kazelee Wrote:Tobberoth Wrote:kazelee brings up another good advice, shadowing. This can definitely help you in a situation such as this since it makes you more comfortable when speaking.
I don't know about your classes though kazelee... when you're in a language institute in Japan studying, you'll be studying with enthusiastic people. After all, they are paying quite a bit to be there, and you generally do not go to another country and study a language if you're not enthusiastic.
Ah, money the great inspirer! LOL.
I really wish this were true, but unfortunately it isn't. Things might different with different programs, but few of the students I was in Japan with were very motivated to learn Japanese. There were people who could barely order food at restaurants by the time they left, and they would argue with you about being able to speak Japanese. They'd constantly say stuff like, "You just think you're so much smarter than us or something. We know just as much as you do," but then they would refuse to go anywhere without one of our Japanese friends leading them. They were barely comfortable with Genki 2 material by the time they left, and they bitched, moaned, and complained whenever the teacher wanted to do something even a little bit difficult(or interesting) like reading from real Japanese sources and doing mock conversation exercises. Meanwhile, I was in their classes as well as in the intermediate classes. I passed JLPT2 before I left. My big souvenir from my time in Japan was my Japanese ability, there's was a giant kotatsu that cost more to ship back than it cost to buy.
Not all of the people were like this, but there were enough of them to make the 初級 classes really annoying. It was kind of split down the middle. About half the people really cared about learning Japanese, they were in the 中級 classes. The other half didn't care, were in the 初級 classes. Then there were the rapid climbers like me and another guy from my university who began the year in 初級, but ended the year taking both sets of classes. We were the only Americans in the 中級 class out of 7 of us from the US. All of the people from Australia, New Zealand, and Britain were in the 中級 classes.
I don't want to like badmouth Americans or anything, it could have easily been an issue of the kind of schools the Americans were from versus where everyone else was from. The non-Americans had to pass tests and stuff to be able to go to Japan in the first place. None of us Americans had to pass any tests to go, and because of this the majority of the people didn't use their time wisely while they were there. Sometimes money is just not a sufficient motivator, and it's difficult for money to motivate students if their parents are paying for it, or it's all coming from some enormous vat of money they're going to pay back over the next 25 years. For most students, it doesn't feel like its their money. It should be a motivator. I wish it was, but it doesn't seem to be in students.
The moral of the story is, don't be one of those people. You have time to study while you're in Japan that you would not have if you were home. You also have immersion everyday. Language learning will not work through sheer osmosis. I knew a Russian woman who'd lived in Japan for 10 years, and every year repeated one semester of beginner Japanese. Her attitude was horrible. She couldn't speak Japanese at all. She couldn't understand Japanese at all. The combination of studying hard, and taking advantage of the immersion will bring you a long way in a short amount of time. It's going to be hard work though.
Edited: 2009-05-27, 4:54 pm
