Hello,

I am writing because some friends and I would like to make a website to help people learn Japanese (mainly grammar and vocabulary, but perhaps also a bit of pronunciation and of sentence making; for kanji there is already Koohii, from beginner to higher intermediate and perhaps, in the future, also kanbun.
The idea is to make a site with various types of exercises (cloze, gap fill, type missing words, simple addition, sentence blocks, verb "inflection", etc.) and I would like to do a big brainstorming with all of you (examples taken from first hand experience are great) in order to see:

1) what are the CMS (class management systems) that work best. (I have tried Moodle a bit but it is not so "exciting" and I know there are many other systems both free and with subscription);

2) what are, in case, the best "add-ons". (I mainly know HotPotatoes, but there must be other tools as well);

3) what are the exercises that work best;

4) what are the exercises that work the least;

Furthermore:

5) Advice of any type is most welcome (for example: "you should definitely add a section on the use of wa and ga"; "you should use some kind of RPG interface such as .... because it makes it much more fun").

6) Warnings/criticisms are also welcome (for example: "you should not put ... because after 10 minutes it gets too boring").

If possible, in the reply, please try to follow the numbers above (you don't need to address all the points, just the ones you want), since once the thread gets long enough, I would like to post the results so that other people will be able to benefit from the discussion and perhaps even make something better. A link to the thread will be put in the site so that users can know where the ideas came from.

Thank you in advance for your help.

5. Put an easily accessible table of content somewhere.
Check out imabi and maggiesensei. Both really good sites, and they two take different stylistic approaches.

Thanks for the advice and for the links. I didn't know the sites.
Imabi in particular is so full of information.
I will definitely use them as a reference, for the grammar, but I would like to focus more on the sections with interactive exercises, of which there seems to be little available.

[RawToast]

kanbun1 Wrote:The idea is to make a site with various types of exercises (cloze, gap fill, type missing words, simple addition, sentence blocks, verb "inflection", etc.) and I would like to do a big brainstorming with all of you (examples taken from first hand experience are great) in order to see

I can't help with CMS, but I have some tips for this (from grumblings when looking at decks,

Try to provide audio for your example sentences and exercises. Very few sites (outside of paid resource) offer audio examples. Just don't use the Core sentences.

If you decide to make a verb conjugation game/exercise/test; please provide an example sentence/word in English if possible and not just the tense name. There is little need to memorise the tense names -- it's just an extra memory test.

e.g. If you were to ask English natives to construct any sentence using the causative form, I suspect very few would answer correctly (English graduates and second language users will). Likewise if you were to try the other way round (providing a sentence and asking about the tenses/verb forms), the results would be similar; however, every native would understand the meaning of the sentence.

This is a pet peeve of mine. Essentially, in the UK we don't get taught the names of the grammatical structures; however, we are expected to know them when we are being taught a foreign language (outside of those English does not have).

RawToast Wrote:This is a pet peeve of mine. Essentially, in the UK we don't get taught the names of the grammatical structures; however, we are expected to know them when we are being taught a foreign language (outside of those English does not have).

Weird, in Finland we get taught this stuff about our own language, not English.

kanbun1 Wrote:3) what are the exercises that work best;

4) what are the exercises that work the least;

Here's my two cents:

3) Exercises that work best: straight translation giving practice with particular grammar points, i.e.,

"Translate the following sentences into Japanese".
"Translate the following sentences into English".

4) Exercises that work the least:

"How would you order a glass of sake in an izakaya? What would you say to the waiter?" I hate that kind of exercise; I like a more disciplined approach.

Also, have everything viewable in romaji as well as kanji/kana.

john555 Wrote:

kanbun1 Wrote:3) what are the exercises that work best;

4) what are the exercises that work the least;

Here's my two cents:

3) Exercises that work best: straight translation giving practice with particular grammar points, i.e.,

"Translate the following sentences into Japanese".
"Translate the following sentences into English".

I actually completely disagree with this since English and Japanese are so grammatically different, that one of a number of this will happen: You will end up having painfully awkward English sentences or painfully awkward Japanese sentences. eg I like dogs: 私が犬たちを好みます||私は犬が好きなんだ: As for me, It's that dog is likable.

Or you have sentences that could easily have multiple translations お座りください: Please have a seat. Please take a seat. Please sit here.||See you, tomorrow: まあ、明日でね。また明日。お疲れ様です。

Or you'll start associating English grammar pieces with Japanese: Saying things like in 像は鼻がない that 像 is the subject because the normal English translation is "Elephants have long trunks"

OR you'll run in to things that are strait untranslatable: 犯人が掴まった. (There is no intransitive form of caught in English.)

As far as what I would recommend for the most useful exercise, fill in the blank/ clozed deletions or multiple choice where you have to fit the best example in, to be the most efficient.

RandomQuotes Wrote:

john555 Wrote:

kanbun1 Wrote:3) what are the exercises that work best;

4) what are the exercises that work the least;

Here's my two cents:

3) Exercises that work best: straight translation giving practice with particular grammar points, i.e.,

"Translate the following sentences into Japanese".
"Translate the following sentences into English".

I actually completely disagree with this since English and Japanese are so grammatically different, that one of a number of this will happen: You will end up having painfully awkward English sentences or painfully awkward Japanese sentences. eg I like dogs: 私が犬たちを好みます||私は犬が好きなんだ: As for me, It's that dog is likable.

Or you have sentences that could easily have multiple translations お座りください: Please have a seat. Please take a seat. Please sit here.||See you, tomorrow: まあ、明日でね。また明日。お疲れ様です。

Or you'll start associating English grammar pieces with Japanese: Saying things like in 像は鼻がない that 像 is the subject because the normal English translation is "Elephants have long trunks"

OR you'll run in to things that are strait untranslatable: 犯人が掴まった. (There is no intransitive form of caught in English.)

As far as what I would recommend for the most useful exercise, fill in the blank/ clozed deletions or multiple choice where you have to fit the best example in, to be the most efficient.

That's funny, because right now I'm working through "Teach Yourself Japanese" and ALL exercises are translation exercises and when I correct my work, my version matches the answer key 90% of the time.

It's precisely because Japanese and English are so different that translation practice is essential.

Here's some sample sentences that I had to translate into Japanese:

"The one who will get up earliest tomorrow morning is probably Mr. Tanaka."

"On days when it rains and we can't go to the sea, shall we go to the cinema?"

"That bookshop is nearer and more convenient, I suppose, but it may not sell that book."

By correctly translating the above into basic Japanese you are proving to yourself that you understand the underlying Japanese grammar.

Multiple choice and fill in the blanks can also be useful (I've done them before with another textbook) but fill in the blanks and multiple choice aren't "meaty" enough (at least not for me) and as I did those exercises I kept wishing for honest to goodness translation exercises.

john555 Wrote:That's funny, because right now I'm working through "Teach Yourself Japanese" and ALL exercises are translation exercises and when I correct my work, my version matches the answer key 90% of the time.

It's precisely because Japanese and English are so different that translation practice is essential.

Here's some sample sentences that I had to translate into Japanese:

"The one who will get up earliest tomorrow morning is probably Mr. Tanaka."

"On days when it rains and we can't go to the sea, shall we go to the cinema?"

"That bookshop is nearer and more convenient, I suppose, but it may not sell that book."

By correctly translating the above into basic Japanese you are proving to yourself that you understand the underlying Japanese grammar.

Multiple choice and fill in the blanks can also be useful (I've done them before with another textbook) but fill in the blanks and multiple choice aren't "meaty" enough (at least not for me) and as I did those exercises I kept wishing for honest to goodness translation exercises.

I'm not going to argue with you, but the the "Teach Yourself" book series tends to rely heavily on the grammar translation method. The grammar translation method is not the best way to learn a language. Using the language and being able to translate are completely different skill sets. If you want anecdotal evidence. Japanese students are required to take six years of English in school. This is almost entirely translation based and almost no one graduates with any real ability to use English.

If you want research here's a paper publish by Harvard about foreign language acquisition: http://dash.harvard.edu/bitstream/handle...sequence=1

a study contrasting the grammar translation method with the direct method: http://www.ccsenet.org/journal/index.php...10755/7604

Advantages and Disadvantages of Different methods
http://www.jcjykc.sdnu.edu.cn/english/unit2.html

Examination of the Grammar-Translation method: faculty.mu.edu.sa/download.php?fid=35886

RandomQuotes Wrote:

john555 Wrote:That's funny, because right now I'm working through "Teach Yourself Japanese" and ALL exercises are translation exercises and when I correct my work, my version matches the answer key 90% of the time.

It's precisely because Japanese and English are so different that translation practice is essential.

Here's some sample sentences that I had to translate into Japanese:

"The one who will get up earliest tomorrow morning is probably Mr. Tanaka."

"On days when it rains and we can't go to the sea, shall we go to the cinema?"

"That bookshop is nearer and more convenient, I suppose, but it may not sell that book."

By correctly translating the above into basic Japanese you are proving to yourself that you understand the underlying Japanese grammar.

Multiple choice and fill in the blanks can also be useful (I've done them before with another textbook) but fill in the blanks and multiple choice aren't "meaty" enough (at least not for me) and as I did those exercises I kept wishing for honest to goodness translation exercises.

I'm not going to argue with you, but the the "Teach Yourself" book series tends to rely heavily on the grammar translation method. The grammar translation method is not the best way to learn a language. Using the language and being able to translate are completely different skill sets. If you want anecdotal evidence. Japanese students are required to take six years of English in school. This is almost entirely translation based and almost no one graduates with any real ability to use English.

If you want research here's a paper publish by Harvard about foreign language acquisition: http://dash.harvard.edu/bitstream/handle...sequence=1

a study contrasting the grammar translation method with the direct method: http://www.ccsenet.org/journal/index.php...10755/7604

Advantages and Disadvantages of Different methods
http://www.jcjykc.sdnu.edu.cn/english/unit2.html

Examination of the Grammar-Translation method: faculty.mu.edu.sa/download.php?fid=35886

The book I'm using, "Teach Yourself Japanese" does have 50 pages of conversational dialogues. As the introduction states, each converstation is a cumulative review of another 5 lessons. So you work through lessons one to five, then you read through conversation one. When you finish lesson ten, you study conversation two.

I know, doing "grammar translation" as you call it isn't fun because it requires you to roll up your sleeves, knuckle down and do actual hard work (not trendy today perhaps), but you learn A LOT that way. But you do have to supplement it with conversational practice too.

I'm not saying don't study grammar. Or don't work Hard. On the Desk Next to me I have The Kanzen Master Grammar and Reading, Japanese For Professionals, the Kanken STEP series, A Japanese dictionary of Grammar, 2 books on Keigo intended for native speakers, 1 grammar/collocation dictionary aimed at native speakers, and a handful of novels. I've studied roughly 600 flash cards today. I am all for hard work. However, I am for hard work that gives the largest benefit in the shortest amount of time. Can translation be useful? Sure sometimes. Do you need to be able to translate something to be able to understand it? No. If your goal is to be a translator, then by all means translate away. If your goal is language use, then translation is not the most effective use of your time.

john555 Wrote:"Translate the following sentences into English".

How about: "Read the following sentence, then compare your understanding of it to our English translation"?

The problem I have with translation exercises is that they tend to focus on easily translatable sentences only, and they pretty much lull you into thinking that it's okay to translate everything in your head, rather than starting to think in the target language, which is a very poor practice as far as language acquisition is concerned.

However Grammar translations are a good way to drill sentence structures and grammatical points if you can stomach the intense bore from the deeply uninteresting sentences.

edit : typo

[RawToast]

Vempele Wrote:

RawToast Wrote:This is a pet peeve of mine. Essentially, in the UK we don't get taught the names of the grammatical structures; however, we are expected to know them when we are being taught a foreign language (outside of those English does not have).

Weird, in Finland we get taught this stuff about our own language, not English.

Which is how it should be! Typically up to GCSE level (age 16) English lessons will focus on reading (classic literature, 1/2 Shakespeare plays, broadsheet newspapers, and poems) and writing. Very little is taught about grammar beyond verbs, adjectives, nouns, and how to construct a correct sentence. It's a completely different world when you step into a French, German, or Spanish class and have to learn all the verb forms.

Linval Wrote:The problem I have with translation exercises is that they tend to focus on easily translatable sentences only, and they pretty much lull you into thinking that it's okay to translate everything in your head, rather than starting to think in the target language, which is a very poor practice as far as language acquisition is concerned.

However Grammar translations are a good way to drill sentence structures and grammatical points if you can stomach the intense bore from the deeply uninteresting sentences.

edit : typo

The ones in my book aren't that easy. I'll try to provide a link to a scan of a typical page of exercises so people can take a look. The sentences are designed to practice points of grammar.

The point is, in order to think in the target language you need to know some basic grammar, e.g., you have to know that "apples are cheaper than peaches" can be translated as "ringo wa momo yori yasui desu" or "momo yori ringo no hoo ga yasui desu" and what the difference is. Translation is good practice.

john555 Wrote:The point is, in order to think in the target language you need to know some basic grammar, e.g., you have to know that "apples are cheaper than peaches" can be translated as "ringo wa momo yori yasui desu" or "momo yori ringo no hoo ga yasui desu" and what the difference is. Translation is good practice.

This is correct to an extent, you need some language to be able to think in the language. However what you need is not a declarative knowledge of grammar, but rather an "instinctive" one, otherwise you're basically just translating in your head.

Translation can be a good practice, but one has to know when to stop - declarative knowledge can only take you so far.

Vempele Wrote:

john555 Wrote:"Translate the following sentences into English".

How about: "Read the following sentence, then compare your understanding of it to our English translation"?

Nothing beats translating from English into the target language. You really have to know your stuff.

The thing that drove me NUTS about the Japanese For Busy People textbook was that there was no translation from English into Japanese. Finally out of sheer desparation I started taking the English translations of the dialogue and translating them back into Japanese.

john555 Wrote:Nothing beats translating from English into the target language. You really have to know your stuff.

The thing that drove me NUTS about the Japanese For Busy People textbook was that there was no translation from English into Japanese. Finally out of sheer desparation I started taking the English translations of the dialogue and translating them back into Japanese.

Out of curiosity, how many languages do you know at a high-intermediate or above level?

Wow, I have been away for just one day and there are already so many posts!

Thank you all for the useful advice and the extremely interesting discussion on what are the best ways to learn Japanese (all with pros and cons).

It is extremely stimulating, showing how different people approach the language differently, but things seem to be going a bit off-topic (we could of course start a separate thread, since the topic is worthy of being discussed in detail).

My aim is indeed to understand what is the best way to help others learn Japanese through a website (therefore the ongoing discussion is on-topic), but I am at present more interested in the types of tools to use for that aim and also the specific tools, i.e. the actual pieces of software or code to put online, since I would like to provide as many types of exercises available, structured in the best possible way (within my limits).

But I realize this is partially my fault since I haven't been specific enough in my first post.

Please help me keep this thread alive and kicking !)

kanbun1 Wrote:It is extremely stimulating, showing how different people approach the language differently, but things seem to be going a bit off-topic (we could of course start a separate thread, since the topic is worthy of being discussed in detail).

Yes, these discussions often seem to degenerate into cat fights.

Maybe the thing to do is just sift through everything and take the parts you believe are useful.

Thanks for the advice, I will certainly keep the best parts and later on an easily readable summary.

Just to try to get back to the main topic I would like to ask for comments on point 1) and 2), related to CMS/LMS (Class/Lesson Management System).
I have looked around quite a bit these days and there so many different options, but interestingly enough it seems that there are no language-teaching-specific systems or add-ons.
Among the ones I am more interested are the ones that are a) free or very low cost b) easy enough to use c) interesting enough for the user/learner.

1) Here is a list of the ones I am considering:

-Sakai (the name itself fits well with the language for which the classes/exercises will be made) http://sakaiproject.org/features-tools-functionality
free, full of features and integrations, perhaps a bit of an overkill for my purpose

-Learndash http://www.learndash.com/learndash-lms-features/
low priced, light and easy to use, nice looking (WP themes)

-Openolat http://www.openolat.com/features/?lang=en
free, relatively simple to use, many features, simple graphics

-Moodle http://docs.moodle.org/27/en/Features
free, big community of users, tons of addons and features, complex to use and to taylor to specific needs, ugly graphics


2) As for "addons"/plugins (specifically those to make exercises, that I would like to be the most instructive and interesting as possible, prompting the learner to continue in spite of the increasing difficulties). I have so far looked into just a few, that integrate with Moodle and Learndash (not sure about the others):

-Hotpotatoes

-Quizport

-Adobe Captivate

As a technical trainer for a large company who has looked at some of these packages, I can tell you that moodle, while the standard, definitely has a reputation of being complex and hard to use. You should also look at standard Content Management Systems that offer plugins for e-learning modules, such as Joomla and Drupal. You could also use something like wordpress and custom build the e-learning portion yourself, or have someone build it for you. In the end, however, a content management system or pure LMS is probably the better choice.

I would stay clear from adobe captivate. Neither myself nor any of my colleagues like it. It contains a number of bizarre bugs that require some expertise with the tool to work around. I would personally try and keep as much material in the LMS as possible. Find an LMS with built-in quiz features, for example.

Learndash looks interesting. I don't have any experience with it, however.

john555 Wrote:

Linval Wrote:The problem I have with translation exercises is that they tend to focus on easily translatable sentences only, and they pretty much lull you into thinking that it's okay to translate everything in your head, rather than starting to think in the target language, which is a very poor practice as far as language acquisition is concerned.

However Grammar translations are a good way to drill sentence structures and grammatical points if you can stomach the intense bore from the deeply uninteresting sentences.

edit : typo

The ones in my book aren't that easy. I'll try to provide a link to a scan of a typical page of exercises so people can take a look. The sentences are designed to practice points of grammar.

The point is, in order to think in the target language you need to know some basic grammar, e.g., you have to know that "apples are cheaper than peaches" can be translated as "ringo wa momo yori yasui desu" or "momo yori ringo no hoo ga yasui desu" and what the difference is. Translation is good practice.

Here are some sample pages of Teach Yourself Japanese (Lesson 16) plus part of Dialogue 3. Note the copious translation exercises.

http://i698.photobucket.com/albums/vv346...G_0507.jpg

http://i698.photobucket.com/albums/vv346...G_0508.jpg

http://i698.photobucket.com/albums/vv346...G_0509.jpg

Also in case anyone's curious, here is the original review of the book from the June 1959 issue of the Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies (sorry it's kind of blurry):

http://i698.photobucket.com/albums/vv346...stract.jpg

http://i698.photobucket.com/albums/vv346...stract.jpg

Thanks for the scans, but what I meant by "easily translatable" was not "easy" in terms of exercise difficulty ; what I meant is that many such translation exercises have a strong bias towards sentences that can easily be translated into the target language without having to do much adaptation work. In other words, translation exercises usually stick with the less idiomatic parts of the language, which might be good to drill basic or advanced grammatical structures, but in terms of language acquisition, I find this less than ideal.

I think it is good to shift away from the idea that everything can be almost literally translated as quickly as possible. (I don't like bringing "friends" into discussions, because anyone can make up the friends they want to prove their point, but here I go : ) I have a friend who's been learning french for two years now, doing basically only translations from a grammar book, and dialogues from pimsleur. She is still completely incapable of stringing a complete sentence together if it deviates ever so slightly from something literally translatable. She is still trying to translate everything from english to french in her head, because that's how the material she used does it, and she never broke free from that ; she says that its the pronunciation that trips her up, but she's essentially pulling wool over her eyes.

Now I'm not saying don't use grammatical translations or anything... It's simply something that I think is best used in moderation.

Linval Wrote:Thanks for the scans, but what I meant by "easily translatable" was not "easy" in terms of exercise difficulty ; what I meant is that many such translation exercises have a strong bias towards sentences that can easily be translated into the target language without having to do much adaptation work. In other words, translation exercises usually stick with the less idiomatic parts of the language, which might be good to drill basic or advanced grammatical structures, but in terms of language acquisition, I find this less than ideal.

I think it is good to shift away from the idea that everything can be almost literally translated as quickly as possible. (I don't like bringing "friends" into discussions, because anyone can make up the friends they want to prove their point, but here I go : ) I have a friend who's been learning french for two years now, doing basically only translations from a grammar book, and dialogues from pimsleur. She is still completely incapable of stringing a complete sentence together if it deviates ever so slightly from something literally translatable. She is still trying to translate everything from english to french in her head, because that's how the material she used does it, and she never broke free from that ; she says that its the pronunciation that trips her up, but she's essentially pulling wool over her eyes.

Now I'm not saying don't use grammatical translations or anything... It's simply something that I think is best used in moderation.

Thanks. I agree the learner needs more than just the exercises in this book. I know I need live practice as well. When I'm done working through it I plan to enroll in Level IV Japanese at my local university (I already took Levels II and III).