Hey all! First, a quick summary to let you know where I am: I started in January of this year, and after 6 months (two months longer than planned, unfortunately) I finished RTK1 [I love you, sign of the snake]. I quickly moved on to the Hiragana using Heisig's method, breezed through it, and I am now about to start the Katakana as I review the Hiragana and do my daily SRS reps for Kanji.

Now, this is where I get stuck. I have literally no idea what to do next. After accomplishing such a massive undertaking as RTK, I feel sorta overwhelmed and with a sort of empty "what do I do now?" feeling. I don't want to add more Kanji quite yet (I will soon), and I know I need to get through the syllabaries and *really* learn them... but I am totally confused about what to do next! Having such a set routine and easy goal (not easy to complete, mind, just an "easy goal" - as in, finish the RTK1 book) made the past 6 months go by without such confusion, but now that it's accomplished, and I need to, and want to, actually take the next step and move on to learning Japanese itself, I don't quite know how to proceed.

I have accumulated a number of resources - Genki, kanji chain, movie method, RTK2, AJATT 10,000 sentence marathon - but I am just... sort of lost. What should the next step be after RTK? I know there really isn't a set "path" and that there isn't any step I "should" be doing next... but I am just so so lost that I am trying to explain this feeling as best as I can, in the hopes that someone can understand what I'm talking about and give me a helping hand. I also know could just go through RTK2 and just set that as my goal, but I just get the feeling I won't want to do that.

To make things easier: my next goal is to be able to read the Kanji, and build up my vocabulary of words. I've looked up some words myself out of curiousity as I studied, and memorized their meaning in Kanji (携帯電話, 新聞...) and the way they break down make sense to me (and I love it). I thought maybe I'd just explore on my own, adding words and memorizing their pronunciations as I go, but that seems sorta inefficient and brute-force.

And with brute force, that brings me to the 10,000 sentence AJATT method. This confuses me. If I don't know anything, how am I supposed to read something in Japanese? It's irritating!

I want to be able to use what I have learned (the Kanji) and build on them towards Japanese in some way. Linking Kanji to Kana, for example, seems like the way to go - along with just learning words. But my own personal attempt failed miserably. I downloaded the lyrics (kana/kanji) to a song I like [I refuse to mention it out of embarassment] and tried reading it, and got demoralized very quickly. I realized that despite all the effort that went into the Kanji learning, I am still very very far behind in being anywhere near quasi-functional. It was very humbling, but also horribly demoralizing - and coupled with the indecision following the end of RTK, it only added to my confusion.

So basically, what I am asking fellow learners of Japanese, is what you did at this stage (should you have passed it), so that I can have an idea of how to proceed. What possible next step is there? I know the smart thing to do is build on the kanji and work my way towards being able to read Japanese and understand it - but how do I do that?

I would really appreciate any help you guys have to offer!

Use a textbook until you have a good foundation in the language then go into the sentence method. That's what I did.

I also started RTK1 in January, but finished it four months later (and I learned the Kana before that, by the end of December/beginning of January).
In these two months after RTK1 I've been doing Core 2000 on Smart.fm (together with a pre-made Anki deck) and I've been studying Tae Kim too (although in a very slow pace, since it's kinda hard to follow it with such a limited vocabulary yet). I can tell you it's working for me, since I've been able to understand some words and sentences while watching animes and listening to music. I don't know this would be the best path, but I think that building your vocabulary is a must at this stage and Core 2000 gives a systematic method and a well-defined goal to achieve (like RTK).

Other than that, I've been adding 5 Kanjis from RTK3 by day because I noticed it's so easy because most of the Kanjis use already known primitives from RTK1.

If you're truly a beginner to Japanese, I second Womacks23's recommendation - find a textbook, or even Tae Kim, to get some grammar fundamentals down. Even simple sentences will make no sense if you don't have some sort of background.

I wasn't a beginner when I finished RTK - I had taken a few semesters of Japanese, so I knew the basic sentence patterns - but the biggest thing that helped me was cramming vocabulary. At the start, that meant Japanese words with English definitions - I started from the JLPT3 and 4 lists from jlptstudy.com. I use 3 types of cards - kanji front (recognition), kana front (kana->kanji), and English front (production).

(Side note: kana->kanji cards will become a problem when you get to the point that you know several words with the same reading. Hopefully by then you can add a Japanese sentence for context to distinguish them.)

Once my vocabulary was up around 2000 words, I started to see (and hear) Japanese as a few words I can't understand floating around in a sea of vocabulary I know, instead of the other way around. I believe this is the point where the sentence method starts to be helpful, because you can use Japanese sentences for context, and understand definitions in Japanese. Get a kid's dictionary and have a blast!

Now I've mostly given up textbooks and am reading novels, listening to podcasts and music, etc. It can be a long grind to get your vocabulary up, but if you could get through RTK (which is even more work for even less immediate gratification) you can get 2000 words under your belt in no time. Then things will start to fall into place, I promise.

Edit: Noticed you'd already learned the kana.

Start with SRSing vocabulary first and leisurely read Tae Kim. Core2000 is a good place to start, once you finish it it will slowly all come together.

Personally, I found Genki to be a better starting point than either Core2000 or Tae Kim, both of which are certainly useful too. But both Core and TK assume some knowledge of the language, whereas Genki doesn't. Also, Genki gives you exposure to all facets of Japanese: grammar, reading, writing, listening, speaking. OK, it's a bit dry at times, and it's pitched to people leading the student life, but that was fine with me. I skipped many of the "in-class exercises", but I found the dialogs, grammar and vocab lists very useful.

If you already own Genki, I think now is the time to use it, when it will be most helpful.

I would do Genki, and add the vocab from that to an SRS. If you've done rtk then it should be easy to learn a load of readings as you go but at least the vocab you'll get will be in a nice order. Core 2000's order is really bad imo.

Consider using Japanese for Everyone. It covers as much as both genki books in the space of one book, and it is much cheaper (about $20 on amazon).

I went from RTK1 straight into AJATT (skip RTK2, complete waste of time).

Khatz made a beginner's sentence pack, which is available on AJATT, I'd buy that and use those as your first sentences:
http://www.alljapaneseallthetime.com/blo...ere-huzzah

Just start following AJATT hard core. Six hours listening (minimum) per day, 1 hour reading, 100 sentence reps, 20 new sentences. You're going to need pretty easy material for sentences, but make sure you're only watching/listening to native media.
If you do decide to use a textbook, sentence-mine them.

Of course, at the start, you won't know any readings and therefore it'll be difficult. But as you gradually build up your knowledge of readings, you'll start to find it getting really easy.

I'd advise against doing RTK3 for a while, as there are a lot of rare (useless) Kanji, just learn new Kanij as you come across them.

I would definitely consider doing the movie/town method. Maybe not just limit yourslef to movies or towns or what not... but regardless... being able to know the onyomi of just about any kanji you see is a huge leg up. Doing that, some grammar, and some vocab from the core 2000/6000 or KO2001 would be enough to keep you busy for a while

I would personally recommend RTK2 and skimming Tae Kim. But after that and in general, just read. Read a lot. And you know what? You won't understand much if anything at first, but that's okay. Read manga so the pictures give context. Read translated novels that you've read before in English, so your memory gives context. You'll find that with time invested it comes to you quite quickly and naturally.

I'd say go through Assimil Japanese With Ease at this point. It should be a relatively easy 5 month course (at the most), and by then end you'll have a reasonable command of Japanese. At that point the transition to native Japanese material should also be relatively easy. A lot of people seem to think you should just dive right in to native material now, but that's too overwhelming for most people, IMO.

I should say I haven't used the Assimil Japanese course myself beyond the first few lessons (but I will when it comes time for me to learn Japanese). But for the sake of comparison I'll say that after about 30 lessons (out of 113) of the Assimil New French With Ease, I have no problem going to a French-language forum about Chinese and making my way through the posts with a dictionary. Now, this is a field with which I'm fairly familiar, and much of the terminology is similar in both languages, so take that with a grain of salt. But I have no doubt that by the end of the Japanese course, you'd be pretty well-prepared to tackle just about anything (dictionary in hand, of course).

Diving straight into Japanese material would be the language-learning equivalent of dropping a five year old that can't swim into the English Channel without a life-vest. Smiles and, "Don't worry, you'll get the hang of it!" aren't too comforting.

If you have no previous experience, textbooks will be your best route. Since beginner textbooks are written for complete novices, it'll guide you every baby step with dialogues, reading material, audio, grammar, and vocabulary all at your level. Genki is a great beginner text just get the workbooks too, and make sure to do all the classroom exercises in the book as well for extra practice with the grammar and vocabulary.

@Aijin you should try it sometime for your next language. You might like it.

Aijin Wrote:Diving straight into Japanese material would be the language-learning equivalent of dropping a five year old that can't swim into the English Channel without a life-vest. Smiles and, "Don't worry, you'll get the hang of it!" aren't too comforting....

I disagree, I used textbooks for quite a long time, and found them useless. It was only when I started immersing myself in native media that I gradually got better.
That being said, if you just sentence-mine the textbook for your SRS, you shouldn't have any problems.

looks like we've all reached a consensus

I think it depends which way you wanna go. If you actually want to start saying anything correctly soon a textbook is def gonna help. And you can do a textbook + immersion as bonus, that's what I did to get to intermediate (and be able to have basic conversations).

the problem with sticking with textbooks for a year is that when you finally try to tackle real content you realize you have almost no vocabulary and the grammar you have learned is massively insufficient. Jumping into real content is always gonna be a massive shock so you may as well get used to that fro the beginning. What you'll discover if you focus on content is that later when you do read grammar explanations is that you actually already know it anyway. At least that was the case with me.

But if you don't have at least some sense of the basic sentence patterns you're liable to just try to figure out what the words in the sentence mean, and then make up a sentence that makes sense and has those words in it. I've seen it happen a lot in Japanese classes. Or you'll find yourself unable to parse the boundaries of where one word ends and another begins. And perhaps it's possible that you're going to pick up from context on the distinction between 犬をかんだ　and 犬にかまれた, but... I have my doubts.

I think a textbook can be enormously helpful, but even reading quickly through Tae Kim just to give you a basic foundation in grammar is a good idea because the grammar is entirely different from English and it's hard to wrap your head around without some direct explanation.

If you balance between sentence-mining some textbooks/Tae Kim, and native media, that should be a pretty good first step.

Like I said, I recommend Khatz's beginner sentence pack to get started off, it includes all the kind of useful stuff you'd expect from Genki, and more natural material as well:
http://www.alljapaneseallthetime.com/blo...ere-huzzah

mafried Wrote:you should try it sometime for your next language. You might like it.

I have, I just personally get far better results from my own methods

thecite Wrote:I disagree, I used textbooks for quite a long time, and found them useless. It was only when I started immersing myself in native media that I gradually got better.
That being said, if you just sentence-mine the textbook for your SRS, you shouldn't have any problems.

How are lists of vocabulary, compilations of grammar in progressive order with explanations, accompanied by exercises and assignments to practice the grammar, as well as dialogues, reading material, and audio specifically designed for material the learner knows possibly useless? Textbooks may not be everyone's cup of tea, but they provide a methodical route to increase one's skill and proficiency, and are extremely useful.

Perhaps I am being slightly misunderstood: I am not saying that one should ONLY use textbooks. But if one has absolutely no previous experience in Japanese they are not going to be able to simply pick up any material and get through it. One may be able to pick up some from context, and use dictionaries for every single word they come across, but a beginner will not be able to figure out all the conjugations, grammar, and verb forms they come across. I don't really see why one would even bother in such a masochistic practice either; it's infinitely faster to read a short paragraph explanation about causative-passive form and how it's conjugated than it is to try and somehow miraculously figure it out.

I am 100% for immersing oneself in the language they're trying to learn, but I can't imagine a more ineffective method of learning Japanese than trying to pick up a manga or newspaper and try to understand the sentences when the person doesn't even know what ですmeans! Everything in due time

Aijin Wrote:

mafried Wrote:you should try it sometime for your next language. You might like it.

I have, I just personally get far better results from my own methods

Fair enough. I respect that everyone learns differently. If I may continue your swimming analogy, for me it is like a cold river or stream. You could be one of those kids that dips their right toe, then their left toe, then their ankles, etc. and slowly adjusts to the water. Or you can cannonball in and quickly adjust, albeit with a little shock at first.

To me, using a textbook alone is like taking swimming lessons without ever going in the water. Maybe you lie on a bench and demonstrate the right form, but that and swimming are two very different things. Textbook Japanese is isolated, sterile, non-living Japanese.

Of course if someone jumped in a pool and floundered around, determined to learn to swim entirely on their own without any help, it at best would take a while. They'd acquire bad habits, miss out on basic fundamentals, etc. Of course the same is true of jumping into native media and refusing any textbooks or reference material. Personally I think that's a stupid thing to do. The reference material should be there, but as support for your exploration of native material, not as the focus of learning.

But again, I respect that everyone learns differently.

I would also advocate using a textbook. I used the Adventures in Japanese series, and personally I think it is vastly superior to Genki (although that might just be personal preference). I honestly don't know why Khatzumoto from AJATT (or anyone else, for that matter) is so anti-textbook. As long as you don't pick one that's totally crappy, they're great for explaining the basics. They've got vocabulary lists laid out in a neat, organized fashion, example dialogues, grammar explanations, and practice exercises to reinforce it all. What's not to love?

mafried Wrote:Of course if someone jumped in a pool and floundered around, determined to learn to swim entirely on their own without any help, it at best would take a while. They'd acquire bad habits, miss out on basic fundamentals, etc. Of course the same is true of jumping into native media and refusing any textbooks or reference material. Personally I think that's a stupid thing to do. The reference material should be there, but as support for your exploration of native material, not as the focus of learning.

But again, I respect that everyone learns differently.

It seems we practically are in agreement then I am not suggesting that only using a textbook is the best course for learning; textbooks are just a tool, and should be supplemented with countless other materials. Manga, novels, news, Japanese websites, music, movies, TV shows, conversation partners, and any other means of exposure to actual Japanese are invaluable learning resources. Textbooks, grammar books, etc. just help to hone one's skills, and act as guidance for progressing deeper into the language. If one had 10 hours a day to study Japanese, for example, I'd advocate 1-2 hours of textbooks/reference material, and the other 8-9 hours immersed in the language.

But for a complete beginner it's very different. If they can't even read 「山田さんは学生です」then there's little point in trying to decode authentic media, and following textbook and coursework structed for novices is the best bet. My personal advice to most students is that once they have down basic grammar and verb forms (finishing Genki 2 for example) then they can really try to hit home with as much exposure as possibly. Until then there's not really that much media out there that they'd be able to comprehend.

caivano Wrote:And you can do a textbook + immersion as bonus, that's what I did to get to intermediate (and be able to have basic conversations).

This is the way I went too.

Tools I've used along the way, and would use again:
Japanese in Mangaland series
Assimil Japanese With Ease
iknow 2000-6000
soumatome series grammar books
kenkyuusha
dictionary of blah blah japanese grammar series

Edit: I forgot to mention that I used Anki with sentences from all of the above. I figured it would go without saying but just in case.

On top of the textbook thing, consider taking a class too. It might not move at the pace you want, but it's nice to have a teacher that speaks the language fluently and a community that is interested in learning. As long as you don't get conceited because you did RTK and claim that you know more than everyone, it can be helpful.