amount of work and get the maximum amount of benefit out of it. That is why I did research into how to learn and this is what I came up with.

There are a few key things that you need to learn to effectively learn and speak another language. Those are:

• Vocabulary – Without knowing words you can’t do anything at all in another language
• Grammar – You need to actually know to use those words effectively so grammar is important to know
• Alphabet – When it comes to using the language a lot of what is needed is written so since a lot of languages have their own alphabet. This is a major priority when trying to learn.
• Culture – One thing that some people overlook I have seen in my class is Culture. Others want to learn the language but don’t learn the culture which helps to shape language just as language shapes itself. If you speak English look at all the different dialects of English and knowing a bit about culture helps you understand each a bit better.
• Listening Comprehension – while this isn’t exactly something you can “learn” per se. It is something that is needed so concentrating on it early is very important.

Generally there are 4 key things you do to learn new things and be able to effectively understand/use your new knowledge.

• Memorization – Unfortunately there is no way around it you have to memorize things langauge is no different. You have to memorize your new language.
• Practice – Lets face it if you don’t practice drills and other things repeatedly then you aren’t going to learn it so practice is definitely something you need to do
• Use – Using your knowledge is important and lets you make mistakes and learn from them so using should be one of the funnest things you can do especially since it means you learn something
• Total Immersion (if possible) – Conventional wisdom says live in the target country and consume it 24 hours a day will help you learn faster so if you can try total immersion

Now I have kind of gone on in such a way that might make all this seem hard and daunting, but the presentation is definitely something to help you accomplish all these things easier. Remember I am lazy and want to put the smallest amount of effort in to get the most out of it.

I call this the traditional way to learn a language or the 20th century way, were in the 21st century now. These are your more stereotypical ways to learn and seem the easiest ways to get started.

First you Listen to Words Over and Over think of the guy in a movie driving down the highway listening to the language tapes over and over. Beyond that you start to Try to find content in your Target Language be it books or newspapers or even local communities. Another way to practice or learn is to try to write in the language and hope it is right. Unfortunately, it can take a while to see if you are correct because you might do this with a pen pal or something so immediate feedback to learn from is more difficult.

After you have learned more and more you get to a point where you could potentially read books or be able to speak to others that know the language well. These are definitely good things to do, but finding books traditionally has been hard. Finding people is more likely even more difficult than books.

These aren’t presented as just traditional ways to learn, but are useful in the 21st century too. Lets move on to that.

Here we are 21st century learning methods or Technology Assisted Learning. We have all this technology now lets use it to our full advantage. We still want to some of the same things as before just using technology to facilitate that learning and make it easier.

Immersion/AJATT first thing we can do is let technology get us into a total immersion or almost total immersion environment. We want to take a look though at what is a total immersion environment. Well generally it consists of all your audio and visual world being in Japanese. So that means we need to do the same. With technology you can get your media, software, and most of your books all in Japanese.

The AJATT method was developed by some polish dudes a while back that wanted to laern English. They contended that if they “became” english then they would learn English a whole lot faster, thus they turned their whole environment around them to English. Well Khatsumoto, from the AJATT site, took this same method and applied it to learning Japanese.

The first part of the AJATT method is what I call the rule of 10,000. 10,000 hours and 10,000 sentences. The 10,000 hours is the amount of time it takes to get to 18 months of audio which is how long it took Khatsumoto to become fluent in Japanese to go from nothing to conversations with no problems.

The 10,000 Sentences represents how many sentences you should memorize so through the process you will learn grammar, kanji and a lot of sentences. The point isn’t to actually memorize 10,000 sentences, but to learn a number of ways to communicate. One you learn to a certain amount you can start taking sentences t you know and using your vocab to make more sentences.

The AJATT method also suggests getting all your books in Japanese you want to read therefor forcing you to learn and use your Japanese language skills and to increase your immersion.

The same goes for the world around you by maybe putting up Japanese posters or changing the language on your computer to Japanese. The over all point is to immerse yourself in Japanese.

So we have gone over local environment and a couple of key concepts of total immersion and AJATT, but lets look at some fun ways to learn and practice.

Media has to be the best way to learn. I mean who doesn’t like to watch a good show or listen to good music. While this won’t out and out teach you Japanese it will help to tune your ear to Japanese so that you can pick it up easier.

One way it has helped me is by watching more and more J-Drama’s I pick up on subtle nuances of the language and the different inflections on how to say things that give me an advantage in class when we come up on new words or speaking in general. Besides, JDramas are usually better than American dramas, there is actually a story.

So definitely if you can get hold of some media in Japanese and start enjoying the language.

So here is where the lazy comes in. I can use the least amount of effort to learn the most if will use an SRS program. “Spaced Repetition Software”. Spaced Repetition started in the 30′s, but was quickly lost as it was localized and not a lot of information could spread easily. However, it was popularized in the 60′s again and started a new way of learning that quickly picked up speed and eventually lead to software.

It really started with flashcards, however to do it effectively over the long term flash cards became unmanageable. Couple decades later it started to be implemented in software and we are were we are today.

I did start to go into the science and all, but wasn’t to comferatlbe explaining it so I thought i’d let you watch a video from someone who writes an SRS application because they can do it much better than I can. So please watch the screen cast to get a better idea.

http://ichi2.net/anki/screencast1.html

Hopefully, that video helped with what SRS is and how it works.

These are a list of applications that implement the Spaced Repetition that can be used.

• SuperMemo – This was one of the first implementations of spaced repetition but isn’t free. It is good from what I have read, but it costing something shy’s people away
• Anki – This is a free and open source appliction with a lot of features and one of the most popular SRS apps
• Mnemosyne – I use this one I prefer it to some degree when I can’t use iKnow
• iKnow – This is the main application for the Smart.FM site formerly iknow.co.jp. I prefer this one because it takes some of the guess work out of doing SRS
• Surusu (AJATT) – This is a web version of an SRS app written by the guy that helped to form the AJATT method I haven’t used it but read good things about it
• Word Champ – This is an almost direct competitor to smart.fm/iKnow it has a couple of extra features than Smart.FM does, but it is a pay site.

Hopefully this quick rundown of different apps will help you to decide where to start in looking at what application you might want to use if you choose to go the SRS route to learn.

These are sites I try to use regularly to help learn

• Smart.fm – I use this as my main SRS application I like it because it makes SRS fun
• lang-8 – Lang-8 is for language exchange you can write journal entries and japanese people will fix it for you and help you learn
• jisho.org – This is probably one of the best dictionaries ever quick an easy to use takes kana, kanji, romaji, and english
• Google Translate – This is great for quick and easy translation of text and sites. Not always the most accurate, but enough to get the idea.

Books are an important part of the learning process I especially like Remember the Kanji to learn 2046 kanji so I can get around day to day easier. By far this has been the simplest way to learn kanji I personally have found.

Along with the book you can get a poster of all those kanji at kanjiposter.com. This is useful as it is laminated so you can mark it up and watch your progress. What thing katsumoto suggests is highlight in red what you have learned and watch it fill up in red.

Next is suggested to get a monolingual dictionary eventually. You will hit a plateau at some point where you just can’t seem to quite go anywhere. From reading apparently this will help you break it because it forces you to do a lot of work to look stuff up. I have yet to get one because i don’t feel I am close to that plateau, but I am keeping my eye out for one so if find a good one let me know.

Genki books. When i started learning 2 years ago i started with Japanese Pod 101 while this was all fine and dandy i didn’t get anywhere fast because there was no structure to my learning so it retarded it a lot. However, taking a class has helped me to gain that structure I am missing. To learn more on this please read my blog posts “Japanese Langauge Classes DON’T Suck.”

Anyway I like the Genki books because of the structure it provides that is why I recommend it.

Finally down to the last 2 slides “Resources” YAY. I am basically going to list these out and let you follow them. I went through over about 100 sites that help you learn Japanese and picked out the best ones.

FireFox Addons

• Kanji-lish
• Furigana Injector
• RikaiChan

Web Sites
- Genki Resources

• Usagi-Chan’s Genki Resources
• Genki Online
• Genki Exercises

Web Sites
- Listening Comprehension

• ?????????
• Smart.fm
• Japanese Pod 101

- Others

• Charles Kelly’s Japanese Language Study Website
• JGram – The Japanese Grammar database
• Daily Page for Students of the Japanese Language
• Japanese: Vocabulary Guide
• Japanese Lessons
• Japanese for Busy People Supplement Materials
• Learn Japanese On the Web, CosCom
• English-Japanese Vocabulary Quizzes
• Speak as Romans Speak
• NSW HSC ONLINE – Japanese
• Griffith University grammar frame
• Tae Kim’s Japanese guide to learning Japanese grammar
• Japanese for the Western Brain

I just want to point out this isn’t a “Use the AJATT method” presentation. It just so happens there are a lot of common sense things in the method that really help you to learn that is why I like it. Heck, one of the first things I started to do was listen to Japanese music without reading about the method. Some of the things just make sense.

Download: How to Learn Japanese Powerpoint Presentation

It seems that in every society there is a set of rules which need to be followed day-to-day which are intuitive to all.  No one speaks of these rules except if a group is doing introspection on society.  If someone were to break one of these rules it can be embarrassing or uncomfortable for the person who knows and understands the rule.

An example of the above is ending a conversation.  In America, at least where I am from, just by changing the inflection you can signal the end of a conversation.  One such way to do this is in passing when you stop to talk to a person for a second and get some information.  Normally, you would just say okay with a bit of a higher tone and force than normal, generally this is the sign of we are done I need to go.  However, there are people that do not catch this social queue and keep talking.  It can be awkward to some degree to say “hey I have to go” as it might seem rude.

Japan is no different there are unwritten social rules people are expected to follow, but may not necessarily ever be written down or discussed explicitly, especially if you are foreign.  Some of what I learned in this research on unspoken culture has really opened up a whole new understanding of what I see in anime, manga, and live action, or read about in news articles.  To some degree it will change the way you think about certain things.  Some of this information is intuitive and after watching enough anime, live action, and/or Japanese news you can pick up on it, but to be explicitly made aware of it could save you some pitfalls with interaction as you can keep it on your mind.

To start most of my information came from At Home in Japan.  The site is a very long read, well thought out and very informative.  I am going to provide my understanding of the site and a summary of what I read.  This post is a bit long, but please read it as it might be very informative and helpful to you.

We are going to talk about Tatemae and Honne first then Uchi and Soto.  Both are key to really understand the layers or wrapping of Japanese social society.

Lets Get Started:
The first thing to understand is everything in Japan is wrapped up.  Whether it be physical, mental, or theoretical everything exists inside of something else, like an onion.  Some key things to note you can physically see are food(obento), houses (usually inside gate), construction sites, and not physical is language.  These all have layers to them from sugar packets which are individual to a bigger box.  Houses usually have gates around them, then the front door, and even then the entry way, it is layered toward you getting to the main subjects of the house.  Then you have the language with multiple layers of formality that if broken lead to some pretty awkward situations.  Keep wrapping in mind when reading this and as you watch or view things in and from Japan.

Tatemae and Honne:
There are two key words to know to start with Tatemae and Honne. Tatemae is a social wrapping put in to make things seem as nice as possible where they do not see any problems no matter what the situation. Honne is what the hosts really feel, but never directly say as it might create problems.  Honne is a term the to define the type of a feeling.  Imagine Tatemae as a fine restaurant where you walk in and see waiters and waitresses serving people being happy and everyone eating, but know nothing about what is going on in the kitchen.  Honne is where the there is 100 customers and only 1 of the 4 grills work plus they are short of staff for the evening.  Basically there are problems all over the place words are exchanged behind the scenes yet the customer never knows about, this is Honne.

Tatemae and Honne are important to recognize because through your interactions with other people you could be causing a social disconnect and not be aware because you are seeing the Tatemae and will not be privy to the Honne.  However, there is hope because there are ways to see or find out about the Honne if you pay attention to the social queues that are available.  If a Japanese person makes a simple “suggestion” or “request” in a seemingly innocuous manner it could be they are trying resolve a big problem in the Honne(again unexpressed frustration).  The key thing is to be aware in most society, outside of the personal, you are being presented with a Tatemae just remember the Honne does exist. (An assertion on my part I would take it that foreigners, like Americans or Europeans, are more likely to see the Tatamae longer than any other foreigners or locals.)

As an aside on the communication – During my reading of this article it hinted at something that I have seen for a while in Japanese shows I watch. That is specific sounds that Japanese make which aren’t words, but carry a lot of meaning along with gestures.  Going on a limb one such one is closing the teeth and inhaling while moving the head back slightly is sign of “I don’t really know what or how to answer”.  There are many more, but this article confirmed these are very very prominent and not just my imagination.  So be sure to pay attention to them and figure out what they might mean.

Uchi and Soto:
The uchi is similar to the “I” except it has a broader meaning to mean more of the family, company, or group you are with.  When talking or referencing yourself you would normally put the uchi first then your name.  So it would be something like “I am from the ABC company my name is Buddy”.  The uchi is important because it is the unit that will have a Tatemae and a Honne.  The uchi will discuss the Honne and present the Tatemae.  The soto is the outsider that will be seeing the Tatemae and not be able to see the the Honne inside the uchi.  Think of it as a foreign exchange student doing a home-stay in Japan.  The student is the soto coming to live with the uchi, or family unit.  He will see the Tatemae, but not necessarily see the Honne

It is worth noting once you become part of the uchi and are no longer the soto it isn’t automatically an intimate situation where all the rules go out the window and social rules no longer exist.  In fact you are presented with another set of uchi soto relationships just on a more intimate not so formal level.  Quickest example I can see for this is you are part of an uchi which is your company and are you are looking at a new recruit they are the soto. Well once the soto is hired they are part of the uchi now and no longer a soto in the sense he is part of the company, but he must still act in accordance to the rules and structure of his new uchi(company).

Generally uchi and soto are based on an anchor point of you or your group depending on now far away from that anchor point a person falls depends on the formality shown.  If a person you have never talked to or seen in your life shows up then you are usually very formal and respectful.  However, if your neighbor comes over whom you see weekly, while they too are a soto, you will not be as formal with them as the person you have never seen in your life.  Basically this is like all relationships as you get to know a person more and more they come closer to the uchi, but remember you can be very very close and still be a soto and therefore there is a Tatemae that you are shown.  Just note that you will not always be presented with a Tatemae, but to be safe assume one is there.

Conclusion:
To better understand the language and the people we must understand what lies in the background of the culture or we might not understand the subtleties that lie in what we watch, read, or hear.  Understanding the structure of the Japanese culture that is normally not spoken of can help us to better understand and avoid potential pitfalls when communicating with others.  To be aware of problems and how problems can arise is another important step.  One of the most important aspects we can learn is to listen to what people say and how they say it because it can tell you a lot about the situation.  Someone might be telling you it is very taboo to do this but say it like “Well we don’t normally do that” which isn’t harmful and leads one to think it is okay. So the key is listen, be aware, and pay attention to what is around you.

またね