I'll try and explain what I'm after so that those that don't practice scales can also understand.

In recent years I've started to realise that scales are very useful for improving my instrumental technique and though I used to hate them I've started to really enjoy practicing scales because there's always so much to think about. For those that don't know, the value of scales is mostly in practicing them, not in memorising them, because they provide the perfect place to practice almost every aspect of playing an instrument, and often highlight what needs practicing.

I often feel motivated to work on my Japanese in the same way, but apart from pronunciation practice, I can't think of a how to do it. Most active study methods, like SRSing and reading grammar explanations, seem to be about memorisation, but I'm looking for ways to improve my ability to use what I've already learnt. I.e. Qualitative not quantitative learning. Jumping straight in to reading/writing etc seems more useful, but it feels like I'm just playing through pieces without stopping to work on the bits where my technique is lacking. It's better than nothing, but there must be ways to target your practice more specifically, or so I imagine.

Obviously reading, writing, listening and speaking are all going to are all going to require their own practice methods, and I guess if people had a good way to practice them it would have already come up on one of the "how do I improve my..." threads, but I figured it was worth asking anyway.

P.s. I've heard people say they find it useful to practice sentence structures by changing the words to say different things. I'm thinking that maybe that's more along the lines of what I'm looking for, but I'm not really sure how that works because when I try doing it I don't feel like I'm practicing the sentence structures so much as just coming up with words. For example, when changing 車を買った to パンを食べた, all I'm conscious of thinking is that I need a noun and a verb. It's completely different from coming up with the sentence pattern.

indeed. shadowing is probably the closest thing to scales. The problem is though shadowing will be very difficult if you don't know enough of the words. I don't know what the OPs level is, but generally speaking, one of the best things anyone can do at a low level is boost their vocabulary. Double or triple your recognizable and comprehensible vocabulary and you'll notice everything else you do in your studies becomes much easier. That way when you start shadowing/reading/listening/speaking, you're doing it with a greater number of words you know. It's like the musical equivalent of knowing what each key/fret sounds like on an instrument. Learn that first and then scales and musical theory suddenly becomes way easier.

I think of shadowing full sentences as more like playing a simple (but real) song. Wouldn't playing scales would be more like the drills from JSL?

Given a prompt, you need to produce a simple bit of language that has the same pattern as all the other instances of the drill. For example:

http://nihongo.byu.edu/jsl/L13/13A_A.mov

But like any analogy, there are probably various ways of interpreting it...

CJ

cjon256 Wrote:I think of shadowing full sentences as more like playing a simple (but real) song.

I agree, but I think it still retains the important aspect of allowing you to focus on small sections and correct specific failings in your technique. I think pronunciation drills, like ああ　ああ　ああ、　かあ　かあ　かあ、　があ　があ　があ, etc are more scale like, but I think it's pretty easy to apply instrumental practice techniques to pronunciation so I'm more interested in finding a way to do something similar for the less physical aspects of Japanese learning.

cjon256 Wrote:Wouldn't playing scales would be more like the drills from JSL?

Given a prompt, you need to produce a simple bit of language that has the same pattern as all the other instances of the drill. For example:

http://nihongo.byu.edu/jsl/L13/13A_A.mov

But like any analogy, there are probably various ways of interpreting it...

CJ

Maybe... I think I'll give it a go though I suspect I'll just end up turning it in to pronunciation practice. XD

nadiatims Wrote:I don't know what the OPs level is, but generally speaking, one of the best things anyone can do at a low level is boost their vocabulary. Double or triple your recognizable and comprehensible vocabulary and you'll notice everything else you do in your studies becomes much easier.

I definitely do need to expand my vocabulary, in fact there's a huge amount of other things I still need to learn as well, but I also think it's worth spending some time improving your ability to use (I'm not necessarily talking about production) what you've already learned, regardless of level.

We're probably on the same page here, since you often recommend extensive reading as a good study method for pretty much anyone, so I'm sure you agree that one of the main advantages of reading is that it allows you to see the same vocab and grammar in lots of different contexts, which does a lot to improve your understanding of them.

yeah, i think shadowing may be the wrong suggestion.
I think the benefit of scales in music is that it teaches you where/what each note on the fret/keyboard is making everything easier. When you see a chord diagram or something you can instantly tell what each note is, you can figure out what key songs are in etc. The equivalent to scales for language learning would be whatever teaches you words rapidly. So reading is definitely a good candidate.

JLPT grammar and kanji questions are excellent in terms of pinpointing weaknesses and then improving on them. They require you to respond with the most appropriate kanji or grammatical structure, which passive reading does not demand. However, it's important to read first and develop an intuition for the use of a kanji of grammatical structure before you begin testing to see whether you've adequately developed that intuition.

maybe verb conjugations?

when I was playing scales on the violin I never even though about it ....it was second nature....

in the same way once you learn the various rules for verbs you can mix and match as needed in a methodical way.

nadiatims Wrote:yeah, i think shadowing may be the wrong suggestion.
I think the benefit of scales in music is that it teaches you where/what each note on the fret/keyboard is making everything easier. When you see a chord diagram or something you can instantly tell what each note is, you can figure out what key songs are in etc. The equivalent to scales for language learning would be whatever teaches you words rapidly. So reading is definitely a good candidate.

I don't know... I found that practicing scales improved both my finger coordination and my ear/pitch. I was about to recommend reading sentences and passages from books on Japanese pronunciation (the ones with intonation marks and pronunciation drills), but shadowing with just an unmarked text is probably more useful, at least for training the ear and tongue.

As for verb conjugation drills, if you have an apple device, you could drill verb conjugations with an app like 'Te-form Master' ($0.99 a few years ago). It can help you increase your conjugation speed--speed being another benefit of scale practice.

Oniichan Wrote:

nadiatims Wrote:yeah, i think shadowing may be the wrong suggestion.
I think the benefit of scales in music is that it teaches you where/what each note on the fret/keyboard is making everything easier. When you see a chord diagram or something you can instantly tell what each note is, you can figure out what key songs are in etc. The equivalent to scales for language learning would be whatever teaches you words rapidly. So reading is definitely a good candidate.

I don't know... I found that practicing scales improved both my finger coordination and my ear/pitch.

What scales are really good for varies a bit from instrument to instrument, and even learner to learner.

For example, on guitar getting to know where the notes are is much more difficult than on a piano, so knowing scales is helpful even when it comes to knowing what note an individual fret is. In piano there is never any question of that, it's all visible and in front of you. Likewise, if you know the notes of a scale in theory (i.e., thinking to yourself: Okay, it's in D, so F and C are sharp), you can bang it out on a piano even when you're a total n00b, though it will be sloppy and less natural without having practiced it as a scale.

Scales can help with finger coordination with both piano and guitar, but the extent of that varies from learner to learner. For example, one thing you should get used to on guitar is not letting your fingers flail around. All four fingers should stay close to the strings when you are doing a run, as it's the most efficient way. You can choose to practice this by doing scales OR by doing it with other runs. There is an advantage to doing it with runs--you don't want to introduce mistakes into your scales. You want to play them correctly and clearly each time, but when you are trying not to flail your fingers and you are not used to it you sometimes make more mistakes.

So, some people practice that form of finger coordination with scales and some don't (don't get me wrong, practicing scales on a guitar is at heart a coordination thing, but what type of coordination you are practicing varies by learner. And coordination may not be your main goal).

Also, for example, scales might help your ear get used to hearing that combination of notes (say, in a major scale), but it wouldn't really be very helpful to those who already have a good ear or are gifted. Another instance where it varies from learner to learner.

Oniichan Wrote:As for verb conjugation drills, if you have an apple device, you could drill verb conjugations with an app like 'Te-form Master' ($0.99 a few years ago). It can help you increase your conjugation speed--speed being another benefit of scale practice.

Are there any apps that drill other conjugations (in particular: 受身、使役、and 可能)?

I guess this is too vague a question since everyone seems to have a different idea of what scales are for, but some of what you all suggested sounds like it will be useful so thanks the help.