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+--- Thread: Discovered an awesome Japanese text - "Elementary Japanese" (/thread-2156.html)
Discovered an awesome Japanese text - "Elementary Japanese" - Miaow - 2008-11-26
Ryuujin27 Wrote:http://www.amazon.com/Elementary-Japanese-Vol-Yoko-Hasegawa/dp/0804835047I'll do that! ^_^
Is this the book you're talking about? If they've used it at Berkley (I'm looking at the reviews for this information), then I can probably asked my professor for a review, as he taught there. But the book sounds good by the reviews.
As wccrawford said, let us know what you think 2-3 weeks down the line!
Discovered an awesome Japanese text - "Elementary Japanese" - Miaow - 2008-11-26
Tobberoth Wrote:Don't most real Japanese textbooks start you off with kana right away? I know both Minna no Nihongo and Genki does.My very first textbook was "Japanese for Busy People" (non-kana), then later I bought the kana version, but there was just something about the book that I disliked.
Then I took a Japanese course in college, and the book we used was Jorden's "Japanese the Spoken Language". I thought the extensive grammatical information was awesome, compared to the very sparse "JBP", but the "All romaji all the time" drove me nuts.
So when I come across a Japanese learning source that doesn't use romaji, I find this a real relief. I guess I was just exposed ton the wrong books earlier in my Japanese studies, so books with kana from the beginning seem to be a big deal to me.
Discovered an awesome Japanese text - "Elementary Japanese" - Miaow - 2008-11-26
mattyjaddy Wrote:If you're not familiar with this particular text, it could be called "Japanese for Busy, I mean, College People". It's got basically the same format. Just a different vocabulary focus. It has: Intro dialogue (with [so-so] comics drawn), grammar explanation, exercises. In the first 2 chapters you're expected to master kana on your own.I think the grammar explanations are more in-depth than JBP, and EJ does incorporate kanji as the book progresses, which is cool, IMHO. JBP does not incoporate kanji, in the first volume, anyway.
Quote:Then they start introducing kanji with little to no real help or explanation of the radicals or anything. You have a few boxes for writing practice and BAM you apparently know it.That's what RTK is for! ^_^
Quote:The original post sounded like a straight advertisement. Textbooks always have faults that should be recognized and managed with supplemental resources.Of course, I agree - no textbook is without its faults. And no person either - I tend to get long-winded and easily excitable. I wrote that post after doing two chapters of EJ - I was on a "I could read this whole dialog" high.
And I *am* using supplemental resources, as no one book can do everything:
Main Study Material:
* Remembering the Kanji
* Japanese for Everyone: Text, Workbook, Kanji Book
* Elementary Japanese
Other supplementary material:
* Japanese in Mangaland series
* Japanese the Manga Way
* Mangajin's Basic Japanese Through Comics
* Reading Japanese
* Was using Eleanor Jorden's Japanese: the Spoken Language for the interesting linguistic/grammar descriptions, but I'm hoping EJ will fill that gap with non-romaji-ness. THAT'S why I leaped before I looked and had that gushing post. I'm going to edit it so it doesn't come across as an advertisement. (blush) すみません
* I recently discovered the AJATT method, but I think I need some grammar under my belt to start sentence mining from manga, "Breaking Into Japanese Literature, and other sources. (even though Khatz is not favourable toward textbooks - but I'm a Japanese book junkie - more on that in another topic).
~Miaow~
Discovered an awesome Japanese text - "Elementary Japanese" - Miaow - 2008-11-26
MeNoSavvy Wrote:I'm sure the textbook is awesome, but it seems a bit suspicious that your first post is a gushing review of it. I would strongly recommend beginners stick to textbooks that have already been used by others on this forum. Don't waste your time on an unproven text, it is unlikely to be substantially better than any of the other beginners textbooks such as Genki, Japanese For Everyone, etc.I'd thought of getting Genki at one point, but the price of the books plus the CDs is really high. another thing I liked about Elemntary Japanese was the fact it came with a CD. And it just happened to be at the bookstore when was browsing the Japanese book section. (Always a dangerous practice for me, but.... I'm so drawn to that section of the store.... o_O
Quote:Regarding Japanese For Everyone, I think it is a great book. My only complaint is the font is too small ! The pace is good for someone like me who studied a little bit of Japanese before. I think if I was a complete beginner of average aptitude, Japanese for Everyone might overwhelm me with it's "busy" format. Other good points are relatively clear explanations and heaps of drills.Yes, I like Japanese for Everyone too, but I AM overwhelmed with its busy format.
I guess my original post could be boiled down to two things:
1. Does anyone else here use Elementary Japanese
2. Does the Teacher's Manual have the exercise answers?
~Miaow~
Discovered an awesome Japanese text - "Elementary Japanese" - Tobberoth - 2008-11-26
I really can't bring myself to recommend Genki. I used it before going to Japan and safe to say, it's extremely inferior to Minna no Nihongo. The pacing just felt really odd in it, I guess it might be different if you have classes to go with it.. there was also way too much English in it, I prefer my textbooks to be 100% Japanese (Minna no Nihongo and 中級から学ぶ are both Japanese-only, at least in the main textbooks.)
Discovered an awesome Japanese text - "Elementary Japanese" - mentat_kgs - 2008-11-26
Tobberoth Wrote:You make it sound as if Minna no Nihongo is dumbed down Japanese. It isn't. Putting "watashi" in front of everything is something you learn from western resources, not textbooks made by Japanese companies.Yes, in my opinion, it is dumbed down. The situations are boring and uninteresting.
When your goal is fluency in the language. To be able to reason and discuss, you cannot limmit yourself to such shallow input.
You need the odd slang from the future, the poetry from the songs. These are the things that are fuel to interpretation and discussion, not the saltless japanese from minna no nihongo.
Discovered an awesome Japanese text - "Elementary Japanese" - Tobberoth - 2008-11-26
mentat_kgs Wrote:Limit yourself? Who's talking about limiting anything. I'm talking about beginners, the people the books are meant for. I'm talking about people who learn Japanese for practical reasons, not for dreams of being able to become a native Japanese like some people here seem to think is a reasonable goal. No, you don't need slang from the future. You don't need poetry from songs. You need to be able to function. I'm fluent in conversational Japanese, and I became fluent in very short time. How? Because I learned the Japanese one needs to be fluent in, not stuff I can look up when I need it. When I'm in Tokyo and want to go somewhere, I want to be able to go up to a random japanese person and have a natural correct conversation about how to get there. Not yelling "omae, eki doko? fukusatsu na michidakara sa. wakanai pyon." just because I heard those words in the latest anime I saw.Tobberoth Wrote:You make it sound as if Minna no Nihongo is dumbed down Japanese. It isn't. Putting "watashi" in front of everything is something you learn from western resources, not textbooks made by Japanese companies.Yes, in my opinion, it is dumbed down. The situations are boring and uninteresting.
When your goal is fluency in the language. To be able to reason and discuss, you cannot limmit yourself to such shallow input.
You need the odd slang from the future, the poetry from the songs. These are the things that are fuel to interpretation and discussion, not the saltless japanese from minna no nihongo.
Fuel to interpretation and discussion? You're not studying philosophy, stuff like that can wait until you're actually good enough to hold a decent conversation about something which has some form of practical importance.
The conversations aren't dumbed down in the slightest. They are focused. They are natural real dialogs while still not introducing too much at the same time.
Discovered an awesome Japanese text - "Elementary Japanese" - albion - 2008-11-26
Can you have slang from the future? I'd assume that would have to be made up, and not much use outside of what it was made up for.
Tobberoth Wrote:Minna no Nihongo is dialogs picked because of their usefulness in day to day Japanese, most of the "real" resources aren't. Minna no Nihongo was made with lack of ability in mind and explains stuff which might be unclear. Standard resources do not, you're supposed to already know Japanese when you use them.I don't have anything the sources you mention. It'd be hypocritical for me to do so, since for the longest time (but before hearing about AJATT) it was pretty much the only thing that kept my Japanese alive. And I'd like to understand the stuff I like more fully, even if that isn't applicable to real life. So I'm all for using what you love to learn from. Plus it gives you something to talk about. But I don't get some of the textbook hate that goes on some times.
It'd be nice to find real-life, 'in the wild' examples of 'sink' and 'tap' and 'bathtub' and so on. But it'd be a lot easier just to have a textbook list them all together, with a workable dialogue using them, than wait until the stars align and I manage find examples in what I read/watch containing each of those.
I already know a fair bit of Japanese, and I know enough not to use 'watashi wa...' or the like. But it's that real life stuff I'd like to more of. I've watched films, read novels and manga, and played videos games for years. And while I can get through and understand those the majority of the time, I wouldn't like my chances in a practical situation in the real world without some kind of reinforcing some practical Japanese. Because all that stuff was entertainment, and not meant to teach you how to function in society. So if I can learn that practical, useful stuff from a book, I'm all for the book.
In a similar vain with books on grammar and sentence patterns. I'd just rather someone give me all this stuff up front so I don't have to search far and wide for it, and so with an explanation so I know I'm getting the right idea and not making something up in my head.
I've not tried Minna no Nihongo, but I do have Genki I laying around. But I've not made much way through (more from laziness than any fault I found in the small amount of the book I've looked through, but maybe I need to skip to stuff I don't know). But I wouldn't mind having a look at MnN.
I've probably lost the topic completely now and said a whole lot of nothing, so I'm stopping here.
Quote:"omae, eki doko? fukusatsu na michidakara sa. wakanai pyon."I saw someone (actually, a couple of people) talking, or writing, like that online. Like they're a manga character or something. As I recall, they didn't take much notice of the people telling them they sounded strange. I'd hope that's just an 'internet tough guy' kind of thing, and that no one in their right mind would speak like that face to face to another human being.
Discovered an awesome Japanese text - "Elementary Japanese" - Miaow - 2008-11-26
bodhisamaya Wrote:This is almost certainly spam. It reads like a professionally written advertisement. The user registered two weeks ago. Hmmm....No, it's just a post by someone who gets easily excitable. "Professionally written advertisement"? yikes. Maybe I should go into a new line of work?
Why though?
Really, I just discovered this site and the AJATT site and then I find this book that seems what I've been looking for in a textbook - a textbook that seems to have been designed for those who have the kana down pat. Maybe it's not such a great book. Like another poster said, let's see how it goes in a couple weeks.
Take my post like this: I was like a kid with a new toy. Enthusiasm ensues.
すみません
Discovered an awesome Japanese text - "Elementary Japanese" - Miaow - 2008-11-26
cameron_en Wrote:Who'd wanna put themselves through the pain of using a textbook?I find grammar explanations to be interesting.
I am attracted to the AJATT methodology, but, with my not knowing a lot of basic grammar, it seems a bit to me to be jumping in headfirst at the deep end of the pool. I think there should be some basic foundation before sentence mining.
Discovered an awesome Japanese text - "Elementary Japanese" - mentat_kgs - 2008-11-26
Tobberoth Wrote:I want to be able to go up to a random japanese person and have a natural correct conversation about how to get there. Not yelling "omae, eki doko? fukusatsu na michidakara sa. wakanai pyon." just because I heard those words in the latest anime I saw.Again, this is a false assumption. The guy you are describing also probably cannot conjugate 書く.
Even if minna no nihongo is not dumbed down, you are dumbing everything else down.
Discovered an awesome Japanese text - "Elementary Japanese" - Tobberoth - 2008-11-26
mentat_kgs Wrote:I'm sorry, it's called "theoretical examples". This is a forum, not a scientific report. I don't have the time nor the resources to write 100% correct situations for every single one of my points. The guy I'm describing does not exist in real life. I would love to find real people like that, record them talking to Japanese people and show you, but it's not going to happen, my simplified examples will have to do.Tobberoth Wrote:I want to be able to go up to a random japanese person and have a natural correct conversation about how to get there. Not yelling "omae, eki doko? fukusatsu na michidakara sa. wakanai pyon." just because I heard those words in the latest anime I saw.Again, this is a false assumption. The guy you are describing also probably cannot conjugate 書く.
Even if minna no nihongo is not dumbed down, you are dumbing everything else down.
The point being, if you still haven't realized it, that to converse about something in a natural sense, you need to know HOW it's discussed in a natural sense. It isn't enough to know the words, and I'm sure you agree with me, it's one of the reasons why exposure is such a powerful learning tool. So, you need exposure to real natural dialogs in those situations to be natural in those situations yourself. A good way of doing it? Exposure to enough Japanese texts which concern the situation. A faster way? Studying the situation.
Instead of having to look up 10 books about asking for directions, or at least a few books where the situation comes up, I can read one chapter in Minna no Nihongo and my bases will be covered.
From my point of view, Minna no Nihongo is a source of exposure, which has all the stuff you need lined up in a great i + 1 sense. You're exposed to a natural dialog of a situation, you're given example sentences to show how to be creative with it, all in one chapter.
Discovered an awesome Japanese text - "Elementary Japanese" - Miaow - 2008-11-26
Tobberoth Wrote:Of course it's expensive, then again, you only need the textbooks, not the whole set. Maybe it differs depending on location, but I found Minna no Nihongo insanely useful living in Japan.. pretty much every new chapter, I learned new things I could use right away. I seriously doubt there's a better source of good early Japanese. If you want to become conversational as fast as possible in Japan, I would totaly recommend it.Well, while I hope to visit Japan someday, my goals at this point are, I admit, not very ambitious, compared to others' - I want to be able to read manga in its original form... and the manga I like tend to be those featured in 「なかよし」, 「リボン」, - しょうじょ manga - aimed at middle school kids. I also want to understand anime and Japanese movies without subtitles. The Japanese have some beautiful bead-craft books, so being able to read those are another goal of mine.
It might be strange, but spoken conversation ability is less important to me than written/read at this point.
Discovered an awesome Japanese text - "Elementary Japanese" - Tobberoth - 2008-11-26
Miaow Wrote:Well, while I hope to visit Japan someday, my goals at this point are, I admit, not very ambitious, compared to others' - I want to be able to read manga in its original form... and the manga I like tend to be those featured in 「なかよし」, 「リボン」, - しょうじょ manga - aimed at middle school kids. I also want to understand anime and Japanese movies without subtitles. The Japanese have some beautiful bead-craft books, so being able to read those are another goal of mine.It isn't strange at all, if you're not in Japan you might not even have anyone to talk to.
It might be strange, but spoken conversation ability is less important to me than written at this point.
I'm going to be straight with you though: Getting good enough to learn to understand Japanese movies without subtitles takes very long, so I'd say your goal is more than enough ambitious. But stick to the books and this site, do your best and keep going. As soon as you feel ready, start mining sentences like crazy and you'll be able to read manga soon enough. After that, all you have to do is keep practicing and the talent will come as you go. It won't go over night, but eventually you'll probably sit by the TV watching a movie in Japanese without subs. And who knows, by that time it's possible you'll be good enough to speak Japanese quite decently when you get the chance
Discovered an awesome Japanese text - "Elementary Japanese" - phauna - 2008-11-26
Anti-textbook and anti-school, it's the cool new thing these days, school sucks, textbooks suck, I don't know about you guys, but schools are effective at what they do, if they are good schools. If they are not, then go to a good one. Some textbooks are bad, and some are good. I didn't hate going to school or university, I don't hate textbooks, even for language learning. If I could go to a good school to learn Japanese, I would, and watch dramas and read mangas on the side. It wouldn't be worse, it would be better than self study.
A teacher or a textbook is meant to make things easier for you. It's standing on the shoulders of giants. They save you from having to come up with everything yourself, and order it in a manageable progression. I think these anti-school types perhaps didn't do so well in school or something and are looking for someone to blame. And what do you call Heisig? It's a textbook!
Discovered an awesome Japanese text - "Elementary Japanese" - Mcjon01 - 2008-11-26
phauna Wrote:Anti-textbook and anti-school, it's the cool new thing these days, school sucks, textbooks suck, I don't know about you guys, but schools are effective at what they do, if they are good schools. If they are not, then go to a good one. Some textbooks are bad, and some are good. I didn't hate going to school or university, I don't hate textbooks, even for language learning. If I could go to a good school to learn Japanese, I would, and watch dramas and read mangas on the side. It wouldn't be worse, it would be better than self study.All study is self study. The best programs in the world will do nothing for somebody that's unwilling to learn. Of course, I only hate schools because I'm struggling under the weight of a lot of frivolous projects and assignments right now.
A teacher or a textbook is meant to make things easier for you. It's standing on the shoulders of giants. They save you from having to come up with everything yourself, and order it in a manageable progression. I think these anti-school types perhaps didn't do so well in school or something and are looking for someone to blame. And what do you call Heisig? It's a textbook!
Textbooks are great, though; if I didn't think so I wouldn't have thousands of them.
Discovered an awesome Japanese text - "Elementary Japanese" - mentat_kgs - 2008-11-26
I want to be a professor someday. So I'm not against the school system at all.
But there are many kinds of professors:
The bad ones, that teach nothing;
The good ones, that teach a lot;
The awesome ones, that inspire you to learn by yourself, and that'll give you a hand when you need it.
The same for minna no nihongo. It is digested knowledge. I know a lot of people who started and love it. I see why they like it.
But I don't like it. It was made for people that don't know kanji. It simply doesn't fit after RTK. After RTK, the learner has potential for much better sources.
RTK frees you to get better input from the beginning.
Discovered an awesome Japanese text - "Elementary Japanese" - mentat_kgs - 2008-11-26
Grammar instruction is very controversial.
Let me tell you my story.
I learned Portuguese when I was a baby.
Then I went to school, and they started feeding me grammar.
At some point I ended up learned English by accident while playing videogames and watching hollywood movies. And later reading Frank Herbert's and Bernard Cornwell's noves.
In highschool I had English classes in my curriculum, but the teacher released me from the classes and only let me do the tests - I would allways get an A anyway. He was a great guy.
There was also Spanish, but the teachr was a b****. So I ended up learning no Spanish at all.
By the time I got in college, I had studied portuguese grammar for 11 years already.
At this stage of life, most decide to forget it - as it is normaly useless anyway. But I loved languages and decided to keep this knowledge, and learn a bit more. So I kept reading about the subject and I have a modest idea about natural language grammar frameworks.
I loved so much grammar and languages that I chose to enter a Computer Science course. And so I did. Since my first day, I started learning as many programming languages as I could.
During my 2nd year of college, I wrote my first compiler, i.e., a computer program that checks the validity of other computer programs. A grammar!
By the end of my course, I had already learned the basics of many programming languages. Btw, I'm very passionate about functional programming.
A few years have passed and I'm still messing with compilers (i.e. grammars checkers for computer programs).
So, basicaly you can say that I'm a grammar loving person.
I did nothing in my life but to study grammar systems.
But I'm still against studying grammars when learning a language, in this case, japanese.
It is not that I'm lazy, or that I'm being an AJATT fanboy (wich I might be). I honestly think it is useless.
Discovered an awesome Japanese text - "Elementary Japanese" - bodhisamaya - 2008-11-26
Miaow Wrote:Well then you should do really well at RTK. Be sure to share your stories. I did check that book out at the public library 6 months ago. It had some good charts and I practiced reading the sentences for a couple weeks. I didn't feel it justified the huge price tag (for my budget) at Borders to add to my collection of books though.bodhisamaya Wrote:"Professionally written advertisement"? yikes. Maybe I should go into a new line of work?
Really, I just discovered this site and the AJATT site and then I find this book that seems what I've been looking for in a textbook - a textbook that seems to have been designed for those who have the kana down pat. Maybe it's not such a great book. Like another poster said, let's see how it goes in a couple weeks.
Take my post like this: I was like a kid with a new toy. Enthusiasm ensues.
すみません
Discovered an awesome Japanese text - "Elementary Japanese" - timcampbell - 2008-11-26
Tobberoth Wrote:Just a question for you Tobberoth, out of curiosity. You've mentioned before that you learned English as a second language. Judging from your posts here I'd have a difficult time distinguishing your writing from native speakers, if I was tested on it. There's a very natural flow to the words. What methods did you learn to use English? Some school textbooks, I assume - movies, books, friends?mentat_kgs Wrote:I'm sorry, it's called "theoretical examples". This is a forum, not a scientific report. I don't have the time nor the resources to write 100% correct situations for every single one of my points. The guy I'm describing does not exist in real life. I would love to find real people like that, record them talking to Japanese people and show you, but it's not going to happen, my simplified examples will have to do.Tobberoth Wrote:I want to be able to go up to a random japanese person and have a natural correct conversation about how to get there. Not yelling "omae, eki doko? fukusatsu na michidakara sa. wakanai pyon." just because I heard those words in the latest anime I saw.Again, this is a false assumption. The guy you are describing also probably cannot conjugate 書く.
Even if minna no nihongo is not dumbed down, you are dumbing everything else down.
The point being, if you still haven't realized it, that to converse about something in a natural sense, you need to know HOW it's discussed in a natural sense. It isn't enough to know the words, and I'm sure you agree with me, it's one of the reasons why exposure is such a powerful learning tool. So, you need exposure to real natural dialogs in those situations to be natural in those situations yourself. A good way of doing it? Exposure to enough Japanese texts which concern the situation. A faster way? Studying the situation.
Instead of having to look up 10 books about asking for directions, or at least a few books where the situation comes up, I can read one chapter in Minna no Nihongo and my bases will be covered.
From my point of view, Minna no Nihongo is a source of exposure, which has all the stuff you need lined up in a great i + 1 sense. You're exposed to a natural dialog of a situation, you're given example sentences to show how to be creative with it, all in one chapter.
Just wondering since your English (at least the written part I see) is very proficient, so I'm wondering what methods you used, discovered or discarded to get yourself up to that level of English fluency that you are now applying to Japanese.
Discovered an awesome Japanese text - "Elementary Japanese" - alyks - 2008-11-26
Miaow Wrote:Well, while I hope to visit Japan someday, my goals at this point are, I admit, not very ambitious, compared to others' - I want to be able to read manga in its original form... and the manga I like tend to be those featured in 「なかよし」, 「リボン」, - しょうじょ manga - aimed at middle school kids. I also want to understand anime and Japanese movies without subtitles. The Japanese have some beautiful bead-craft books, so being able to read those are another goal of mine.That's a very good goal to start out with. But if you want to read manga and anime in the original, why would you be spending your time not doing that? If you find your textbook enjoyable, then by all means continue. But if it ever gets to the point where you don't look forward to opening that textbook and you long for the manga and anime, you need to stop.
It might be strange, but spoken conversation ability is less important to me than written/read at this point.
mentat Wrote:The same for minna no nihongo. It is digested knowledge. I know a lot of people who started and love it. I see why they like it.That's exactly it. You can learn from minna no nihongo and you can get up to conversational Japanese quickly. But it's learning stale knowledge. It may make things easier for short term goals. Minna no nihongo can be excellent for a beginner if they enjoy it, but thinking you won't learn as well or better over the long run without a textbook is something I disagree with. Even learning textbook Japanese well, the discovery still needs to happen through exposure. So you might as well start from exposure. I believe it's better in the long run to learn by discovering these things on your own.
There's no doubt Einstein truly understood his formulas, he discovered them through trial and error and constant exploration leading to discovery. How many people can be said to have the same understanding today having studied his digested conclusions? Did Einstein force himself and think "I need to learn x amount of things today"? I feel it would eventually lead to a better understanding and a deeper grasp of the knowledge to follow the path of discovery.
And I don't see anything wrong with that. If you follow the path of interest and discovery, the risk of burnout is much lower. If you look forward to exploring the language then you will naturally spend more and more time with the language, which is a good thing no matter how you slice it.
I simply believe this:
Grammar instruction is risky because you don't truly understand it until you're exposed to it enough. So you might as well start from the exposure.
Grammar instruction and textbook instruction runs a high risk of burnout. It's very easy to get bored here. Besides, why do you want to learn a language? If it's to read manga, then why would you spend time not reading manga? If it's to make friends in the target language, wouldn't your time be better spent immersing yourself in the culture to understand their viewpoint?
To understand the Japanese viewpoint, you must walk a thousand miles in Japanese shoes. English instruction gives an English perspective on Japanese. To truly master a language you need the cultural perspective.
Discovered an awesome Japanese text - "Elementary Japanese" - TerryS - 2008-11-26
MeNoSavvy Wrote:For example the Japanese for Busy People series (which was for a long time the most popular text), was initially published only in romaji versions.What I find frustrating in looking for beginner-level books is that I'm not totally a beginner...and even if I was, books should just have a chart at the beginning, anyway...you can learn this "alphabet" extremely fast, so you *should* be able to use it after the first 1 or 2 chapters. After researching on Amazon, Japanese for Busy People was my top choice, except that the first book spends too much time "teaching" kana. In my opinion, you don't even need to teach it, just present it, along with how to lengthen a vowel, when vowels become silent, etc. It's ridiculous to waste workbook space "practicing kana" when a simple sheet of scrap paper will do. But I figured if I jumped ahead to II, I might miss more basic grammar...so I'll wait until I work through the "sentence pattern" books I have. Then I may consider buying JFBP II and III -- or maybe not.
@ miaow: Now, I may seriously consider Elementary Japanese -- at least I will bookmark it -- thanks for the description and the link!
Discovered an awesome Japanese text - "Elementary Japanese" - phauna - 2008-11-27
alyks Wrote:There's no doubt Einstein truly understood his formulas, he discovered them through trial and error and constant exploration leading to discovery. How many people can be said to have the same understanding today having studied his digested conclusions? Did Einstein force himself and think "I need to learn x amount of things today"? I feel it would eventually lead to a better understanding and a deeper grasp of the knowledge to follow the path of discovery.Einstein in the situation you are describing is using his creativity and intelligence to produce new knowledge, not to learn something already known. He presumably learned maths and physics first, and then developed them later. There is no point reinventing the wheel. I highly doubt Einstein didn't read maths and physics books for about twenty years before coming up with new stuff. Physicists all go to school, a lot, and read textbooks and research papers all day and night. No physicists start from first principles to gain their scientific knowledge, it would be impossible to do it all in a lifetime these days.
I simply believe this:
Grammar instruction is risky because you don't truly understand it until you're exposed to it enough. So you might as well start from the exposure.
Grammar instruction is not risky. 'No instruction' is risky. Are you seriously saying that learning a language from first principles is easier and more effective? It is extremely difficult and error prone I should think. Imagine being dropped in the Amazon and having to decipher the language of a tribe. It would take many many years. Now imagine being dropped in the jungle holding a grammar book with English explanations of that tribe's language. Congratulations, you have saved yourself years of work.
Input is very important. Here's how I use a grammar book. I see an unknown construction, I look it up in two minutes, read the explanation for five minutes, and then I put the unknown sentence into my srs, possibly adding other examples with the same structure. Then I don't look at the grammar again, unless I forget what it means. The same for text books. I go through them once, put things I find useful in the srs, then never look at them again. Nobody is advocating the poring over of grammar books, but to say you should never use a grammar book, or that you should just somehow 'work out' the structure through willpower is ludicrous. If you don't know a word, look it up in the dictionary. If you don't know a structure, then look it up in a grammar book. If you can work out words and structures from context, then you have already probably learned most of the grammar and common words in a language anyhow. Beginners cannot do this.
I feel you are my amicable nemesis, alyks. It's always a pleasure.
Discovered an awesome Japanese text - "Elementary Japanese" - Tobberoth - 2008-11-27
timcampbell Wrote:Just a question for you Tobberoth, out of curiosity. You've mentioned before that you learned English as a second language. Judging from your posts here I'd have a difficult time distinguishing your writing from native speakers, if I was tested on it. There's a very natural flow to the words. What methods did you learn to use English? Some school textbooks, I assume - movies, books, friends?Why, I thank you for the compliment! My English ability is the result of years of studies and usage. In Sweden, we start studying English in second grade, several hours a week. I'd say, we learn to speak simple English even before we learn to speak Swedish on an adult level. This is pure textbook study in class, just like other language studies. English and Swedish are very similar, being north germanic languages, so we don't have to learn any new big concepts really. Stuff like I have, you have, he she it has, we learn from mnemonics like the one I just said.
Just wondering since your English (at least the written part I see) is very proficient, so I'm wondering what methods you used, discovered or discarded to get yourself up to that level of English fluency that you are now applying to Japanese.
Learning English just like this would make Swedes decent at English but not much better than the average Japanese. What makes the difference later, in the long run, is of course exposure and usage. I'd say over 50% of Swedish television is in English, pretty much any popular american show is aired here. Prison Break, Heroes, Jericho, Days of our lifes... you name it. Pretty much any American sitcom ever has probably aired in Sweden. Same with music, I'm sure I can name as many American bands as the next guy, many Swedish artists write their songs in English. As for written proficiency, I've been using American forums for as long as I can remember... gamefaqs being one of them.
Since I've learned English since I was 8, I can't remember ever feeling like I got good... I know it took me several years before I could watch English TV without the need of subtitles but I don't remember noticing the difference. Pretty much every Swede is fluent in English, it's not something we study actively outside of school so I can't really say I'm applying anything in my studies of Japanese.
My way of studying Japanese was more or less: Go to Japan and study at a language institute for a year, hope to get fluent. If not, keep going from there, which is what I'm doing right now. I'm good enough for most Japanese sources, all I need is the time it takes to get better. I'm focusing my studies on JLPT1 but outside of that, I'm just letting more vocabulary and phrases sink in.
EDIT: I'd also like to give my support to Phaunas post, I agree with it wholeheartedly. Grammar isn't an old bad way to learn a language, it's using the experience of others to get done faster.
Discovered an awesome Japanese text - "Elementary Japanese" - mattyjaddy - 2008-11-27
Gomen Miaow! I thought you were spam, too. I'm glad you found a textbook that fits your style. And good luck working through. I see where your post was coming from and it seems you have a good idea for how to incorporate it into a grander study regime and how to complement it with other resources. The dialogs are nice because they are written so that you can easily understand them from one chapter to the next. I used the book up to Chapter 6. That was about the time last year when I abandoned my studies altogether due to being fed up with Japan and the wintertime blues and culture shock and missing my family. When I came back to studying, I found AJATT and didn't feel the need to use the textbook again. Though I haven't used it, I think I would actually recommend minna no nihongo even if it doesn't have the comics. The idea of an all Japanese text is appealing to me. And in my opinion all these basic texts generally contain the same information, which is to say only semi-useful information, but enough to get you started acquiring through input.
Anyway, gambatte kudasai ne!