nest0r Wrote:You can grab an Anki deck of iKnow sentences w/ pictures and audio sorted by difficulty over at ajatt.pseudosphere.net.... You'll have to log in.

I've been finding this really helpful too!

oregum Wrote:

mentat_kgs Wrote:I'd ignore all these comments, pick your favorite show of all time in Japanese and listen to it continuously.

Well obviously this guy knows what he's talking about. So tell me mentat_kgs, how has the method of listening to "your favorite show of all time" repeatedly "in Japanese" been working out for ya?

I have a whole blog about this exact subject:
http://onhowtolearn.blogspot.com/

pm215 Wrote:

kazelee Wrote:http://speaking-japanese.com/breaking/index.html

You can get the audio to some popular stories here.

Aren't those in rather a formal/literary style? (I have the book but it's been a little while since I last read any of it -- must have another go.) They're good, but I'm not sure I'd recommend them for beginning listening practice...

Quote:Trying to shadow this is very fun.

Can I ask you to give some more detail on what 'shadowing' actually involves? I tried googling and didn't really find a clear description of the method. (I did find one website that said that "walking outdoors as swiftly as possible" was a critical part of the method!) Do you read from a text and try to match the audio you're hearing, do you try to repeat from the audio alone (presumably a bit behind it), or what?

(I'm hoping to improve my pronunciation rather than listening skills; my accent's always been in the 'understandable but lousy' category and it would be nice to improve on that a bit.)

Yes those books are high level. I do it anyway. It's hard, but it's not my only source. So it's good practice.

For tips on shadowing

http://www.foreignlanguageexpertise.com/...study.html

This is not my advice only. It is katz advice and more than that, it is lingosteve's (http://www.youtube.com/user/lingosteve) advice. It is also in accord to the +1 theory of krashen.

The listening to music and never learn japanese is that music is not structured text. Dialogues are much more repetitive and easier to learn.

Maybe I was lucky because the shows I enjoyed had great dialogues, Lucky Star and Tiger & Dragon, but I think anyone would be able to find resources as good as these.

If you are a Disney maniac, you might chose something like The Lion King, for instance.

Tobberoth Wrote:All the anime fans who love Japanese music has proven pretty well that simply listening to things you like over and over won't make you better at Japanese at all. Again, i+1 > all for effectiveness. Japanesepod101.com is very hard to beat in the i+1 department. i+1 is extremely important in the listening department since vocabulary is vital to understanding. You can listen to a Japanese show over and over a million times and learn nothing at all because you don't know the words in it. If you don't understand most of the words, you can't parse it, it just becomes a rumble of japanese sounds. Nothing to learn from that.

Actually I don't think this is true. I have a friend who has been in Japan for 4 years now and he can't speak Japanese. However, he was saying to me that in the beginning it was all a wash of sound, but now he can pick out all the words and he knows them. He doesn't know what they mean, but he recognises them as the ones he hears all the time.

VL, are you using TTS software for your SRS? This should help with your listening. I do things like:

- Shadowing
- Dictation
- Try to read the sentence at the same speed as my SRS with the same intonation. (Usually takes me a few goes) I think speaking and listening are closely tied together so whilst on the surface this may seem like a speaking thing, you will learn better intonation which will help with listening.

For the same reason, I would recommend speaking to yourself in Japanese rather than use English. This will help a lot with your speaking (especially speed and response time) which in turn will help with your listening. Hard to describe how this works. For me it is like by speaking to myself I help develop and reinforce a model or construct of "communicating in Japanese". Listening then goes into the same construct and enables quick understanding.

Other stuff you need to develop is coping with not understanding 100% of what you hear. You need to learn to make calculated guesses on what someone who is speaking to you means. When I speak to my friends I understand about 95% of what they say on average, however I rarely stop them to ask about a word, as I can almost all the time figure out the meaning from what I do understand and the context.

EG. The cake was only 100yen and almost past the expiry date so I thought it would be ASDF but actually it was ZXCV.

ASDF: maybe disgusting?
ZXCV: if the tone is flat, probably something like OK or fine. If it is excited, maybe delicious.

So my advice is have some listening practice where you don't rewind and don't look up words. Just do your best with what you have to figure out the meaning.

I would be wary of japanesepod101. I don't like how even in Upper Intermediate it intersperses Japanese and English together and I find that the intonation is disjointed. There are ways of speaking slowly without screwing up the intonation, like pausing after certain words, but they don't appear to do it. You need to learn to get used to and speak with real Japanese intonation.

I assume you are watching a lot of anime and dramas with no subs?

Listen to whatever in Japanese, and make sure you can verify what you are hearing. Listen to songs, and then look at the lyrics. Lately I've been noticing that most of the songs I listen to at first, I think I don't understand. It's when I look at the lyrics that I realize that I do understand the song. You may know the individual words, but you may not be able to process it that fast just by listening. Because you can know two words, but yet when you are given a sentence combining those words, they are familiar individually, but together they are new.

It's the same when I'm watching a drama. Lately, I've been hooked on a show called Ainori. This is literally a gift from heaven. It's a reality show with Japanese subs. Its so interesting, and it's something we can contextually understand. After all, the show is about finding love.

I bet people who are musicians are better at language learning. They are probably more aware of the pitch, tones, involve when people speak.

Virtua_Leaf Wrote:Yeah so I think it's time I changed the fact that I have to concede that I pretty much won't be able to understand what's being said every time I hear spoken Japanese.

I don't know any Japanese speakers, but I do have an iPod. Please tell me a good method to work with, or at least what you are/were doing yourself.

And if we can keep the abstract hints to a minimum please ("listen more" works for some people, not so much for me ).

Cheers!

I think you title of the thread does disjustice to your request. To ask for the "number 1" method assumes you just need 1 method. It's a whole assortment of things that build on each other.

Definately listen to stuff in Japanese that you like and listen to it alot (like Mentat says). Definately build your vocabulary like Tobberoth says. Definately talk and think to your self in Japanese like mentioned. Have a grasp of grammar. Do dictation, do shadowing. Watch TV shows and Movies with the Japanese subtitles on.

Hell, do jpod101.

The number 1 method is going to be the method you find works best for you, but it will boil down to:

To answer your question though - Listen to a lot of Japanese. Now, is that with Jpod, Music, Anime, Dramas, News, mix match of these? Should you have the scripts in front of you, or the Japanese subtitle playing?

Build grammar. Now, is this rule intensive (japanese class, genki textbooks), resources (Tae Kim, Kondansha series), variant using sentence examples, mining from sources (antimoon method useful for slang and concepts everyone "knows" but aint written down anywhere)?

Build basic vocabulary. Now, is this word by word (Genki), with sentence context (KO2001, iKnow), mining from your own sources (AJATT's Khatz's and Antimoon method)?

Reading a lot of Japanese. Now, is this TV scripts, manga, websites, newspapers, blogs?

Without some variant of all four of the above, I get the feeling something will be missing from your Japanese that will need to get filled in later. If it's a method you're not likely to do (say, mine vocabulary from Newspapers or Manga) then it's not a good method.

So, take your pick. I can tell what your number one method will be. Go with what feels to be working. Somehow, I think in reality just learning new stuff and listening and reading alot will work itself out all in the end.

Hey everyone, thanks again for all your excellent advice.

Tobberoth Wrote:Go to Japanesepod101.com. Pick a beginners lesson at random and listen to the dialogue. Is it easy? Then go check an intermediate level.

Japanesepod101.com is free, you only pay if you want added features (which aren't needed). If you're affraid Japanesepod101.com might be to easy for you, don't. The upper intermediate is very challenging, harder than the listening part of JLPT2.

If you can understand the top level stuff at Japanesepod101.com, you can start listening to anything, it won't matter at that point. radio, tv, news, you name it.

I've downloaded a few lessons and my first impressions are really good.

Couple of questions:

How do you know when you've completely understood a lesson? There seems to be a piece of dialogue per lesson, so ideally I guess it would be until you've understood all of that. But not every aspect of that dialogue is covered, only certain parts... when can I say I can move onto the next lesson?

And now I've completely forgotten my other question. Will post when I remember.

thermal Wrote:VL, are you using TTS software for your SRS?

Thanks thermal, all your advice has been taken on board.

But no I'm not using TTS at the moment. What exactly is that? Enables audio or something?

Nukemarine Wrote:I think you title of the thread does disjustice to your request. To ask for the "number 1" method assumes you just need 1 method. It's a whole assortment of things that build on each other.

I think I'm starting to see this too. There's loads of methods mentioned alreadly that sound like they can work perfectly in harmony with each other.

I'll definitely have to try some of this stuff out. Big thanks again.

nest0r Wrote:You can grab an Anki deck of iKnow sentences w/ pictures and audio sorted by difficulty over at ajatt.pseudosphere.net.... You'll have to log in.

Also, this sounds really great. I downloaded it, Winrar'ed but can't seem to progress after that. I've boiled it down to this screen:




What do I do next?

you should be able to open iknow_core6000_(01-08).anki in anki.

Virtua_Leaf Wrote:How do you know when you've completely understood a lesson? There seems to be a piece of dialogue per lesson, so ideally I guess it would be until you've understood all of that. But not every aspect of that dialogue is covered, only certain parts... when can I say I can move onto the next lesson?

This is of course completely up to you and your goals. If you know everything covered in the podcast (and can understand those parts fluently in the text) I doubt the lesson has much more to teach you. By all means keep listening to just that dialogue from time to time to keep it in memory, but don't fret over it, those parts will probably be covered later or at least used later.. eventually you will understand them.

If you desperately need the script for the dialogue, you can buy a basic subscription to get them, it isn't very expensive. Personally I never found the need to, but my Japanese listening level was pretty high when I found Japanesepod101.com so it's possible you might need it more than I did.

I do mostly think however that just listening to those dialogues over and over will teach you the most, the rest are minor details. Take a lesson where you understand 50%, listen to the dialogue and the lesson until you understand 90% then move on and you'll raise your level tremendously.

mentat_kgs Wrote:This is not my advice only. It is katz advice and more than that, it is lingosteve's (http://www.youtube.com/user/lingosteve) advice. It is also in accord to the +1 theory of krashen.

This guy has some good info, but he seems to plug his site a bit much. He also recommended against using bilingual books. While I agree they are not for everyone, his reasoning seemed to be nothing more than a plug for his site.

It is his site right?

Virtua_Leaf Wrote:But no I'm not using TTS at the moment. What exactly is that? Enables audio or something?

TTS = Text To Speech. Some people including myself generate audio from the sentences we want to learn and stick that into our SRSs. I personally practice both ways. One way I listen to the sentence and write it out or write out the word that I am trying to learn, depending on how energetic I feel. I also do it the other way, I read the sentence, then listen to the audio to check that I got all the readings correct. Most people only do it one way and usually reading to audio.

Somewhat suprisingly this software is really good. It is quite fast at default (you can set the speed) and new sentences sometimes still challenge my listening skills. Further more by doing this you can do shadowing and such so you get a lot of value out of doing your SRS reps.

The program is called TextAloud which costs $30US. Once you buy this you need to then buy a Japanese voice. Only problem is the good one, Misaki, is currently only sold to companies, however bittorrent solves this problem (Neospeech misaki)..

Are you on to all Japanese now or are you goin J->E? This stuff is for after you go J->J though..

kazelee Wrote:

mentat_kgs Wrote:This is not my advice only. It is katz advice and more than that, it is lingosteve's (http://www.youtube.com/user/lingosteve) advice. It is also in accord to the +1 theory of krashen.

This guy has some good info, but he seems to plug his site a bit much. He also recommended against using bilingual books. While I agree they are not for everyone, his reasoning seemed to be nothing more than a plug for his site.

It is his site right?

I watched a bunch of his vids. I think ideas are good, which is to say very much inline with immersion and the AJATT method (can I call it that? ). He bugs the hell out of me for some reason though. His Japanese is pretty good, but he says katakana words with English pron which annoys me

even if he's got the english pron katakana. I'd say really good considering he's 83.. lol.

howtwosavealif3 Wrote:even if he's got the english pron katakana. I'd say really good considering he's 83.. lol.

How good do you imagine you'll be at that age starting now?

howtwosavealif3 Wrote:even if he's got the english pron katakana. I'd say really good considering he's 83.. lol.

His YT profile said that he was 63.

kazelee Wrote:iKnow. Shadowing. Scriptorium. Constant listening.

http://www.iknow.co.jp
http://www.foreignlanguageexpertise.com/...study.html
http://www.d-addicts.com/ and/or http://www.ebay.com and/or Yesasia

I recommend series with Sasaki Kuranosuke. He speak ridiculously fast, IMO, and if you can keep up with him, you can keep up with anyone.

lol. does anyone else have recommendations for hard to understand actors that talk too fast,etc. Right now that's what I want to listen to, lol. Like I've been watching those Japanese talking/variety shows and of course at first it was very hard to make out what some of the people were saying because you know real people talk a lot "realer" than anime people or singers or newscasters or actors in a drama.

I thoguht Yashima Norito is sorat hard to undersatnd. but I don't know if he's in any really good dramas.

=======

on the 63/83. I guess I misread it the youtube profile thing
===

basically if you want to improve listenign for spoken japanese you listen to spoken japanese (find something fun/interesting even if you don't understand all). Real spoken japanese... with its speed and slurs and mumbleliness.

like
http://jp.youtube.com/watch?v=bhBmT8q6lRo
(note that the subs are wrong)
or
http://jp.youtube.com/watch?v=526KXWG7nk...re=related
or
http://jp.youtube.com/watch?v=f7MpyKQbZyY
or
http://jp.youtube.com/watch?v=g9TfNHS2wn0
or
http://jp.youtube.com/watch?v=9XeK8_VnuL...re=related
or
http://jp.youtube.com/watch?v=I3y2Ey-kZBg
etc.
Shows with text all over them are especially beneficial..
Cause then you can look stuff up..

Tobberoth Wrote:This is of course completely up to you and your goals. If you know everything covered in the podcast (and can understand those parts fluently in the text) I doubt the lesson has much more to teach you. By all means keep listening to just that dialogue from time to time to keep it in memory, but don't fret over it, those parts will probably be covered later or at least used later.. eventually you will understand them.

Sounds good to me. Right, I'll listen to these everyday. A plan at last.

When you mention text, is this something that can be accessed on the site, or is it part of the subscription package?

zodiac Wrote:you should be able to open iknow_core6000_(01-08).anki in anki.

Strange, it tell me I can't have the same deck open twice, despite not having even one open.

thermal Wrote:TTS = Text To Speech. Some people including myself generate audio from the sentences we want to learn and stick that into our SRSs. I personally practice both ways. One way I listen to the sentence and write it out or write out the word that I am trying to learn, depending on how energetic I feel. I also do it the other way, I read the sentence, then listen to the audio to check that I got all the readings correct. Most people only do it one way and usually reading to audio.

Sounds good as well. But sounds very similar to the iKnow/Anki pack nest0r posted. Will I need both?

thermal Wrote:Are you on to all Japanese now or are you goin J->E? This stuff is for after you go J->J though..

I'm going J>J now. Though I've never bothered actually writing out anything, I just read the sentences. I'm hoping this doesn't hamper me for the future, but I seem to be doing OK without it... anyway, I'm getting off topic.

Thanks again everyone.

Virtua_Leaf Wrote:When you mention text, is this something that can be accessed on the site, or is it part of the subscription package?

In that instance, I meant the dialogue... the text of the dialogue is accessible on the website, but since it costs money I wouldn't really recommend it ^^

But yeah, you should more or less understand the dialogue fluently when you hear it to be considered done. Since not everything in the dialogue is covered in every lesson though, you can't be expected to understand all of it fluently... but as long as you understand what WAS covered, you've completed the lesson IMO.

If your deck doesn't open, I don't know what to do, you can try posting to the anki googlegroups for help.

And a TTS is when you have a sentence but no audio. It's like asking someone to read out the sentence and recording it, except the software reads it out, might sound strange sometimes, while the iknow pack really is read out and recorded by native speakers.

Quote:Sounds good as well. But sounds very similar to the iKnow/Anki pack nest0r posted. Will I need both?

It depends on how you want to study. As zodiac mentioned, the TTS software gives you the ability to convert any Japanese text (including that which you write yourself) to an audio file. I am sticking sentences from KO into it and also from the books and manga I read.

If you want to have audio in your SRS you can use sources such as iKnow, movies whatever which is better in the sense that it is all real Japanese voices, however it is unlikely you will only want to add from sources that you can get audio for. In which case you can use hirigana or whatever you want. If you do find yourself adding a lot of sentences that you don't have the audio for, then I think using TTS is a good idea.

Personally, I don't see why you would need audio for every single sentence... I mean it takes a while to learn japanese pronounciation, but once you do it's not like you will pronounce a word wrong just because you haven't heard it spoken. The only reason to have audio in your SRS system is to do dictation and train listening, which is fine but it's not like you need to train listening with everything you learn, just some of it. That "some of it" can come from iKnow and movies...

Personally I don't use TTS at all. The software is impressive but far from perfect so it won't help your pronounciation all that much compared to real audio from iKnow and movies (again, which is more than enough to train your listening).

It's not really about training your listening (althouth that is a bonus), it's about getting as much as possible out of your reps as possible. I do shadowing with every card and I can feel my brain chop it up and understand it as I follow after the voice. It's also good because for every card you are attacking it from two different angles, reading and listening. I believe this causes your brain to integrate the information more than just reading alone.

The other thing is that it does keep helping with pronunciation. Don't forget that each word has a pitch that will rise and fall or fall or rise or whatever. Also there is intonation which the software is quite good at. For example listing a few things, the tone rises for each item and then falls for the last.

The thing is the software is usually close to perfect, which is about 95% of the time and the rest it is clearly wrong. As in it goes all glitchy and weird. So it's pretty easy to know which ones are dodgey and put them in as hiragana.

thermal Wrote:It's not really about training your listening (althouth that is a bonus), it's about getting as much as possible out of your reps as possible. I do shadowing with every card and I can feel my brain chop it up and understand it as I follow after the voice. It's also good because for every card you are attacking it from two different angles, reading and listening. I believe this causes your brain to integrate the information more than just reading alone.

The other thing is that it does keep helping with pronunciation. Don't forget that each word has a pitch that will rise and fall or fall or rise or whatever. Also there is intonation which the software is quite good at. For example listing a few things, the tone rises for each item and then falls for the last.

The thing is the software is usually close to perfect, which is about 95% of the time and the rest it is clearly wrong. As in it goes all glitchy and weird. So it's pretty easy to know which ones are dodgey and put them in as hiragana.

I disagree on most points. Maybe I'm just a fast learner, but I doubt listening would add anything to my cards, I already remember them perfectly by simply reading them. In fact, i think it would annoy me to have to deal with sound as I'm concentrating so it could possibly be detrimental.

I would not trust that software for tones and intonation. Like I said, it's good, but it's not perfect. 95% of the time it's at least not extremely wrong, but it's still wrong, it's very easy to hear whether it's a real native speaking a sentence or TTS running it. As long as it's easy to hear the difference, the difference is there and that proves it isn't perfect.

As for tones in Japanese, they change depending on location AND you will usually get it right automatically when you're used to Japanese, so I don't think the bonus is worth the effort at all.

I'd say using audio to learn pronounciation is important when you're just learning Japanese but once you have real experience speaking Japanese etc, it just loses its impact all together.