+- kanji koohii FORUM (http://forum.koohii.com)
+-- Forum: Learning Japanese (http://forum.koohii.com/forum-4.html)
+--- Forum: The Japanese language (http://forum.koohii.com/forum-10.html)
+--- Thread: Why I've stopped doing soely J-J definitions (/thread-11465.html)
Pages:
1
2
Why I've stopped doing soely J-J definitions - gaiaslastlaugh - 2014-01-12
Jackdaw Wrote:I agree, Nadiatims. Everyone has an idea on the best way for others to learn, but which way is the best for each learner is very individual. It's best to just think for yourself and experiment with many different approaches until you find what works best for you.It also helps to come on a forum like this and get input from a variety of learners with a wide range of experience. I find that more valuable than a single person' opinion. Just because someone has learned Japanese to x level doesn't mean they're good at instructing other people on how to replicate their feat.
Why I've stopped doing soely J-J definitions - yudantaiteki - 2014-01-12
Also sometimes people's recommendations are what they wish they had done rather than what they actually did.
Why I've stopped doing soely J-J definitions - gaiaslastlaugh - 2014-01-12
yudantaiteki Wrote:Also sometimes people's recommendations are what they wish they had done rather than what they actually did.Yep. Or they have biases against certain approaches to studying, or their own results are riddled with confirmation bias, or any of the other myriad reasons to treat first-person reporting with skepticism.
One thing I think bears repeating whenever study methods come up. A certain amount of experimentation is good, even necessary. But you can squander weeks and months in search of "a better method". Beyond a certain point, experimentation yields diminishing returns, and starts to eat into the time you could spend *actually studying Japanese*. There are legitimate reasons at times to mix things up. For the most part, I'd say, do some early experimentation to find what works for you, and then march single-mindedly towards victory.
But that's just one person's opinion about what he wishes he would've done. :-D
Why I've stopped doing soely J-J definitions - nadiatims - 2014-01-12
gaiaslastlaugh Wrote:One thing I think bears repeating whenever study methods come up. A certain amount of experimentation is good, even necessary. But you can squander weeks and months in search of "a better method". Beyond a certain point, experimentation yields diminishing returns, and starts to eat into the time you could spend *actually studying Japanese*. There are legitimate reasons at times to mix things up. For the most part, I'd say, do some early experimentation to find what works for you, and then march single-mindedly towards victory.This is very true. Especially considering study method matters less and less as you get better anyway. At some point studying gets mostly superseded by actual use (media or whatever). That is all study methods tend to merge after a few years anyway whether it takes you a year or 2 or 3.
Why I've stopped doing soely J-J definitions - WataruFord - 2014-01-24
legendmaxx Wrote:Deciding whether or not to use English to help learn Japanese has been something that has been bothering me on and off for the last year and a half. Here's why: I have felt like I am capable of learning vocabulary without the help of English fairly sufficiently, but rarely feel like I can actually put it into practice. I feel like a have a sort of vague understanding of the definition, rather than the real world context I would be able to apply if given an English definition. It would seem then, that it would make the most sense for me to have given up on being solely J-J a long time ago, but there has always been one article posted on the Japaneselevelup site that made me reconsider: http://japaneselevelup.com/saying-farewell-to-english-why-part-with-such-a-good-friend/Despite what other posters may have said, using J-J definitions is not terrible advice. Sources like Antimoon, AJATT, and the famous hyper-polyglot Kato Lomb all recommend going monolingual, and their followers have gotten great results. In fact, Lomb doesn't recommend any dictionary at all. She preferred to learn words through context and close attention, because she felt that doing that produced stronger memories for her than instantly seeing (followed by instantly forgetting) a translation. Granted, SRS didn't exist in her time, but there's no question about the effectiveness of monolingual learning. The real question is the effectiveness of monolingual learning for you specifically.
Even though this whole article is filled with made up statistics and other crap, the thought of never being able to reach my full potential in learning Japanese because of not make the monolingual transition is a scary thought, as well as the last thing I want to have to worry about while learning. I know I can just try to ignore what he wrote, but I have had the hardest time trying to shake the feeling that I will mess myself up if I don't stay as monolingual as possible.
Recently however, I have finally decided that I don't want to have only vague understandings of the words I have been learning, and have decided to have both English and Japanese definitions on my Anki cards. I really do believe that I can actually use what I am learn far more quickly and accurately if I have an English definition that I can relate it to. This doesn't mean that I don't read the Japanese definitions, since those are still the basis of my understanding, but rather the English just adds even more, rather than less, to my overall understanding.
I know this was kind of long, but I really want to know what you all think about what is written in that article and whether anyone else has experienced a similar phenomenon of not really feeling like that understand a word well enough to use it unless there is a clear English definition that you can relate it to. Looking for to what you have to say!
The formula for effective language learning is time invested multiplied by motivation divided by inhibition. If the inhibition of using a monolingual dictionary is too large for you, by all means stop right away and use dictionary translations. It doesn't mean you're wrong or that JALUP is wrong. All roads lead to Rome. You just need to find the best road for your sensibilities, and if that road includes monolingual definitions paired with Japanese ones then so be it.
As for understanding words vaguely, I feel opposite as you; I think Japanese definitions are the words' real definitions, while bilingual "definitions" are really more like thesaurus entries. Let's take the word 述べる for example. The denshi jisho definition says "to state, to express, to mention." You can also look at some example sentences on denshi jisho which may or may not sound natural to a Japanese person. This is the definition from weblio.jp: 〔「伸べる」と同源〕順を追って言葉で言い表す。また、文章にして書きしるす。This is the kotobank definition: 考え・意見などを口に出して言う。You can see example sentences on either dictionary that you know for sure sound natural.
If you only learned 述べる from denshi jisho your understanding wouldn't be wrong per se, but if you want to avoid vagueness it's clear a Japanese dictionary is superior. The Japanese definitions give you a noticeably different, and much more thorough, idea of what 述べる means.
Why I've stopped doing soely J-J definitions - Aikynaro - 2014-01-24
I don't think he said the Japanese definition was vague but that his understanding of the definition is vague, which is a completely different problem.
Why I've stopped doing soely J-J definitions - Betelgeuzah - 2014-01-24
WataruFord Wrote:If you only learned 述べる from denshi jisho your understanding wouldn't be wrong per se, but if you want to avoid vagueness it's clear a Japanese dictionary is superior.If you are at a point where you haven't really internalized the language I don't think a Japanese dictionary would be "clearly superior" for unambiguity. In fact a dumbed down English definition may prove to be much more effective for understanding than an accurate definition you don't yet completely comprehend.
Why I've stopped doing soely J-J definitions - nadiatims - 2014-01-24
Don't think of words as specific, at least not at first. Think of them as vague but gaining specific meaning when found in context. Every word means something specific to the context in which it is found. If you come across some word that you would otherwise not understand but remember some vague one word definition from a flash card or however else you learned it and that vague definition helps you get the gist of the content then mission accomplished. You don't need perfect stand alone definitions, just something good enough to understand a word in context. And each encounter will slowly start to flesh out a clearer idea how a word is used.