What's the best way to learn Japanese?

[KyleGoetz]

Originally Posted by Yuusuke

This is a ridiculously credited video. And his Japanese is pretty excellent for someone his age. I mean, he basically admits he's not a native speaker in the video, and he can't be older than 23 or so.

But with a name like Koichi, he could have grown up speaking it to a certain degree, too.

[Sakuuh]

Hello. I'll do my best to write correctly (my mother tongue is spanish).
Actually I'm studying Japanese at university, so there are around 6 japanese teachers whom are from Japan. And we have too an extra course called "kaiwa" (conversation) where japanese students that come to my country, by student exhange, help us to practice japanese; talking about culture, music, etc.

The teachers here use the "Minna no nihongo" metod. Minna no nihongo is a book series, is divided in various lessons and has an excersise book (that one is full in japanese), and there is other that is in spanish (in my case of course. There are english, korean and chinese version too) that explains grammar and has each lesson vocabulary (kanji-hiragana-meaning). We take two quiz per week, these are about the kanji in each lesson (vocabulary) and grammar.
It's a pretty fast metod, but you have to study a lot. I think that if you study alone it's not that difficult, you can take your own time.
At the same time we learn kanji. 12 per week, this include writing and lecture (the most difficult thing), so we have 1 quiz per week about kanji, words that uses those kanji, radicals, number of strokes, etc.

Honestly I think that the metod for learn kanji is not good at all. Our teacher barely speaks spanish, so it's a little difficult to communicate with her. Really, it's better to learn with a teacher who is not japanese. Because japanese teachers teaches like if you were a japanese student! And a 6 year old kid it's not the same that a 17-19 year old student xD.

Well, in conclusion, I totally recomend "Minna no nihongo", but with kanji it's better to find an own metod.
Please, excuse my english n.n;;

[KyleGoetz]

Originally Posted by Sakuuh

Hello. I'll do my best to write correctly (my mother tongue is spanish).
Actually I'm studying Japanese at university, so there are around 6 japanese teachers whom are from Japan. And we have too an extra course called "kaiwa" (conversation) where japanese students that come to my country, by student exhange, help us to practice japanese; talking about culture, music, etc.

The teachers here use the "Minna no nihongo" metod. Minna no nihongo is a book series, is divided in various lessons and has an excersise book (that one is full in japanese), and there is other that is in spanish (in my case of course. There are english, korean and chinese version too) that explains grammar and has each lesson vocabulary (kanji-hiragana-meaning). We take two quiz per week, these are about the kanji in each lesson (vocabulary) and grammar.
It's a pretty fast metod, but you have to study a lot. I think that if you study alone it's not that difficult, you can take your own time.
At the same time we learn kanji. 12 per week, this include writing and lecture (the most difficult thing), so we have 1 quiz per week about kanji, words that uses those kanji, radicals, number of strokes, etc.

Honestly I think that the metod for learn kanji is not good at all. Our teacher barely speaks spanish, so it's a little difficult to communicate with her. Really, it's better to learn with a teacher who is not japanese. Because japanese teachers teaches like if you were a japanese student! And a 6 year old kid it's not the same that a 17-19 year old student xD.

Well, in conclusion, I totally recomend "Minna no nihongo", but with kanji it's better to find an own metod.
Please, excuse my english n.n;;

Given the informality of the Internet, there's absolutely no way a person could detect that your native language isn't English.

[SamuraiAlchemistNinja]

I have been independantly learning Japanese for 3 years, with wide gaps. A few months ago, I did something that greatly helps to keep Japanese in your surroundings everyday.
I acquire (and pay the $25 a month) for TvJapan (NHK) and record children's shows as well as watching the news, documentaries, music shows, etc. It does help a lot, because 1 It gets you in a Japanese mood, 2 It keeps you in the Japanese culture, and 3 It give you your daily dose of hearing native speakers.us

[aussielung]

I'm not fluent in Japanese by any stretch of the imagination. I only started learning a year ago and went into Japanese class's at the start of this year but I know enough now that I could make myself understood while in Tokyo last month (but only if I started the conversation and the person being spoken to used polite forms). I use the Minna no Nihongo series in class but we did not start learning Kanji until the second half of book 1. I am also learning at a school that has only Japanese people teaching the language so we kind of get a mix of the standard way of learning and the immersion method. We also learn to write and read the way Japanese children learn to write and read. After studying Mandarin at university I appreciate this method a lot more as Hiragana and Katakana are so much easier to learn that Hanzi but I had to deliberately forget how to read Hanzi in prep for Kanji.

Anyway, my tips are as follows and are net based.

First is smart.fm for drilling vocab and kanji. You can make your own lists and hear the pronunciation. Right now the site has a few problems since they upgraded but once they are fixed it should be good again.

Lang-8 is also a good blogging site. You type your blog in Japanese and then Japanese people will go read it and correct your grammar and Kanji for you, in return you'll correct their English blogs. Pretty neat and the users are all really nice in my experience.

I also like to take time each other day to translate things on my own. At your level you should have a pretty good understanding of grammar and particals so I think the problem you have now with your ability is not a matter or knowledge but of confidence. I think if you tried a little translation (English to Japanese) you'll be surprissed how good you are.

The other thing that I am going to start doing next year is maybe vlogging in Japanese on YouTube and have users come in a correct your vlogs. Gimmeabreakman, Eleven Colors and Hikoseamon are nice guys and will happily volunteer once they know you have a channel.

Another friend of mine when she was studying Japanese was to speak to her cat in the language. I do that every now and then but my cat is a shit head so I know DAME!!!! Really well.