I recently tried a new way to practice with my language partner and thought I'd mention it.

Every other day we read a couple of pages of drama script out loud. The native reads and the other partner is not allowed to look at the script/text.
After each sentence you have to repeat the sentence (correcting any pronunciation mistakes or missing words and for long sentences you can break into sections).
Then translate it and make sure you understand it. This task really helps with pronunciation and listening I think.

On the alternate days I do 2 written translations. 1 from Eng->JP and 1 from JP->Eng.
Usually from some interesting jp blog or eng blog, etc.. By the way, I've found the eng->JP translation is very challenging compared to jp->eng.
Then the partner either corrects the translations or does an alternate and we compare and discuss.

What I've noticed is that just after a week of this I start noticing certain patterns much better than just drilling in Anki or looking at a grammar book.
Things like "Ah, I remember translating this style of english sentence a few days ago, etc"

Anyway seems much more effective than chatting about the weather or what I had for lunch. I guess the key is to find a good partner or tutor.

socrat Wrote:I recently tried a new way to practice with my language partner and thought I'd mention it.

Every other day we read a couple of pages of drama script out loud. The native reads and the other partner is not allowed to look at the script/text.
After each sentence you have to repeat the sentence (correcting any pronunciation mistakes or missing words and for long sentences you can break into sections).
Then translate it and make sure you understand it. This task really helps with pronunciation and listening I think.

On the alternate days I do 2 written translations. 1 from Eng->JP and 1 from JP->Eng.
Usually from some interesting jp blog or eng blog, etc.. By the way, I've found the eng->JP translation is very challenging compared to jp->eng.
Then the partner either corrects the translations or does an alternate and we compare and discuss.

What I've noticed is that just after a week of this I start noticing certain patterns much better than just drilling in Anki or looking at a grammar book.
Things like "Ah, I remember translating this style of english sentence a few days ago, etc"

Anyway seems much more effective than chatting about the weather or what I had for lunch. I guess the key is to find a good partner or tutor.

I often do this sort of thing with my partners. Only works if the partner is really good at English, though. Sometimes, we'd use something that's already translated (like Hiragana Times), I'd have a go, my partner would try to improve and then we'd check what the translator did. I only ever translate into Japanese though, I don't see the point of translating into English -- I know if I didn't get something and I ask.

As a variation, I sometimes make my partner tell me a story in English (whatever they want to talk about) and I translate it into Japanese on the fly, orally. This is particularly great to get a good idea of what kind of everyday language you might be missing. Plus, it makes everyone practice!