I took a Japanese class at Uni this year and really hated it for reasons I wrote excessively about in another thread. But I would probably take it again

- If it's credited towards your degree it won't slow you down more than say, an equally credited class taught in English. I took two classes of Japanese which otherwise would have been 18 hours a week of English reading + classes + essays
- 70% attendance req. meant I only went 70% of the time
- I never studied and aced it, as anyone who self studies would. There was homework but I never did it apart from a few graded assignments that were quick to write and probably good practice anyway. If I was asked for a answer in class I could always make one up on the spot. The exams were cake. While my friends were studying I was already practically on holiday.
- Access to native speakers paid to answer my questions about Japanese. Sometimes I feel bad about bugging my friends too much so this was good.

One of shakkuns points make perfect sense in Sweden.

Swedish universities rock. Attendance is NOT calculated. If you pass a test, you pass a test and get the grade. Whether you sat in the classroom is completely irrelevant. (I have no idea why other schools have attendance rates, it makes no sense). Thus, going to Japanese class basically gives you access to a teacher and access to tests which guage if you keep up or not, it doesn't force you to follow their pace, just their study material. Also, all Japanese teachers at Lund University are natives, so that goes for the last point as well.

Another point about classes from someone else was that if the class is slow, you're stuck in it. True for swedish universities as well, but not Japanese language institutes like the one I studied at. In my school, we had two "speeds" for every class (so we had beginners slow and beginners fast, intermediate slow and intermediate fast). If we were good enough we could jump up speeds, or jump up a whole level. Only one guy ever jumped a level. Only like.. 5 guys jumped up speed. Safe to say, the studies at my language school were FAR faster than the average college. At least it was possible though, and that gives motivation. "If I study hard, I can jump up one level next month!".

Tobberoth Wrote:One of shakkuns points make perfect sense in Sweden.

Swedish universities rock. Attendance is NOT calculated. If you pass a test, you pass a test and get the grade. Whether you sat in the classroom is completely irrelevant. (I have no idea why other schools have attendance rates, it makes no sense). Thus, going to Japanese class basically gives you access to a teacher and access to tests which guage if you keep up or not, it doesn't force you to follow their pace, just their study material. Also, all Japanese teachers at Lund University are natives, so that goes for the last point as well.

This is an >EXCELLENT< idea!

kfmfe04 Wrote:This is an >EXCELLENT< idea!

There is a downside however. From what I know, you're only allowed to take a finite amount of courses each year, meaning that if you take a full course in Japanese, you can't take another full course at the same time... so it completely wastes your other academic studies IF i'm right about that.

The other problem is that getting into Japanese courses at Lund University is pretty hard nowadays since it's so disgustingly trendy to learn Japanese.

thermal Wrote:I am studying 4 hours a day at school in Japan at the moment and it sucks.

May I ask which school you're attending?

YAMASA in Okazaki, Aichi - http://www.yamasa.org/acjs/english/index.html