I find a lot of discussion on how to learn vocab and grammer and kanji but not much on how to learn to think in Japanese. I guess its simple, practice a lot, but I was curious how other people do it and if my current approach is a good one.

I've only been studying japanese for a short time but already I've noticed myself changing how I read/listen to sentences and I was wondering if I was heading in the right direction or not.

For example here is a simple sentence：

わたし　は　きのう　うち　で　ともだち　と　ひるーごはん　を　たべました。

When I first started I would have to read the whole sentence, look at each individual word to make sure I understood them all. Then I would go back and group the words with particles and create small english translations for each fragment. I would then have something like "I, yesterday, at my house, with a friend, lunch, ate". Then finally I could rearrange them and modify them into an english sentence before I was happy I understood it.

After a bit of time I realized I didn't need the last step, and now I can create the small english translations on the fly as I read/listen to it. This speeds things up a lot, and as long as I understand how the small fragments interact with each other, i.e. the grammer, I'm happy I understand it at that point and dont try and turn it into english grammer.

Is this a good or bad approach? It seems like the best way to eventually be able to think in the Japanese grammer/language rather than relying on english grammer to understand things, but if there are problems Im not seeing it would be good to know now

The next problem to tackle will be understanding the words and word/particle combinations in japanese instead of having to translate those into english concepts. I think this part will take a lot longer as they don't always have a simple English equivalent, so you need to develop a whole new concept in your head and it has to be the Japanese concept for the particle. I can see it happening slowly so just more practice needed I guess.

Anyone got any tips for learning to think in japanese, apart from sticking 10,000 sentences into Anki

As you become more familiar with words you'll stop translating them in your head every time you see it. You'll see this happen right away with words you hear a lot like 本当 and 大丈夫. It's not something you'll need to force, it will happen on its own.

Keep listening and reading a lot, keep being exposed to the language and let it come on it's own.

When we start out learning a new language of course we try to translate and convert everything into our native one, but with time we start becoming more and more used to the new one and eventually we reach a different mindset. I don't think there are any real shortcuts, it comes along when it's ready.

My 2円 anyway.

You're on the right track. Just keep re-evaluating your process as you get better. Ie, don't force yourself to translate into english if you already have a strong feeling you know what something means. Eventually any need to translate to english will disappear.

Then you get the awesomeness of understanding something and having no clue how to express it in english.

Like most have said. The longer you allow yourself hear, read, and use Japanese the easier it will be to think in Japanese. Pretty simple. But it takes time.

If you're "strongly monolingual", then you're likely to believe, perhaps unconsciously, that "thought" == "my native language" and that you can't really understand something until you've expressed it in your language, with its own peculiar word order, etc.

As zigmonty alluded to, there'll come a "aha!" moment when you realize that thoughts or concepts are independent of language and only need to be converted *to* some particular language to communicate them to someone else, not to yourself.

Yeah, I was basically strongly monolingual (at least compared to some of the europeans on this forum), with the exception of being a programmer. A lot of people really seem to believe that "understanding" is another word for "translating into english". There are quite a few people i know who are afraid of learning japanese in japanese, even though their japanese is easily good enough. At the same time though, sitting there pretending you understand something you don't because you think deconstructing is bad is also not helpful.

Actually, at the risk of dragging another thread into an argument (and sorta contradicting myself...), i find this is a big advantage of listening. Trying to follow something at a native or near native speed forces you to stop translating: there simply isn't time for it. When i was a beginner, i found games with my teacher where she gave simple instructions helpful. Games like simon says. Or listen to a description and put your hand on the matching card. Especially if you're competing against others, it forces you to act on the instruction without translating it. Was fairly eye opening for me.

What you want is for your brain to process larger chunks of Japanese, automatically. Try to focus more on the groups of words, paying attention to why they are the way they are.

わたしは
きのう
うちで
ともだちと
ひるごはんをたべました。

I agree with what everyone has said.

You just get to a point where you 'feel' the meaning when you are listening to something in Japanese and can understand it. Often it is difficult for me to then try and put it into English (in both my head and if I am speaking) and I really have to think hard about it. That's why I don't think I would ever make a good interpreter...using one language or the other is fine, but trying to use both simultaneously, what a headache :| But if I hear a word that I don't automatically understand usually I will try and think of the English translation for my self, or just skip it if it isn't really important in the overall context.

But the best advice is just constantly be exposed to it. It took me a few months of living in Japan before I could think in Japanese without trying to translate conversations in my head and over analysing everything I heard or wanted to say. Eventually you will get to a point where your confidence builds up enough and you have had enough experience with Japanese that the words just flow out. Then you will realise that you are thinking in Japanese...it's a bit weird, but in a good way

Particles always have been a thorn in my eye, when I learnt Japanese. Just have a look at the multiple usage of the particle で! The decision and consistent reviewing in anki of the All About Particles deck had an immense effect on me. Of course, there are still troubles with the は or が in active use and which conditional needs to be used in this and that situation - but that's about all. I somehow got the 'feeling' for what sentence ending particle to use, that's for sure.
What I also recognise is, the more sentences I mine from Kanzen Master, that is, sentences exercising and teaching the usage of grammar not only in one, but three sentences per grammar point, the better my overall understanding becomes and I just have to skip a sentence. I find it more comfortable having the asked grammar point of an anki card in my deck marked 'bold'; I see it and I know what the correct answer is.

Works great for me.. Just try it!
P.S. I had been trying Tae Kim's grammar deck by Nukemarine, but that wouldn't work for some reason for me. I did not like the 'enter the right answer' part, as this just cost time and I sometimes did not get the exact answer, but some pretty good alternative as a still valid answer. Perhaps I will come to reconstruct that deck for my own sake and purpose at some point, but I'm feeling tired right now starting from これはりんごです。 sentences :x

You think in Japanese once your brain has built the pathways directly from concept to Japanese word and back. So りんご should NOT make you think of "Apple", but instead you should think of the shiny red/green fruit.

Now guess you're asking how do you get to this stage? Well, I'm now a firm believer than you can't really learn from reading - words are a mere approximation of language, and language really exists in aural form, i.e. spoken / heard.

To build up these connections, you need to watch and read alot of Japanese media. Hear りんご spoken on TV whilst someone is eating one, and you'll remember that word forever. This is why AJATT is so effective, its how babies learn - give your brain a word and a physical context and it'll built the pathways for ya.

Another quick way is speaking practise. You want some fruit and ask "りんご ください" - first time you'll probably need to construct the sentence from english in your head, but after that you'll just know how to say it and you'll even be able to substitute in other fruits!

None of this scientific, just my 2 cents..

@aphasia - Speech is not language. Language is multimodal/amodal. Different sensory paths, e.g. visuospatial/gestural/aural, leading to abstract semantic/syntactic areas in the brain. For Japanese, one good model (a modification of the multilevel interactive activation model) to think of this contains the ‘lemma unit’, a concept node that mediates orthographic and phonological representations.

The speech apparatus, when combined with other senses, is great for speech (though writing isn't far behind when it comes to phonological processing, which is amazing), but especially for Japanese writing/word formation which is heavily morphographic and has a stronger lexico-semantic element with visuospatial processing being an important factor, myths like speech = language aren't any more accurate or useful than language = thought.

Adults are not babies and can't learn like babies. We're not as different as previously thought when it comes to things like plasticity, but. We're still not going to probabilistically drink up new words and constructions like water the way they do. We can approximate it and this is where ideas for L2 learning such as Brian MacWhinney's ‘resonance’ comes into play and we can add spaced retrieval practice and mnemonics (e.g. using previous knowledge, developing chunking and retrieval skills) to conventional concepts like fast-mapping and slow-mapping, but applying ideas of pre-literate language learning of infants (who are going to learn most of their vocabulary in writing after they learn to read) and trying to learn Japanese by watching lots of TV isn't going to cut it. You need some strategy in there. We need quality of active, tough but engaging learning sessions as much or more than just quantity of passive entertaining input.

Combining modalities, e.g. Anki cards with both text and native audio, using muscle memory through writing, using video clips on the cards, subvocalizing, avoiding excessive translating, etc.

I'll take this opportunity to emphasize subvocalization again, when you're doing cards or anytime you're reading, before you hear the audio (e.g. before flipping the card or triggering the audio), subvocalize while reading the text. It helps you develop your own sense of the language prosody and pronunciation while processing semantic/syntactic elements in the abstract, the articulatory rehearsal becomes more skilled at parsing the language without aural support which will be good for when you get phonological interference from listening/speaking/reading longer passages, and you get the immediate corrective feedback when you flip the card and listen/subvocalize/repeat aloud the audio.

Edit: And yes, this reply was sort of a mixture of replies to the OP, aphasiac, and that recent listening thread where you've got the idea of massive amounts of passive listening that's jumped the shark, as it were, and become a gimmick.

Oh, and I found this more recent discussion by MacWhinney, might find it interesting: http://psyling.psy.cmu.edu/papers/years/...s-macw.doc

As I said in my post, my thoughts aren't scientific. Just my opinions after nearly 3 years of trying to learn 2 new languages..

But yeh thanks for that, you obviously know the science and have really proved me wrong! Cheers for the correction

Don't mind me, I have a reflexive response to certain topics. ;p