I was doing a little practice with a Genki textbook today when I realized that I totally suck with counters (枚, 個, 冊, 本, etc.). So basically I was wondering if anyone here knew of any good resources for practicing using counters, or at least something provides good explanations. Can be internet or print and free/cheap is preferred (of course).

Thanks

Don't know what you mean by explanations, you just have to memorize every single case.

Although not free anymore, the 'Japanese' dictionary app for iOS (codefromtokyo.com/japanese) conjugates each counter for numbers 1 to 10.

Tae Kim has a nice table as far as I remember. I personally learned that stuff through immersion via fun talk variety shows. I was aware of counters from his guide but I never went of of my way to memoriz it

http://www.guidetojapanese.org/numbers.html

Well if you know it that means you memorized it.

The Japanese counters. They were causing me some headaches in the beginning as well.

A free resource you can learn about counters from can be found in Michael Kamermans book "An introduction to Japanese - Syntax, Grammar & Language" http://grammar.nihongoresources.com/doku.php

Then there is this Wikipedia list http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E5%8A%A9%E...0%E8%A9%9E and a good example for the counter madness starting at 06:30 with an illustrative example (the fish - and how the counter changes) starting at 08:17

I've been working on an iOS game for learning kana (called KanaSwirl). The way the game works is you see a prompt in the center of the circle (something like "KE"), then tap the answer on the edge of the circle (which would be け or ケ).

Reading this thread, it looks like the way it works could apply to counter words too. So I mocked something up real quick. How does this look?



It could also quiz this way too, but the engine I built isn't quite ready for it yet:

^ That app looks awesome. I already know kana, but I'd love something like that if you intend to release it.

I have a lesson about counters on my site that may be insightful to you.

http://www.imabi.net/lesson7.htm

I also have a list of counters, but I still need to finish this. There are several in-Japanese sites that I have found that extensively cover 助数詞 far more than what I need to cover in my own material.

prink Wrote:^ That app looks awesome. I already know kana, but I'd love something like that if you intend to release it.

I do! I'm just finishing up some loose ends for KanaSwirl 2.0 then my next target is this CounterSwirl. I want something for the intermediate/advanced crowd.

turvy Wrote:Well if you know it that means you memorized it.

Noo. I meant i understood the concept pf counters but I never went out of my way to memorize how the reading changes for counting. 3 as opposed to 5 things for hon Or that x is used to count objects that are round or square or long whatever. I didn't memorize any specifics like that. After lots of fun immersion I can understand and produce it without difficulties. From watching talking variety shows I've heard lots of people tell their stories sometimes counters come up if they want to say the quantity of whatever they need to mention to tell the story so it was a fun memorable and easy to learn it.