So I talked at my camera for a few minutes in Japanese about learning language.
I'm tired and subtitles are time-consuming so I won't have them up for a bit but if you'd like- feel free to take a look! I'm trying to make this vlog a regular thing to:
1. practice speaking without a partner to bounce sound off of (a weak point to be sure)
2. because it's easier to spout opinions on YouTube where I can just let them be and wander off as opposed to directing them at anyone. Haha! and
3. ... なんとなく! to have fun?

Anyway!↓

優しくしてくださいねぇ＞＜(笑)

I'll sub.
Idea: Talk about predictable things so that the learner finds himself making sense of what you are saying based on what you should be obviously saying rather than figuring out what you are talking about. For example, grab a pencil and make a video about what is a pencil? and what it does, describe it.

I did it again. (ok so I've done it a few times)

I've a feeling this is going to be all about beer before long.
... oh well.
Still too lazy to subtitle. If only there were a fast way to do it. :| :|

@drdunlap is all for your Japanese self taught and how long have you been learning?

jordan3311 Wrote:@drdunlap is all for your Japanese self taught and how long have you been learning?

Sort.. of? I took one year of classes at university before discovering Heisig/AJATT/this site/Anki etc etc and beginning my self-study. I've been doing self study (heisig/tae kim->native materials) for 3 years and 4 months. For a grand total of 4 years and 4 months.

Nice man I have been self teaching for about 1 and a half. I hope My Japanese will get as good as yours one day

Both reading about Ta's progress and watching your clip about beer (I don't drink anymore but still, come one; everyone enjoys beer at some level, lol) is making me want to study and immerse even more! Damn, why didn't I start studying those years ago instead of thinking it "too hard to bother starting"?

Like your voice, by the way. Japanese is simply nice to listen to sometimes

.

uisukii Wrote:Both reading about Ta's progress and watching your clip about beer (I don't drink anymore but still, come one; everyone enjoys beer at some level, lol) is making me want to study and immerse even more! Damn, why didn't I start studying those years ago instead of thinking it "too hard to bother starting"?

Like your voice, by the way. Japanese is simply nice to listen to sometimes

Trust me, it's not as grand as it sounds. I think the reason why most people don't get far is because they stop once they hit a wall (a plateau effect, it becomes too hard or not enough time). To be honest I never have enough time but I keep telling myself "Just keep going, you will be thanking yourself once you reach Japan and making a lot of money".

P.S. money isn't the reason why I learned it (actually I think it was Japanese media that got me really interested. You have games,manga,anime,novels,dramas,movies,culture aspects,etc.

Just remember that anyone can succeed but the reason why most don't has nothing to do with the person but rather, there wasn't a will(motivation) to keep going. It's not as hard as it looks but like anything, it does take time.

jordan3311 Wrote:Nice man I have been self teaching for about 1 and a half. I hope My Japanese will get as good as yours one day

Thanks! But ahhh>< still working on it!

Arupan Wrote:First of all, I'd like to congratulate you for your accent from my non-native point of view (lol) And secondly, I wanted to ask if you read something while speaking cause you were frequently looking down. Just wondering.

Thanks! I'm a musician so my ears are trained to hear sounds and just as when an instrument is out of tune I can hear when my accent is weird. It makes me feel uncomfortable in the same way. A great self-defense mechanism but it torments me on a daily basis.

As for reading- I wrote a list of points to make sure to cover in the language learning video but I'm not reading them aloud- and the rest is off the cuff. In the beer videos in particular- I'm drinking them for the first time and just saying what comes to mind. (I do read the can, though.) I'm looking down/around because it feels awkward to stare into the webcam to talk. Maybe I'll get used to it. D: Also, in the beer videos, I'm looking down at the beer while talking sometimes. Maybe I need a better setup so viewers can see everything at once.

ta12121 Wrote:It's not as hard as it looks but like anything, it does take time.

It's true!>< It just kind of happens if you put in enough time and effort. Or that's my experience anyhow..! (it never ends!)

drdunlap Wrote:

jordan3311 Wrote:@drdunlap is all for your Japanese self taught and how long have you been learning?

Sort.. of? I took one year of classes at university before discovering Heisig/AJATT/this site/Anki etc etc and beginning my self-study. I've been doing self study (heisig/tae kim->native materials) for 3 years and 4 months. For a grand total of 4 years and 4 months.

Thanks, it gives a nice, tangible time estimate to reach that level. I'd be interested in how much time you specifically spent on language production :
- did you ever live in Japan, and if so, how many months? (and at what point of your studying?)
- did you do other activities to improve active skills? (e.g. live discussion on Skype/with Jap friends, diary writing, discussing on jap forums). What felt effective and how long did you spend on this?

(or maybe you went passive all the way like me, but on a 4 years scale that's a bit hard to believe)

Warp2243 Wrote:Thanks, it gives a nice, tangible time estimate to reach that level. I'd be interested in how much time you specifically spent on language production :
- did you ever live in Japan, and if so, how many months? (and at what point of your studying?)
- did you do other activities to improve active skills? (e.g. live discussion on Skype/with Jap friends, diary writing, discussing on jap forums). What felt effective and how long did you spend on this?

(or maybe you went passive all the way like me, but on a 4 years scale that's a bit hard to believe)

**I noticed this reply got a bit long... but I figured it would be best to be thorough in my explanation!


I lived in Japan for 11 months on exchange to Kobe University. I spent the first semester speaking way too much English with other exchange students but we all vowed to shut off English for the second semester. (After which everyone showed marked improvement.) However, I'm a bit of a perfectionist so I was still scared to talk a lot of the time. Anyway, those 11 months amounted to my 3rd year of study. Before that I did next to no production.. but when I got to Japan and started taking classes I realized that I could converse fairly well but I got tongue-tied a lot. So the muscles were the only thing lagging, really, despite not actively working on production for the first two years.
My active vocabulary and ability to understand quickly in conversation were still a little lacking at the end of that 3rd year and I couldn't have a very intellectual conversation. Even so, at the end of that year (before returning to the US) I took the JLPT N1 on which I did better than I could have imagined- I think I have my college classes at Kobe to thank for that. I took sociology, religion, linguistics, etc etc. Regular classes in the humanities on topics I likely wouldn't have read by myself at that time.

After returning to the US, I used online websites to chat and became very confident speaking about.. pretty much anything. My most obvious improvements in conversation actually came from that time. I was too embarrassed to participate at first (I still couldn't keep up well enough to feel comfortable diving into a group conversation), reading and listening to conversations between natives worked wonders for comprehension and conversational ability. I surprised just about everyone I know by actually showing the biggest improvements in Japanese conversation while living in America. Haha.

I have now lived in Japan since September 2012. The only recent improvement I've noticed is that I think much less when talking. 95% of the time I don't think at all- once I've entered Japanese mode I'm good to go.

Curious to hear what online websites you used to chat. I know a few, just wanted to hear what you used so maybe I could acquire more places to chat.

I mainly used FC2Live. I had a friend who was doing it at the time and became friends online with a few of the broadcasters as well. I've actually met a few people from the site, too, but I wasn't using it as a tool to meet people- that just sort of happened.

drdunlap Wrote:

Warp2243 Wrote:Thanks, it gives a nice, tangible time estimate to reach that level. I'd be interested in how much time you specifically spent on language production :
- did you ever live in Japan, and if so, how many months? (and at what point of your studying?)
- did you do other activities to improve active skills? (e.g. live discussion on Skype/with Jap friends, diary writing, discussing on jap forums). What felt effective and how long did you spend on this?

(or maybe you went passive all the way like me, but on a 4 years scale that's a bit hard to believe)

**I noticed this reply got a bit long... but I figured it would be best to be thorough in my explanation!


I lived in Japan for 11 months on exchange to Kobe University. I spent the first semester speaking way too much English with other exchange students but we all vowed to shut off English for the second semester. (After which everyone showed marked improvement.) However, I'm a bit of a perfectionist so I was still scared to talk a lot of the time. Anyway, those 11 months amounted to my 3rd year of study. Before that I did next to no production.. but when I got to Japan and started taking classes I realized that I could converse fairly well but I got tongue-tied a lot. So the muscles were the only thing lagging, really, despite not actively working on production for the first two years.
My active vocabulary and ability to understand quickly in conversation were still a little lacking at the end of that 3rd year and I couldn't have a very intellectual conversation. Even so, at the end of that year (before returning to the US) I took the JLPT N1 on which I did better than I could have imagined- I think I have my college classes at Kobe to thank for that. I took sociology, religion, linguistics, etc etc. Regular classes in the humanities on topics I likely wouldn't have read by myself at that time.

After returning to the US, I used online websites to chat and became very confident speaking about.. pretty much anything. My most obvious improvements in conversation actually came from that time. I was too embarrassed to participate at first (I still couldn't keep up well enough to feel comfortable diving into a group conversation), reading and listening to conversations between natives worked wonders for comprehension and conversational ability. I surprised just about everyone I know by actually showing the biggest improvements in Japanese conversation while living in America. Haha.

I have now lived in Japan since September 2012. The only recent improvement I've noticed is that I think much less when talking. 95% of the time I don't think at all- once I've entered Japanese mode I'm good to go.

I'm actually in that phase right now and this story is helping me get even more motivated. What I've noticed is I'm still locked in that phase of "not being comfortable speaking Japanese and the Japanese I speak is still horrible". In my opinion. Then again, I know that all I need to do is keep going until I'm comfortable speaking Japanese (that's why I signed up for immersion classes that focus on building your speaking. I don't need to worry about reading or understanding text, as I have a good grasp on that. I actually got assigned to an upper-intermediate class (difference of 2 classes until "Advanced"). I told myself see how it goes and see if it helps you(I'm hoping it can get me off my feet and I can do the rest). What I mean by that is, I don't get the option to speak Japanese that much, so it's still hard for me to speak it casually. I'm giving myself until the end of the year to get the speaking going.