ファブリス Wrote:So anybody has a good experience with sentence learning, with vocab in context?

It's a bit dry, but what I've been doing recently for my Twinkle flashcards is lift sentences and phrases out of Kanji Kentei prep books, e.g. Side A: 塩を＿える Side B: 加　ー　くわ

I think these books are good as the Japanese, I feel, is for want of a better expression, NHK Japanese.

brose Wrote:Link to Vocabulary Learning 2

http://static.unilang.org/resources/vocab/vocdb.html

I've only read part of it so far, but it looks really interesting. Thanks for that.

You know. In a way, I've always thought that there should be a site using videos from Japanese TV to teach grammar. Maybe transcribing short scenes(less than 1 minute) that use specific grammar pattens. You could use Youtube to host the videos and then use Jgram.org to link to info on the grammar pattern used.

That way, people could also think about the context and environment in which the grammar was used and see it in action.

I don't quite get how the sentence method works. Do you just add sentences to Supermemo or some other review program and simply try to "read" each sentence? What if one doesn't know all the kanji or vocab or something?

you can always use rikaichan if you don't know the meaning of something.
http://www.polarcloud.com/rikaichan/

This is just my experience so far... but I find kanji stick to me more when I can use them in some kind of context. I cannot forget 元 anymore because I know it is part of a compound: 元気. With some basic grammer, I can put together phrases like:

わたしは元気です。
or
元気ですか？

All of this can be surrounded around that single kanji, and in memory, linked to it.

I think that is the key to working with things like sentences, vocabulary and grammer. Like, the first 10 kanji you can work with japanese numbers, and while you're doing that, speed along the rest of kanji. Later on, perhaps after you get up to kanji 275 or so, you can work on days of the week, (after having all of the kanji related to the weekdays under your belt).

Compounds, and interesting words can be added early on in the RTK game, as long as all the players know the parameters. For instance, I know that 気 is pronounced ki, and I have a rough idea of what its meaning is, but don't ask me to draw that kanji.

Verb conjugations can be taught and practiced as one runs across verb kanji. In fact, while 唱える　might not be the most used verb in the word, it would be an early start to learning how to conjugate verbs. In fact, this is a perfect example, because you can take a bit of time and talk about the いちだん　&　ごどあん verbs. Just a quick bit of text about how there are two types, and why they are called 一　＆　五. There, you've just delt with the matter of what 2 numbers are called, and tied it up to an early kanji along with maybe 1 or 2 different conjugations.

I can remember 元気 so easily because I think that its inherent symbolism is cool (beginning mind) and because I can use it in conversation quickly, easily and early with conversational partners.

jonnay Wrote:while 唱える　might not be the most used verb

That's true. When I picked it up I used the mnemonic "tonal chant" or "となえる chant"

ファブリス Wrote:So anybody has a good experience with sentence learning, with vocab in context?

Because I am really excited about building something like that that takes care of vocab, sentences, kanji readings all in one swoop. I've already started the design process actually. But it would be flexible enough that you could enter a dummy/empty sentence or just use it as a "tag", and add a bunch of related vocabulary.

I think video and real life situations are the way to learn this stuff. My experience was lucky b/c I was in an intensive Japanese program where all of classtime consisted of the the teacher creating a real life situation and then either involving you in it or asking you about it (all done in Japanese) .... up to the level of grammar and vocabulary that you know up to that point.

If we took samples of Japanese television that, for example, contained "元気ですか。" in action, then I think this could be very useful. This example is just basic.

It WOULD be a lot of work though, and I think it would take at least a few people working on this. And it might have to be 1 example per day or so b/c it's a bit of work recording, editing, putting on the computer, uploading. Not everyone has that kind of equipment.

It would be great though if it happened, wouldn't it?

????? Wrote:I've been thinking about that for a while...

There's a LOT more things possible than what is allowed by using generic flashcard programs like Mnemosyne... but I get ahead of myself. ^_^

I suspect most sentences would come from dictionaries or textbooks, so I thought one solution is to give credit to the source (i.e. "Kodansha dictionary", "JFE", "ALC online dictionary", etc. This *may* cover some of the copyright issues, while at the same time confirming that the sentence is from quality learning material.

This quote gets me really excited!

I feel bad asking this because it is clear that so much work went into the site and it is invaluable for following the RTK methodology. However, are you continuing to work on the vocab/grammar section of the site? I think many users are eagerly awaiting it, I know I can't wait.

Maybe we should start a thread with suggestions and/or progress for the new section.

[ファブリス]

Hey, thanks for your interest snozle.

I have been working on it and have most of the screens designed as "wireframes". I started implementing the add sentence/vocab page two weeks ago.

Yeah I could make a thread, because I have some questions regarding the study process. Things that came to mind while designing the wireframes like active/passive vocabulary distinction (i.e. reviewing in one direction or both ways). Whenever I have something usable I plan to make it "closed testing".

I just wanted to add that I too am just trying to learn vocab out of context, using JLPT lists as a guide. This is because I'm trying to bulk up on vocab, rather than build fluency. On a typical day I add 50 new words, but sometimes more. It all depends on their ease and familiarity, and I always go for the low hanging fruit on any given day.

I could be totally wrong, but to me it makes sense to have sufficient vocab so as to be able to understand roughly what is being talked about; way before you can start worrying about context. Context, and its evil cousin idioms, are a very big task and one that is not necessary to begin with in my experience.

In fact learning sentences in context reminds me of the ineffective way languages are often taught in schools. They teach sentences in context; you learn by heart what sentences to use in a certain context for example talk about yourself: "Bonjour. Je m'appelle Claude. J'ai douze ans. J'aime bien etudier francais..." but you have no real understnading why they are the way they are.

English is my second language, but I have a native level of fluencey thanks to being immersed in it for many years. I can confidently say that I didn't start learning English by learning all contexts, all idioms, politeness, pronunciation, and such, not even grammar.

Lets take an example sentence in english "I want to have some soup please". All you need to understand is "I want soup", three little words. Imagine you don't know those words, it just suounds "blah blah to have some blah please". Even if you know grammar, it is useless because it still sounds like blah blah nonsense.

That's how Japanese sounds before you learn vocab, "blah blah blah". As long as your input sounds like that, learning the language is an uphill struggle. My theory is that with enough vocab under one's belt it will snowball. When you can understand a lot of vocab you can assimilate all the rest passively, just watch some Japanese TV, listen to songs, etc. and your brain will decode the logic of the language itself. Learning contextual usage, and the idioms will come naturally.

Learn to walk before you can run... and all that. I'm all for divide & conquer. Learn "water", "under", "bridge", long before you learn "water under the bridge".

I disagree.

As an exercise, take your JLPT lists and ask a native Japanese which words
they know or have heard people used before. Have them actually mark
them off with a check mark. I'm gonna guess that that maybe 60% to 90%
of the words are useless.

Japanese is a language where you don't need to know too many words.
The grammar is so flexible that you can mold simple words to express
complex thoughts.

Big words are mostly fluff. Maybe if you want to be a journalist or a writer it might
help, but for practical purposes it's not very useful.

I used to do the vocab list thing until time after time my tutors commented that they either haven't heard that word or maybe no one ever uses it. Whenever, I went on to ask them how they might say, they always just use simpler words and mixed it with skillful use of grammar. And I've had tutors for the last 4 years or so. It always ended up that way.

If you watch TV or movies, there are tons of specific words that they could have used, but they always go back to using the simpler words and using grammar to mold it until it's just right.

In my opinion, if you had to choose, it's better to be REALLY good grammar and poor vocab instead of REALLY good vocab with poor grammar. It's really your manipulation of grammar that'll make you sound like a native speaker. As opposed to using fancy or rare words.

Lastly, I will make the argument that native speakers usually pick up vocab from the people that they interact with. Hang out with someone long enough and you might start talking like them!.........lol..........

I remember in elementary school we used to have vocab books that taught fancy, big, intelligent words. I don't anyone learned anything from them and no one ever used them.

Anyway, that's just my opinion.
YMMV

P.S. I would argue that "Bonjour. Je m'appelle Claude. J'ai douze ans. J'aime bien etudier francais..." example is NOT in context. Those fake class exercises are never in context. Do that same greeting in France with French people that would just met up with on the street and THEN you'll have context. And you'll be more likely to remember it.... :-)

True true, but I think it is a fact that many people go to Japan and don't advance their Japanese just by being immersed. You really have to get above a certain level before it can grow by itself.

Btw I certainly don't restrict myself to JLPT lists, in fact at least half the vocab that I've learned is not on JLPT lists, its just that I've encountered it in use. So I'm not implying to stick only to JLPT lists. I've spent some time in Japan, I work with Japanese, my wife is Japanese, and also our baby is learning both English & Japanese, so I get lots of chances to hear Japanese in use and I include it in my study.

Native speakers do learn vocab from people around them, however you have to reach quite a high level of comprehension before you can really do that passively. Or ofcourse, you learn like a baby, through constant immersion and nothing better to do than learn by example .

I'd say that trying to learn vocab in context is a lot like trying to learn the writing & all different readings of Kanji at the same time. Imagine you go to class and instead of learning 1 new word, instead you were given 3 or 4 words with explanations of when you should use each one. When talking to your friend, when talking to your superior, your stranger, your dog, some teenage punks, whatever. Why would you want to bother yourself with all that contextual complexity in one go?

Anyway take what I say with a pinch of salt, because I'm not at the point where my Japanese is great and I can look back and say my technique works. I really like to read about others tactics.

I've got to say I agree with the sentence learning method. Although I haven't started using it yet (300 odd kanji to go in RTK1...), I have done quite a bit of reading around second language learning (comes with the job of being an English teacher in Japan I guess!).

The trick with the sentence learning method is that you're only choosing sentences which are slightly above your current level. Maybe you understand all the words, but the grammar structure is new or vice versa. The best part is that if you make sure your sentences are 'good' Japanese (said/written by a native speaker) then you'll automatically be absorbing information about which words go together naturally.

Remember that the aim is to give the brain the information and let it work things out itself. You should never force production, just let it happen when you're ready. First words, then simple sentences, then more complex sentences will just 'pop' into your head when you want them. All this and they'll 'sound' correct!

There's nothing wrong with learning the vocab as individual words and then working out the grammar 'from context' but as a baby you just did it all at once, so why not do the same thing again?

Quote:I'd say that trying to learn vocab in context is a lot like trying to learn the writing & all different readings of Kanji at the same time.

I don't think that's learning in context. What you're talking about is really rote memorization. I'm against learning kanji readings by memorizing a list of them.

If you were learning from context, you would only remember the pronunciations from words that you know the kanji used in. Readings of the kanji that you haven't seen used anywhere wouldn't matter. This has the advantage of throwing away all the useless pronunciations without even having to sift through them one-by-one.

The only reason to learn a reading is because it's used for a word/name that you will use. Of course, this is something that a list of readings can't tell you. You have to learn words and figure out yourself what's useful and what isn't.

With RTK, you're now good enough to recognize Kanji to the point where you can look at words and know that you've seen that kanji used in other words, which really makes the task much easier.

Mighty_Matt Wrote:There's nothing wrong with learning the vocab as individual words and then working out the grammar 'from context' but as a baby you just did it all at once, so why not do the same thing again?

Babys learn languages sideways, not all at once. First babys just learn to smile, then learn individual words: mama, papa, pipi, poopoo... Later simple constructs, want mama, want pipi.... and build sideways on what they already understand. Its baby steps.

Japanese kids will learn tens of thousands of words long before they learn any Kanji that make them up in writing, so it is not necessary to know Kanji to understand Japanese; it is just a useful mnemonic system for adults. Kids will learn sound to meaning, rather than kanji to meaning.

For English I was immersed as a child, so I picked it up one way or another. I went from zero to ok in about a year, and proficiency didn't take much longer after that. The hardest part is just the beginning. I used to have a tutor every week, but after about 1 year I didn't need tutoring anymore because the rest came naturally.

One of my memories is of my tutor trying to teach me the concept of "a-sleep", "a-wake". I just looked at her like "why are you adding "a-"???". It was like double dutch to me at the time, and did not stick at all. It was ineffective to be forced to study details like that. They only came to me later subconsciously. At least that was as a child; I don't know how it would work with me now. Maybe now I know more grammar points such that someone could explain it and I may understand it.

As a child when I started learning English, it must have been really broken: "I am wake " before I learned details like that, but it really didn't matter because you have to start somewhere and all that matters is to reach a point where the language is self sustaining. At least, if the goal is total fluency and time is on your side.

I'm not just doing vocab btw, just I don't use only sentences to learn/review vocab, because vocab by itself is quite easy. I also use a book "Japanese Sentence Patterns for Effective Communication" which I really like. Also using some progressive readers. These are things that I can do while doing RTK1. After RTK1 I will probably want to start learning compounds, and my strategy will change more towards reading.

[ファブリス]

vosmiura, I don't understand your point about learning in context with example sentences.

I think example sentences help you absorb "patterns" of grammar and vocabulary, the same patterns that you would absorb subconsciously with lots of reading and listening.

In your example with "wake" you could have learned :

"Wake me up at seven."

"His mother stayed awake all night."

In the 2nd sentence awake acts more like an adjective. You don't even have to know what is an adjective, you can just understand it.

ファブリス Wrote:vosmiura, I don't understand your point about learning in context with example sentences.

I think example sentences help you absorb "patterns" of grammar and vocabulary, the same patterns that you would absorb subconsciously with lots of reading and listening.

In your example with "wake" you could have learned :

"Wake me up at seven."

"His mother stayed awake all night."

In the 2nd sentence awake acts more like an adjective. You don't even have to know what is an adjective, you can just understand it.

It seems obvious to us now, because we understand those concepts of English like "a-wake". However as a kid it really didn't make any sense to me at the time. I could understand that awake acts like an adjective, but I didn't understand why in that case I should use "awake" and not just "wake". "His mother stayed wake all night." - it can be only a subtle difference to a language learner.

But I should point out that I didn't have a teacher in my mother tongue to explain what that was equivalent to. It was just explained English to English, and I didn't get it. If you imagine in Japanese, it is not as wordy as English, so to a Japanese some aspects of English will seem superfluous and not easy to understand. But the point is that it came to me eventually, just by hearing it I guess. It was not something that had to be learned and practiced explicitly to be accquired (eventually).

My hope then, is that with Japanese I can arm myself with enough vocab and basic grammar that the rest of the fluff will come naturally just watching TV, and hopefully with kanji under my belt through reading too. Sentences are everywhere, sitting waiting to be read and heard... but if it sounds like blah blah blah then its just wasted .

vosmiura Wrote:Lets take an example sentence in english "I want to have some soup please". All you need to understand is "I want soup", three little words. Imagine you don't know those words, it just suounds "blah blah to have some blah please". Even if you know grammar, it is useless because it still sounds like blah blah nonsense.

Boy, I can really relate to that. That's also my reason for trying JLPT lists: I often I recognize the common 'linking words' like "to have", "some" or "please" in your example, but the really important ones (SOUP!) are just blabla (or [kana]BERABERA[/kana] ). It's frustrating to understand most of the words in a sentence and still not even have a clue what the main topic could be.

Learning with sentences isn't a bad idea either, but where do you find a lot of sentences which are "just above your level"? I've picked up an Assimil book which will provide me some material, but definitely not 10 000 sentences. If we could collect some sort of graded list I'm sure that would be a huge help.

As for the soup example, the way to get around that is to ask other people for their opinion on the difference between "I want soup" and "I want to have some soup please". Sit back and try to think about what the responses tell you. And all the while use "I want to have some soup please" and try to see if there is a difference in other people's reaction.

Also, even if you didn't know soup, but you knew "to have some" and "please", you can still figure out what soup is. How? Well every time someone wants that specific item, you always hear them say "soup". And every time, they are handed the same thing. You hear the words "I" and "want" all the time, but it seems to be the case that everytime they want to eat that food they always say "soup". So, from context, you can guess that maybe that thing he/she is eating is probably called "soup".

Also, if you didn't know what soup is, just do what little kids do..... say "Mommy, what's soup?" and she'll help you figure it out.

Also there are tons of words that people say without ever thinking of the meaning, especially for many of the set phrases in Japanese. If you had a script of all the conversation you've had recently, I'm sure there are words/phrases/sentences that make sense to you, but in reality the literal meaning makes no sense at all. You use them without any regard to knowing their exact literal definition. You just know how to use them.

chamcham Wrote:As an exercise, take your JLPT lists and ask a native Japanese which words they know or have heard people used before. Have them actually mark
them off with a check mark. I'm gonna guess that that maybe 60% to 90%
of the words are useless.
...
Japanese is a language where you don't need to know too many words.
...
I used to do the vocab list thing until time after time my tutors commented that they either haven't heard that word or maybe no one ever uses it...

Oh dear... This really makes one wonder what kind of tutors you've been using and what kind of language you've been exposed to?!... I actually recall you marking PERFECTLY USEFUL grammar points as 'low frequency' in this topic: http://forum.koohii.com/showthread.php?tid=407 and I really have an issue when someone starts calling acquiring vocabulary a useless task.

I have so far gone through about 60% of the Level 1 vocabulary list and I see the vast majority of the words I've learnt from it in books and newspapers and hear them in news broadcasts every day.

How can anyone want to limit their vocabulary?!..

chamcham Wrote:Big words are mostly fluff. Maybe if you want to be a journalist or a writer

...or being able to read and understand what journalists and writers write about.

chamcham Wrote:but for practical purposes it's not very useful.

And how practical is watching the news or reading a newspaper or a book, pray tell?! Not everyone's world is limited to manga and buying a beer...

chamcham Wrote:I remember in elementary school we used to have vocab books that taught fancy, big, intelligent words. I don't anyone learned anything from them and no one ever used them.

Once again, don't assume everyone on this website lives in a world where the above is the case.

chamcham Wrote:As for the soup example, the way to get around that is to ask other people for their opinion on the difference between "I want soup" and "I want to have some soup please". Sit back and try to think about what the responses tell you. And all the while use "I want to have some soup please" and try to see if there is a difference in other people's reaction.

Also, even if you didn't know soup, but you knew "to have some" and "please", you can still figure out what soup is. How? Well every time someone wants that specific item, you always hear them say "soup". And every time, they are handed the same thing. You hear the words "I" and "want" all the time, but it seems to be the case that everytime they want to eat that food they always say "soup". So, from context, you can guess that maybe that thing he/she is eating is probably called "soup".

Also, if you didn't know what soup is, just do what little kids do..... say "Mommy, what's soup?" and she'll help you figure it out.

Euh.... ALL of the above just to figure out one word?.. As opposed to learning it from a book?!.. Even if one has unlimited access to native speakers, this truly seems like a waste of their time. And one's own, at that.

vosmiura Wrote:I could be totally wrong, but to me it makes sense to have sufficient vocab so as to be able to understand roughly what is being talked about; way before you can start worrying about context. Context, and its evil cousin idioms, are a very big task and one that is not necessary to begin with in my experience.

That's how Japanese sounds before you learn vocab, "blah blah blah". As long as your input sounds like that, learning the language is an uphill struggle. My theory is that with enough vocab under one's belt it will snowball. When you can understand a lot of vocab you can assimilate all the rest passively, just watch some Japanese TV, listen to songs, etc. and your brain will decode the logic of the language itself. Learning contextual usage, and the idioms will come naturally.

Learn to walk before you can run... and all that. I'm all for divide & conquer. Learn "water", "under", "bridge", long before you learn "water under the bridge".

Very true. Also, Japanese vocabulary is different from any other languages in that it takes TIME to look up a word, much more time that, say, in French or Russian. So just reading and having to look up every single word (or enough words for the sentence to start making sense) makes reading unbearable.

Also, as I have pointed out earlier, in my method (learning JLPT vocab with http://dictionary.goo.ne.jp/ entries) there are plenty of examples / context that are contained in the actual dictionary entries.

I'm quite into the 'learn through context' style of learning. But when say, reading a novel, you really have to have a certain amount of vocab/structures under your belt before it's possible to pick unknown language up.

So I try and hit vocab like a 2 pronged trident (a bident...or a hoe). Drill vocab and grammar in Twinkle, and read. I find it great for motivation when I see a recently learned item appear in a genuine text.

chamcham Wrote:As for the soup example, the way to get around that is to ask other people for their opinion on the difference between "I want soup" and "I want to have some soup please". Sit back and try to think about what the responses tell you. And all the while use "I want to have some soup please" and try to see if there is a difference in other people's reaction.

Also, even if you didn't know soup, but you knew "to have some" and "please", you can still figure out what soup is. How? Well every time someone wants that specific item, you always hear them say "soup". And every time, they are handed the same thing. You hear the words "I" and "want" all the time, but it seems to be the case that everytime they want to eat that food they always say "soup". So, from context, you can guess that maybe that thing he/she is eating is probably called "soup".

Also, if you didn't know what soup is, just do what little kids do..... say "Mommy, what's soup?" and she'll help you figure it out.

Also there are tons of words that people say without ever thinking of the meaning, especially for many of the set phrases in Japanese. If you had a script of all the conversation you've had recently, I'm sure there are words/phrases/sentences that make sense to you, but in reality the literal meaning makes no sense at all. You use them without any regard to knowing their exact literal definition. You just know how to use them.

I know what you're saying, but its all different levels to different people. Sure something as simple as soup that I will eat probably every day in Japan, I picked it up like no tomorrow. The simple "soup" sentence was just an example to show how importand vocab is to understanding.

Once you have a level where you know a large enough amount of vocab & grammar so that there are only small gaps in sentences, then its easy and quick to pick up the rest of both. Say you hear "I was drinking ラムネ yesterday." Now you know a lot. Some kind of beverage was being drank. You can ask your language partner "What's ラムネ. How does it taste?" and you'll have hardly any trouble remembering it after that.

In my case I will just ask my wife "Honey, what's 味噌汁?" . For simple day to day stuff its easy to make progress like that. Also for business stuff I could pick up a lot of what is being said in meetings, especially since the same or similar stuff keeps repeating day to day. But, for real life Japanese, like my wife talking to a friend or relative on the phone = impossible for me to follow enough . Its always changing and so much variety. After the simple standard chit chat it just becomes a bit of a blur with only the odd word that I know.

I really feel that I need to bulk up on more words to be able to catch more what is being talked about, then I can ask more questions.

As Serge said, its a lot of effort to ask about every word. Also the frequency of used words starts to drop off the map quite quickly, which means you don't get that much chance to hear them. Languages have a few words used frequently, and a bazillion words used infrequently. With years of immersion, you can learn them all by hearing/reading, but without immersion the more infrequent words need special attention I feel.

Its not the case that you only need to learn infrequent words either. 5 year old children know and use tens of thousands of words; and its not because they are news readers or novellists .

PS. I'm probably going to benefit when our baby starts to learn Japanese and speak it with his mom more. This is going to lead to hearing lots of basic conversations, building up baby step by step, until the kid will outrun me :p.