Your thoughts on self study

[MMM]

Originally Posted by Zagato289

you dont have to be sorry to MMM: you did nothing wrong.

I am not sorry. I was just explaining myself.

[GTJ]

Originally Posted by MMM

Because we wouldn't say that in English. You are still translating in your head, which is normal, but eventually you will want to get away from that. To be a fluent speaker you shouldn't be translating into English in your head, rather, you should have a "Japanese section" in your brain that thinks and speaks in Japanese.

Exactly! I forgot to make this point. Or at least, I covered it a little when I said "think in Japanese".

Translating will be your biggest bane. Ideally, you want to learn it like a child would; I've been doing a lot of research into this approach. Basically, get access to a Japanese only dictionary, then look up words and try to learn their meanings in Japanese. So that way you don't have translations floating around.

I agree with what MMM said in that you should "partition" your mind, but even better would be to make Japanese an everyday thing for you, just something you're always thinking about.

Here's an exercise I do that's great for nouns and vocab: In whatever room or area you're sitting (classroom, kitchen, bus, wherever), look around and name everything you see in Japanese. What I also do is draw the room in my notebook and label things, so I get a twofer in getting my right brain AND my left brain going at the same time which = increased learning! ☆

[Xentron]

It might be a bit ambitious but setting goals really helps accomplish them.
And of course it depends on the person, I my self don't really have much trouble learning different languages.
Japanese is quite different from any language I have studied before but speaking and understanding it is fairly simple when comparing it to more complex languages.
The one thing that is extremely difficult would be the written Japanese.
Just because of the enormous amount of different kanji that is available for you to use.
Of course you don't need to know all of them but you can't just stick to the 26 letters we learned as kids and which we could use for almost every other western language around.

That being said I still find learning Japanese fun and even a bit entertaining.
I'm like a Japanese sponge at the moment
I already have a few penpals whom I mail every now and then.
I mostly write in english though but I try to squeeze in as much Japanese as I can.
Luckily a few of them don't mind writing parts of their letter in romaji as well.

I'll keep pushing my learning abilities to the limit and try and learn this in record time!
Of course with the help of forums like these and friends who speak the language

[edit]
Reply to GTJ

Forgot to get into the point MMM and you made about this.
I'm slowly using that thinking process though.
In the beginning I would hear a word, translate it into English and then continue onto the next one.
This would take so long to actually translate a entire sentence, too long if you're watching a show and a Japanese person is speaking at full speed.
Now I tend to slowly translate everything using images instead just like you would with your own language.
When you hear "Tamago" you just know it's an egg or when to greet you know which greeting to use instead of thinking up it's English equivalent first.

[alanX]

Originally Posted by noobee

i prefer to study Japanese in parallel of what I am doing..

Is it just me, or does this make no sense at all?

[GTJ]

Originally Posted by Xentron

In the beginning I would hear a word, translate it into English and then continue onto the next one.
This would take so long to actually translate a entire sentence, too long if you're watching a show and a Japanese person is speaking at full speed.
Now I tend to slowly translate everything using images instead just like you would with your own language.
When you hear "Tamago" you just know it's an egg or when to greet you know which greeting to use instead of thinking up it's English equivalent first.

Yeah, you've got the right idea. What helps me is images. When I hear a Japanese word, I don't see the translated word in my head, I see the meaning. So when you say tamago, I see an egg. When someone says tomodachi, I see a friend or I get the feeling associated with that. You have to try to reassociate things, rebuilt those neural pathways. You'll get it, man, you definitely have the right attitude and determination!

Just keep coming back whenever you need help or wanna talk about it!
It helps that all the menus in this forum are in Japanese. Especially if you have Rikaichan installed! (It's a great firefox plugin, I highly recommend it)

[KaiTea]

Wow, just reading this entire thread has inspired me in great deals! (Well, maybe not great deals, but it has inspired me) I do understand Xentron on self studying. For about a year, I tried to self study in Japanese... It worked, however because I did not have anyone to practice with the basic things I knew went down the toilet.

Currently, I am taking a class once a week to just keep up with learning. I am the type of person who wants to be ahead of the class, or wants to know what is going on before the teacher covers it... I guess it prevents me from being embarrassed when my teacher asks me "So, please say this..." It is actually embarrassing to me when I stutter when reading Japanese. x_x But! That only means that I am learning, right?

I appreciate your tips and pointers, GTJ. I have never thought of actually trying to think of things in Japanese, rather than in constant English. I guess that is where a few of my flaws lie.

Get Genki. Genki I and Genki II. These are the best textbooks you'll ever read. It helps to get the workbooks, too. I went to the university that wrote them (Kansai Gaidai), and I gotta tell you they're amazing. They're paperback, too, so they won't break your bank.

That is the book I am actually using in class. (lmao) But, it is very very useful! However, it is always good to get another book to get a second opinion on different topics. I self-studied chapters 1-4 in the Genki book and got stuck on chapter 5, only because I felt as if it was very overwhelming to do it all on my own without the help of a teacher to get me to pronounce everything in the correct manner. And it helped! Retaining the info in a different subject though... >_>;;

As for going to Japan... I would love to go to reinforce speaking in Japanese, however... It is something I have to put in the budget sooner or later... -Sigh- I just wish I had to proper resources to go for more than a week. I have been told about the J.E.T program, but I am not interested in teaching children... =/

PS: Sorry I didn't use the "Quote" command correctly... I am just a little slow. ._.

[GTJ]

Originally Posted by KaiTea

Currently, I am taking a class once a week to just keep up with learning. I am the type of person who wants to be ahead of the class, or wants to know what is going on before the teacher covers it... I guess it prevents me from being embarrassed when my teacher asks me "So, please say this..." It is actually embarrassing to me when I stutter when reading Japanese. x_x

Yeah, I'm the same way. I like to be as far ahead as possible.. in fact, I usually like to be just a little bit ahead of myself. If I'm close to mastering a particular grammar point or vocab set, I'll start looking at a new one while I finish up, to kind of overlap and keep up the momentum while at the same time challenging myself by going over things that are beyond me at that time. Which I then learn.

Try not to "overdrive your headlights", as it were. Don't go studying causative-passive just after mastering -te form. Pace yourself and you'll soon figure out what you should be studying and when!

But! That only means that I am learning, right?

Right!

[Ronin4hire]

Just want to sing Genki's praises!

At my university it is the course textbook and it (aswell as my excellent teachers of course) has helped go from being a noob at Japanese to an Intermediate speaker in just 2 and a half years.... (I only call myself intermediate because the uni paper I'm doing at the moment is titled "Intermediate Japanese".. but what I'm trying to say is that I feel my progress has been significant)

[Xentron]

The thing I've always felt is that learning in a class room really slows down the learning process.
When I studied French and German in a class room it took me 4 years just to reach some level of knowing the language (I'm not sure if you could call it intermediate...).
When I attempted to study it at home using my own methods I really got ahead way faster then when I did in school.

For some reason I think that learning in a classroom really holds you back because there are always people who are way behind you when it comes to studying.
And you're always following the pace of the most dull student in your class.
I've contacted a private tutor who lives only a half an hour drive away from where I live.
I'm hoping this will speed up my progress even more.

Also looking for people on skype to help out.
Still kind of hard to find someone who is looking for a language exchange AND knows the English language.
Japanese people trying to learn English for me is not really what I'm looking for, sure I can practice my accent somewhat but I won't be corrected by them because they are A. too polite and B. probably don't know how to explain it in English yet.

It feels really good to read all the comments in this thread though!
We're all like one big japanese studying family or something

[Ronin4hire]

Learning in a classroom means that you have people to practice and socialise with though.

It depends on the class... but where I'm from there is no slowing down for the dull students.

You either keep up or fail.