Letter to my Sensei

[mercedesjin]

Hi everyone! I've written a letter to my sensei, and I was hoping to really impress her and write her a letter without any grammatical errors. So, will anyone do me the great favor of proofreading this for me? I'd be so grateful!

先生：

お久しぶりですね！お元気ですか。夏休みはどうですか 。今、私はセントトマスにいます。京都で日本語の試験 が難しいそうだから、勉強しておきます。一人で日本語 を勉強して見ます。一人で勉強しにくいと思うのに、「 げんき２」を読んでしまうばかりです。今年「げんき１ 」を勉強してよかったです。「げんき１」を教えてあり がとうございます！

レポートを書きました。先生は読んでいただけませんか 。新しい仕事についてです。

母は高校の校長です。高校は夏休みの授業があります。 高校でいろいろな先生に助けてくれて教えることになり ました。高校で新しいプログラムが始めした。「プレト 」と言うオンラインプログラムです。プレトは教えます 。例えば、英語の授業で、学生はプレトサイトに行って から、プレトのサイトは「英語の読み方」を教えます。

いろいろな先生によってどうやって教えます。プレトは 教えるから、先生は教えなくてもいいはずです。例えば 、毎日ベンチュラ先生は学生を見ながら電話をかけるけ ど、教えません。時々、学生はプレトの教案が分かりま せん。でも、学生はベンチュラ先生に一人で習わせます 。でも、ビカズ先生はいつも教えます。いっしょに、ビ カズ先生と学生はプレトの教案を読みます。新しいプロ グラムだから、多分学生は人の先生になれてきました。 前に学生は「ケレン先生、私に教えて下さい」と言いま した。いろいろな先生は教えるべきだと思います。

ビカズ先生の授業で、「ヨエル」と言う学生がいます。 ヨエルはサントドミンゴで生まれたから、英語が上手じ ゃありません。毎日「先生！先生！これは何ですか」か 「先生！先生！分かりません」と言います。いつも「先 生！先生！」と言うから、全部学生とビカズ先生はヨエ ルが好きじゃありません。英語の授業から、ビカズ先生 は「とても良いえんまちょうがないでっしょ」と言いま す。しかし、先週ヨエルは一番なえんまちょうがありま した。本当によかったと思います。先生さえ必ずしも英 語が分からないから、悪いえんまちょうがあるわけでは ありません。

先生はメールをくれていただけます！

ケレン

EDIT: I realized after that it may seem like I'm trying to cheat, but I'm not getting any kind of grade for this. This is just for practice and having a pleasant conversation with my sensei. =)

[KyleGoetz]

Where is "St. Thomas"? Do you mean Sao Tome? That's サントメ. The St. Thomas in Jamaica is セント・トーマス. The ones in US Virgin Islands and Ontario are the same as the one in Jamaica.

Originally Posted by mercedesjin

Hi everyone! I've written a letter to my sensei, and I was hoping to really impress her and write her a letter without any grammatical errors. So, will anyone do me the great favor of proofreading this for me? I'd be so grateful!

先生：

お久しぶりですね！お元気ですか。夏休みはどうでしたか。今、私はセントトマスにいます。京都での日本語の試験が難しいそうだから、勉強しておきます。 一人で日本語を勉強して見ます***。一人で勉強しにくいと思うのに、「げんき２」を読ん でしまうばかりです。今年「げんき１」を勉強してよか ったです。「げんき１」を教えてくださってありがとうございました！

レポートを書きました。先生は読んでいただけませんか 。新しい仕事についてです。

母は高校の校長です。高校は夏休みの授業があります。 高校でいろいろな先生に助けてくれて教えることになり ました。高校で新しいプログラムが始まりました。「プレト」と言うオンラインプログラムです。プ レトは教えます。例えば、英語の授業で、学生はプレト というサイトに行ってから、プレトのサイトは「英語の読み方 」を教えます。

***Question for a native speaker. In the sentence I've starred above, presumably the speaker is trying to emphasize that he wants to study by himself, so would it sound more natural to put 一人で after 日本語を? Or is it just my native-English propensities bleeding through that make me want to switch those around to place the emphasis on 一人で rather than no emphasis?

The green colored sentence...I'm not sure about. Did you become some kind of teacher or what? I think if you're talking about a lot of teachers helping you out, the 教える should be 教えられる instead because the former means "I taught ~" and the latter means "I was taught [by ~]".

What is プレト? Is it Plato? because Plato is プラトン in Japanese (yes, "Platon"—I proofread an English essay for a Korean friend of mine (we only share Japanese as a common language and know each other from our time at a university in Japan) and she kept writing "Platon"; I finally figured out it was a Japanese->English translation error).

Someone else can finish. I sort of got disheartened when I saw you ask your teacher to proofread a report for you, but yet you're asking us to proofread a letter to your teacher to impress her. Also, I'm feeling less and less confident about my (apparently) diminishing Japanese since I got completely smacked down a day ago on a trivial piece of grammar that I thought I'd had down for half a decade.

I feel comfortable with the corrections I made, but like I said, I'm feeling less confident in my abilities lately, so if anyone else responds, you might want to take their answers over mine. However, if no one responds, then my word is probably more valuable that nothing at all.

[mercedesjin]

Originally Posted by KyleGoetz

Where is "St. Thomas"? Do you mean Sao Tome? That's サントメ. The St. Thomas in Jamaica is セント・トーマス. The ones in US Virgin Islands and Ontario are the same as the one in Jamaica.



***Question for a native speaker. In the sentence I've starred above, presumably the speaker is trying to emphasize that he wants to study by himself, so would it sound more natural to put 一人で after 日本語を? Or is it just my native-English propensities bleeding through that make me want to switch those around to place the emphasis on 一人で rather than no emphasis?

The green colored sentence...I'm not sure about. Did you become some kind of teacher or what? I think if you're talking about a lot of teachers helping you out, the 教える should be 教えられる instead because the former means "I taught ~" and the latter means "I was taught [by ~]".

What is プレト? Is it Plato? because Plato is プラトン in Japanese (yes, "Platon"—I proofread an English essay for a Korean friend of mine (we only share Japanese as a common language and know each other from our time at a university in Japan) and she kept writing "Platon"; I finally figured out it was a Japanese->English translation error).

Someone else can finish. I sort of got disheartened when I saw you ask your teacher to proofread a report for you, but yet you're asking us to proofread a letter to your teacher to impress her. Also, I'm feeling less and less confident about my (apparently) diminishing Japanese since I got completely smacked down a day ago on a trivial piece of grammar that I thought I'd had down for half a decade.

I feel comfortable with the corrections I made, but like I said, I'm feeling less confident in my abilities lately, so if anyone else responds, you might want to take their answers over mine. However, if no one responds, then my word is probably more valuable that nothing at all.

Thank you so much! After wards I realized that it's actually a pretty long letter, and didn't expect to get any responses.

Sorry if it's confusing. During the school year, my teacher decided to teach me independently, and for the independent study I would write her reports regularly - reports that are more like weekly journals that have my opinions on different issues. After the school year ended, though, she asked me to continue sending her reports - not for a grade, but just for practice and so that we could keep talking. So this is really more a letter, but I called it a report in Japanese because that's what I'm used to calling it with her. So, it's basically an informal thing and I'd like to have it perfect so that she can just email me a response without having to say, "By the way, you made mistakes here, here, and here."

As for the teacher part, I just didn't know what the word for "assistant" was so I just tried to describe it. I'm a paraprofessional or a teacher's assistant, so I go from teacher to teacher helping them in their classrooms.

Thanks again.

[Khengi]

I noticed in your post that you studied げんき. I apologize for this being off-topic, but is it a really good series? I studied from なかま and hated it.

[mercedesjin]

Originally Posted by Khengi

I noticed in your post that you studied げんき. I apologize for this being off-topic, but is it a really good series? I studied from なかま and hated it.

I don't mind, I'm used to going off-topic. I've used both textbooks before... and I personally think that nakama is better. I feel like it's a little more organized, and genki tends to baby the readers, not really giving a whole lot of information... And then, on top of that, there's only genki 1 and 2, so when I got to my 3rd Japanese class, my class had to switch to a different series.

Also - and this is just based on something I've heard - when students who used genki for two years were compared to students who used other textbooks, the students who used genki were far behind where they were expected to be.

Why did you hate nakama?

[Khengi]

Originally Posted by mercedesjin

I don't mind, I'm used to going off-topic. I've used both textbooks before... and I personally think that nakama is better. I feel like it's a little more organized, and genki tends to baby the readers, not really giving a whole lot of information... And then, on top of that, there's only genki 1 and 2, so when I got to my 3rd Japanese class, my class had to switch to a different series.

Also - and this is just based on something I've heard - when students who used genki for two years were compared to students who used other textbooks, the students who used genki were far behind where they were expected to be.

Why did you hate nakama?

Well (like many people), I'm self-taught, so when I decided to go to college and see how good I really was, I passed out of 101, 102, and 201 quickly from 3 tests I took, based on Nakama (no English whatsoever). Finding this a little too easy for a 16 year old, I worried what the 202 would be like.

My Japanese teacher is very sweet, but even she hates Nakama 1 and 2. It offers a bit more information and even large amounts of Kanji, but does not correctly explain Kanji, pretty much saying that 便 means mail, and mail only. Deal with it (I exaggerate of course, but sadly no that much).

They also make you jump right into the 丁寧語 instead of the dictionary form (you learn 食べます before 食べる, what the heak?!)

I think I hated it when I compared it to Tae Kim's online guide to Japanese, which is extremely neat, written with humor, and related to the reader, as well as going in depth. In fact, from studying from Tae-Kim, Jim Breen's dictionary, and various other sites, I got to where I am today. Nakama felt like a step down.

[mercedesjin]

Originally Posted by Khengi

Well (like many people), I'm self-taught, so when I decided to go to college and see how good I really was, I passed out of 101, 102, and 201 quickly from 3 tests I took, based on Nakama (no English whatsoever). Finding this a little too easy for a 16 year old, I worried what the 202 would be like.

My Japanese teacher is very sweet, but even she hates Nakama 1 and 2. It offers a bit more information and even large amounts of Kanji, but does not correctly explain Kanji, pretty much saying that 便 means mail, and mail only. Deal with it (I exaggerate of course, but sadly no that much).

They also make you jump right into the 丁寧語 instead of the dictionary form (you learn 食べます before 食べる, what the heak?!)

I think I hated it when I compared it to Tae Kim's online guide to Japanese, which is extremely neat, written with humor, and related to the reader, as well as going in depth. In fact, from studying from Tae-Kim, Jim Breen's dictionary, and various other sites, I got to where I am today. Nakama felt like a step down.

Hm... It's been a while since I used nakama. I used it when I was in high school for independent study. Maybe I'm not remembering it correctly, but I thought it was pretty helpful. I think genki is the same when it comes to strange teachings of grammar patterns, though. A lot of textbooks are like that for some reason.

Tae Kim is definitely one of the best resources for studying alone. I still go back to that site all of the time.

[Khengi]

Originally Posted by mercedesjin

Hm... It's been a while since I used nakama. I used it when I was in high school for independent study. Maybe I'm not remembering it correctly, but I thought it was pretty helpful. I think genki is the same when it comes to strange teachings of grammar patterns, though. A lot of textbooks are like that for some reason.

Tae Kim is definitely one of the best resources for studying alone. I still go back to that site all of the time.

Heh, I have Tae open in another tab right now.

The problem with these textbooks is they try to teach you how to JUMP right into talking to Japanese people so they can 'ooh' and 'ahh', but you will not be proficient in the language. You will not last more than 7 seconds in a conversation, and you will only know proper Japanese, which is not really used in casual situations (which is why, from learning from Taekim, I could only speak very slangish Japanese. My Japanese teacher has a no-slang policy, as she is a native from Kansai and feels you should LEARN the language. But upon hearing me speak, she found it hilarious for an American to speak like 'the teenagers' as she said, and allowed me to continue, waiting with baited breath for me to respond humorously.)

I don't know, it may just be my own personal problem, but I don't like the really simple books that try to keep the student from being overwhelmed. Let's put it simply, Japanese is not an English speaker's dream language in terms of simplicity, so at one point or another, you'll probably be overwhelmed, whether it be with Kanji, Counters, etc. But that doesn't mean you should dumb down the student in hopes that they can take in everything easily.

The Japanese around the university stray away from the students who speak to them as if they were God, I don't think it's Japanese in general who do that, but the ones here like to speak to the speakers who speak to them relaxed.

[Nagoyankee]

Originally Posted by KyleGoetz

***Question for a native speaker. In the sentence I've starred above, presumably the speaker is trying to emphasize that he wants to study by himself, so would it sound more natural to put 一人で after 日本語を? Or is it just my native-English propensities bleeding through that make me want to switch those around to place the emphasis on 一人で rather than no emphasis?

I would feel it slightly more natural to put it where the OP put it. But putting it after 日本語を isn't bad at all.

The clear mistake was in writing 見ます with that kanji. It has nothing to do with "seeing", so it isn't written in kanji. That みる means "to try".
_____________

I don't want to raise the general speech level so just listen and forget. This is because we mentioned the phrase "to study by oneself". There is already a word for it, which is to 独学（どくがく）する. If one says 「日本語を独学する」, there's no need for worrying about where to put ひとりで.

[Nyororin]

They also make you jump right into the 丁寧語 instead of the dictionary form (you learn 食べます before 食べる, what the heak?!)

I agree with you about the order of study - "dictionary" should come before formal, in my opinion, if you`re aiming for anything requiring comprehension... But good luck on finding ANY decent textbook that does this. They all start with です・ます.
I believe this goes back to most adults studying Japanese for actual real life use doing so for business. The goal is to acquire enough to sound decent in business interactions.

Originally Posted by Khengi

The problem with these textbooks is they try to teach you how to JUMP right into talking to Japanese people so they can 'ooh' and 'ahh', but you will not be proficient in the language. You will not last more than 7 seconds in a conversation, and you will only know proper Japanese, which is not really used in casual situations. (cut)

I don't know, it may just be my own personal problem, but I don't like the really simple books that try to keep the student from being overwhelmed. Let's put it simply, Japanese is not an English speaker's dream language in terms of simplicity, so at one point or another, you'll probably be overwhelmed, whether it be with Kanji, Counters, etc. But that doesn't mean you should dumb down the student in hopes that they can take in everything easily.

You`re contradicting yourself.
It is VERY hard to stay away from teaching you to jump into speaking Japanese without being overwhelming. It`s very hard to have both a book that is simple and teaches you well, but yet which lets you be overwhelmed because it is inevitable. Those traits contradict each other and provide little advantage when slapped together. You`d have something that was overwhelming in it`s depth, but which didn`t try to give you the means to use that knowledge in a quick-route-to-conversation.
A dictionary, perhaps?

My Japanese teacher has a no-slang policy, as she is a native from Kansai and feels you should LEARN the language. But upon hearing me speak, she found it hilarious for an American to speak like 'the teenagers' as she said, and allowed me to continue, waiting with baited breath for me to respond humorously

Language isn`t just the words - if you`re speaking to your teacher like teenagers would speak to each other... Maybe you should look into studying culture too. They isn`t something that should be forgiven, no matter how odd it may be.