Yeah, Raschaverak, I say hang in there. Your writing certainly suggests you have a decent intellect, so you have the brainpower to do this.

Heisig said somewhere that many of us have a grumpy relationship with our own memories. We get annoyed with ourselves for forgetting easy stuff. Heisig went on to encourage us to cut ourselves (and our memory) some slack. Forgetting stuff is a natural part of being human -- our brains naturally forget stuff (perhaps for good reason) unless it's important enough that we keep being confronted with it. The beauty of Anki is that it recognizes this human hard-wiring and helps us manage it.

The goal isn't to be perfect -- it's just to improve. Keep at it, and you will.

Nest0r,

Just to make sure: You're for studying grammar to get better understanding of your example sentences and exposure to Japanese media? You're not for the rote memorization and regurgitation of grammar rules.

Like you, I'm also not really getting interested in "don't study grammar" discussion anymore. Yeah, I pushed for that idea early on, but it became apparent that at least understanding grammar points along with having example sentences being tested via SRS helped way too much with just reading books and watching TV.

Maybe, maybe if I had much more daily exposure I would have a different opinion. However, life situation didn't call or allow for it in an easy manner so I have to offer advice based on the idea you're not getting 24/7 effective Japanese exposure.

Raschaverak Wrote:You're right IceCream There is no shortcut. And if that's a given, than I can conclude based on my current studying speed and capabilities, that I'm just not meant for academic learning, or learning in general, since I will never achieve my goals, with this puny brain of mine.....and since several poeple / studies suggest that this can't really be changed, we have to make do with what we've been given, I feel like I should just give up. I really, really envy people who can learn fast and have a good memory, knowledge is everything for me, so nature was a little sarcastic, giving me tihs puny brain, thus making impossible to acquire all the knowledge I want....too bad. Oh well, I guess I'll stick to Anki for now, and see where it goes....

If there's anything this community knows, it's that anyone can learn. Even nest0r... even Yonosa...! Seriously, you will soon come to realise several things:
- You've massively underestimated your natural ability. Your brain is a seriously advanced piece of kit.
- When you start using good methods (e.g. RTK) and tools (e.g. Anki), you'll see more of your potential come out.
- Confidence is very, very important to academic progress. You have to believe you can nail this language... and you can! You nailed English after all.
- You'll develop the tools to learning as you practice learning more. IceCream accurately points out that some of the tools of conceptual mastery come with learning to connect different ideas to form new ideas. You can only do that once you've learned a whole bunch of different facts to start with.

Just put your trust in some of the methods this community has tested, you'll find yourself pleased with your progress.

Blahah Wrote:

Raschaverak Wrote:You're right IceCream There is no shortcut. And if that's a given, than I can conclude based on my current studying speed and capabilities, that I'm just not meant for academic learning, or learning in general, since I will never achieve my goals, with this puny brain of mine.....and since several poeple / studies suggest that this can't really be changed, we have to make do with what we've been given, I feel like I should just give up. I really, really envy people who can learn fast and have a good memory, knowledge is everything for me, so nature was a little sarcastic, giving me tihs puny brain, thus making impossible to acquire all the knowledge I want....too bad. Oh well, I guess I'll stick to Anki for now, and see where it goes....

If there's anything this community knows, it's that anyone can learn. Even nest0r... even Yonosa...! Seriously, you will soon come to realise several things:
- You've massively underestimated your natural ability. Your brain is a seriously advanced piece of kit.
- When you start using good methods (e.g. RTK) and tools (e.g. Anki), you'll see more of your potential come out.
- Confidence is very, very important to academic progress. You have to believe you can nail this language... and you can! You nailed English after all.
- You'll develop the tools to learning as you practice learning more. IceCream accurately points out that some of the tools of conceptual mastery come with learning to connect different ideas to form new ideas. You can only do that once you've learned a whole bunch of different facts to start with.

Just put your trust in some of the methods this community has tested, you'll find yourself pleased with your progress.

Exactly, anyone can do this. Not a matter about being smart or what not. It's just putting the time to learn/review/immerses in native-material,etc
Simple as that. I kept thinking to myself how much I sucked in Japanese but I cannot deny my own progress. If i've improved so much in these 9.0 months+, I can't wait till it reaches 1 year and half. then 2 years then 3 years. If i'm not fluent or close by 2 years, then I'll probably doing something wrong...

Thanks for the help everyone. I think I have a plan now. I'll work my way through Tae Kims just to try and help with a basic understanding and then I'll start doing Core 2000. I'm hoping all the Core 2000 sentences will help me feel more solid on the concepts I learn with Tae Kims guide.

I'll just have to take it one step at a time. If I keep working at it it should all fall into place. It just feels far away and that is a little demotivating. But no giving up. =)

Tobberoth Wrote:Too bad it won't work out okay now. Take a peek through any of the Dictionary of Japanese Grammar books and tell me how much it hurt when your jaw hit your desk. There's WAY too much details when it comes to Japanese grammar which I can guarantee you won't pick up from exposure, even if you live in Japan for 5-10 years. From a foreign country, it's probably never going to happen.

We'll just see about that! >:D

Nukemarine Wrote:Nest0r,

Just to make sure: You're for studying grammar to get better understanding of your example sentences and exposure to Japanese media? You're not for the rote memorization and regurgitation of grammar rules.

Like you, I'm also not really getting interested in "don't study grammar" discussion anymore. Yeah, I pushed for that idea early on, but it became apparent that at least understanding grammar points along with having example sentences being tested via SRS helped way too much with just reading books and watching TV.

Maybe, maybe if I had much more daily exposure I would have a different opinion. However, life situation didn't call or allow for it in an easy manner so I have to offer advice based on the idea you're not getting 24/7 effective Japanese exposure.

Yeah, that's what I'm for.

@arch

If you're interested in 'grammar philosophy' and past wars/arguments, I suggest searching the forum for 'descriptive' and 'prescriptive'. ;p

Also, not sure if we covered this already, but consider focusing/grading mostly on contextual vocabulary usage (including the textural aspects i.e. kanji writing/pitch accent in conjunction with particles, esp. sentence prosody) and making use of the great audio in Core2000 (I focus on the sounds i.e. listening, I subvocalize the sentences *before* flipping over and listening to use the feedback to correct it, and then I speak it aloud).

For grammar you can just focus on any given grammar point and ignore the other components if you like... Not only using an actual structured foundational guide like Tae Kim/Japanese the Manga Way (I always recommend SRSing examples and their explanations from the latter because I think it's the best grammar book ever) but snagging that DOJG 8555 sentence deck from Anki's shared decks, suspending those sentences, and unsuspending them and referencing the books they were taken from as you like... (Well that's one way. ;p)

I was able to understand 90% of every sentence (I mean breaking it down completely and knowing how every component fit) in Core2k based purely on having SRSed the examples and brief related summaries of their notes in Japanese the Manga Way, with some help (other 10%) from Dictionary of Basic Japanese Grammar and random Googlings.

Well I did pick up a copy of Japanese the Manga Way. it will be here tomorrow so I'll be sure to take advantages of the sentences it has =).

Again thanks for all the help. I really appreciate it. You guys really are a great boost to motivation.

I didn't study grammar formally, but I'm only doing it now to get a more deeper understanding of my sentences,etc
Maybe i'm a geek or something but I think the only reason why I've been able to understand so much is my sentence reps and the constant immersion. I even watch news daily now.

ta12121 Wrote:I didn't study grammar formally, but I'm only doing it now to get a more deeper understanding of my sentences,etc
Maybe i'm a geek or something but I think the only reason why I've been able to understand so much is my sentence reps and the constant immersion. I even watch news daily now.

Riiiight.

I forget, ta12121 was fluent in Japanese after one month, from just watching anime. That's the gist of their comments since registering. Oh and they have problems now with their previously learned languages, because they're just so blasted dedicated to and immersed in Japanese!

I shouldn't say anything, anyone who takes to heart vague anecdotal tips and claims deserves the results they'll get. ;p

I second the vote for "Japanese the Manga Way." After RTK1, it's my most-thumbed Japanese book. I read it cover-to-cover, and on that first read-through, I most appreciated it for how it breaks down the the components of each sentence. But now that I'm doing sentences and reading manga, I find myself returning to "Japanese the Manga Way" not so much for sentence breakdowns but simply to re-read its descriptions of various grammar points. For example, today I was reading a manga and encountered a use of "na noni" that I wasn't sure I understood. I thought to myself, I remember a couple panels on that in "The Manga Way." Sure enough, it answered my question. The same thing happened yesterday, as I was SRS'ing "The Girl Who Leapt Through Time" -- she said -chau (-te shimau), and I wanted to read about it; there it was in "The Manga Way."

It may not be as rigorous or as thorough as the Dictionary of Grammar series, but it sure is a great quick reference. Plus it's just plain fun, which may be its greatest virtue. I hear the Mangajin series is like it, no?

nest0r Wrote:

ta12121 Wrote:I didn't study grammar formally, but I'm only doing it now to get a more deeper understanding of my sentences,etc
Maybe i'm a geek or something but I think the only reason why I've been able to understand so much is my sentence reps and the constant immersion. I even watch news daily now.

Riiiight.

I forget, ta12121 was fluent in Japanese after one month, from just watching anime. That's the gist of their comments since registering. Oh and they have problems now with their previously learned languages, because they're just so blasted dedicated to and immersed in Japanese!

I shouldn't say anything, anyone who takes to heart vague anecdotal tips and claims deserves the results they'll get. ;p

lol I wish. One month, I still sucked horribly in Japanese, couldn't even understand anime well. The only reason why I'm going for grammar now(not that I know nothing of it, I did study it in the beginning). I'm just studying it more in depth so i can excel even further.
I tend to watch news stuff nowadays, anime is fun to watch. But it won't help me excel further. I just need to read more(I aim for 50 pages+ to read day). Watching more dramas,etc,news,etc and scripts and such.

Do Japanese students study grammar, such as when to use は or が? Do they study mostly vocabulary and kanji?

In school I studied vocab in 6th, 7th, and 8th grade. They didn't study it in earlier grades (I think). The rest of your vocab study is special terms, like history, or math, or physics terms in those respective classes. English class studies vocab in conjunction with very hard to read stuff like Shakespeare.

BoccKob Wrote:While I'm sure you remember more about my childhood than I do, most of those assumptions are still false.

Which ones? The ones about you doing homework? The ones about you actually learning in school? The one's about context not being able to teach everything? Or the one's where you simply don't remember?

Because if you say you haven't gone through any of the above then all assumptions hold true (as they're all linked). If you say they are all false, then you were either instilled with the English language at birth, or you're just being facetious.

Quote:We'll just see about that! >

Yes. We will. Because even the guy talking about how to gain fluency without so much as cracking open a grammar book... SHOCK... actually opened up a grammar book. He said it himself (anyone else notice something here). But. strangely, he decided to tell people not to, or at least told them not to focus on it, and some how that turned into....

I WILL NEVER EVER STUDY GRAMMAR EVER AS IT IS NOT NECESSARY TO LEARN A LANGUAGE.

But guess what!?

If you've ever looked up the definition of だって、でも、しかし、けれども、より or any of those other simple grammatical pattern, YOU'VE STUDIED GRAMMAR. Finding it in a dictionary and not "A Dictionary of Basic Japanese Grammar" doesn't change that fact.

One way of studying grammar, if you don't want to mine textbooks or whatever, is to add simple contextual sentences while jotting down on your cards or whatever the grammar at work.

Personal anecdote incoming, buuuut, I switched up to an "ignore grammar" approach roughly 6 months ago, shifting focus heavily toward vocabulary and the hope that grammar would begin to "snap into place" with more exposure. Prior to that, I had SRS'd various grammar points (Tae Kim's example sentences were fantastic for this purpose), referenced things I came across them, and so forth.

So 6 months later, what kind of results have I had with focusing on vocabulary and ignoring grammar? Well... my vocab is a heck of a lot better, and my grammar is still absolutely piss poor. Surprise, surprise!

Granted, I have gotten a better grasp on some grammar bits that gave me trouble before, and the "flow" in general of the language feels a lot more natural now, but I'm not convinced that either is a result of my ignoring grammar.

Back to the ol' Tae Kim deck and one or two good grammar books real soon for me. I don't doubt that some have been able to master a language while ignoring grammar, but I ain't one of them peoples.

ropsta Wrote:Because if you say you haven't gone through any of the above then all assumptions hold true (as they're all linked). If you say they are all false, then you were either instilled with the English language at birth, or you're just being facetious.

That's odd, because I know I could speak coherent English before I learned to read, so I couldn't possibly have read a grammar book then. HOW DID IT HAPPEN?! :O

Smackle Wrote:One way of studying grammar, if you don't want to mine textbooks or whatever, is to add simple contextual sentences while jotting down on your cards or whatever the grammar at work.

That's really the same thing though since you need a grammar dictionary/textbook to jott down those notes. It's not like you can get 5 contextual sentences using uchi ni, read them, and then write down how uchi ni differs from aida ni, without having read up on the difference.

Another awesome example is how wake da differs from no da. In some sentences, you have to use one or the other, in some sentences you can use either with a slight difference in emphasis. Stuff like this needs a proper source, 10-20 or even 50 sentences in an SRS won't do.

Tobberoth Wrote:

Smackle Wrote:One way of studying grammar, if you don't want to mine textbooks or whatever, is to add simple contextual sentences while jotting down on your cards or whatever the grammar at work.

That's really the same thing though since you need a grammar dictionary/textbook to jott down those notes. It's not like you can get 5 contextual sentences using uchi ni, read them, and then write down how uchi ni differs from aida ni, without having read up on the difference.

Oh, I was just saying that for those who really want all of these sentences from contexts but not textbook studying, that this was an option. Sort of like using something as the Dictionary of Japanese Grammar series for patterns you find and writing down what's relevant.

Smackle Wrote:

Tobberoth Wrote:

Smackle Wrote:One way of studying grammar, if you don't want to mine textbooks or whatever, is to add simple contextual sentences while jotting down on your cards or whatever the grammar at work.

That's really the same thing though since you need a grammar dictionary/textbook to jott down those notes. It's not like you can get 5 contextual sentences using uchi ni, read them, and then write down how uchi ni differs from aida ni, without having read up on the difference.

Oh, I was just saying that for those who really want all of these sentences from contexts but not textbook studying, that this was an option. Sort of like using something as the Dictionary of Japanese Grammar series for patterns you find and writing down what's relevant.

I see, yeah. As long as one has the dictionary of japanese grammar series on hand, it should work out fine either way.

By the way, even if we assume that adults can learn language to some extent like kids do, isn't there a huge difference in situation? That is, when you're a child you have adults give lots of feedback when you speak incorrectly, and this doesn't happen when you're an adult. This, I think, is a big part of the informal grammar study of children.

My mental image of learning grammar is something like this: You hear or read something to do with grammar and get a general of what it means. For an example let's use は and　が. Your brain makes a theory of when to use which one. At first it's very simple, and whether completely conscious or not you end up with something like "Well, the difference between them is that when you've already been talking about something you use は, whereas when you mention it for the first time you say が." Now, this is very simple, and you could get this impression from many examples, but it's not accurate. There are situations where you mention something for the first time, but you still use は. For example, you're talking about sports and someone says they like snowboarding, and someone else responds "スキーは?" Now, nobody mentioned skiing before, but here there's a は after that. So after more examples like this you come up with a more complex idea about は　and が, where は is used in contrastive situations. This continues until you have a pretty good idea of the difference between the two.

Now, it takes a long time to notice these things. If you've never looked it up anywhere, you need to see something hundreds or thousands of times before you really start to make a theory in your brain that will lead to you being able to use it. I think looking it up in a grammar books makes this process so much faster.

When you're a child and have feedback, it's much easier. If you use は when you should have said が, your mother might correct you. And now your brain realizes that your theory is incomplete or wrong, and it works to find out why it was wrong. But we don't get that kind of feedback as adults (and it's VERY hard to get Japanese people to correct you when you make mistakes). So, we have to compensate by make mental notes to think about what words we are using in order to check ourselves. I think studying grammar is enormously instrumental in this.

Sorry nestor but please learn how to construct a meaningful paragraph before responding to me.

nest0r Wrote:It's not just that your statement doesn't mean anything in regards to learning a second language as an adult

In your first sentence you acknowledge that my statement was NOT in regards to learning a second language as an adult yet.....

nest0r Wrote:nor does it reflect first language development in humans beyond the first few years of life

And yet you throw in this line right afterward talking about how my argument doesn't address language development after the first few years of life, which I specifically noted, and you just two lines prior, acknowledged yourself.

This makes the first half of your response completely nonsensical.

nest0r Wrote:nor does not necessarily learning personally from a book mean that a child doesn't receive explicit guidance in their language usage

And I never said that, but the book drilling type of "explicit" grammar instruction is the kind we are referring to. Of course kids get guidance outside of books. Thanks for proving the point.

activeaero Wrote:Sorry nestor but please learn how to construct a meaningful paragraph before responding to me.

nest0r Wrote:It's not just that your statement doesn't mean anything in regards to learning a second language as an adult

In your first sentence you acknowledge that my statement was NOT in regards to learning a second language as an adult yet.....

nest0r Wrote:nor does it reflect first language development in humans beyond the first few years of life

And yet you throw in this line right afterward talking about how my argument doesn't address language development after the first few years of life, which I specifically noted, and you just two lines prior, acknowledged yourself.

This makes the first half of your response completely nonsensical.

nest0r Wrote:nor does not necessarily learning personally from a book mean that a child doesn't receive explicit guidance in their language usage

And I never said that, but the book drilling type of "explicit" grammar instruction is the kind we are referring to. Of course kids get guidance outside of books. Thanks for proving the point.

So you agree that you need explicit grammar instruction, not just when you're a kid first learning your native language even before you read and onward as you grow and learn your first language(s), but especially as an adult second language learner? I'm glad you agree with the rest of us. Your comments weren't particularly helpful and even came off silly, shallow, and pointless, but thanks for participating. ;p (Although I am curious why'd you write such brief nonsense and yet take the time to complain about another forum poster's writing style and even make a point-by-point quote response when your comments are without substance, it seems a bit... childishly anal? hehe)

Also, I hope you learned something from the extra points I made about how children learn from input even without the inevitable explicit guidance they receive about usage from the get-go, but it's okay if you didn't, I didn't bother simplifying those sections or adding links, as at this point, it's rather moot. Feel free to search the forum if you want to learn more.

So may I drop a quick question about SRSing sentences? I see many people starting out like to use things like Manga to do this. I myself love Manga so this seems like a good way. But how do I go about getting my hands on JP Manga? I read that Khatz talks about buying things off of Amazon JP. Can I buy from there with a U.S. paypal account/debit card? or do I need to do something special?

And what else do people put on their cards when SRSing sentences to help them get more out of it? The sentence on the front, a translation on the back. Anything else important like maybe readings to certain Kanji if your not familiar with them etc?

Sorry to ask so many questions.

arch9443 Wrote:So may I drop a quick question about SRSing sentences? I see many people starting out like to use things like Manga to do this. I myself love Manga so this seems like a good way. But how do I go about getting my hands on JP Manga? I read that Khatz talks about buying things off of Amazon JP. Can I buy from there with a U.S. paypal account/debit card? or do I need to do something special?

And what else do people put on their cards when SRSing sentences to help them get more out of it? The sentence on the front, a translation on the back. Anything else important like maybe readings to certain Kanji if your not familiar with them etc?

Sorry to ask so many questions.

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