So I'm new to the forums and I have a few random thoughts and questions. Summer just started so I've gotta lotta free time and I'm getting kind of obsessed with Japanese.

1. Can someone please explain exactly what you do for the ajatt method? Heh. How do you test yourself, what's to stop you from just recognizing one kanji, for example, which gives away the whole sentence?

2. I really love learning grammar rules and building in my head a more complete linguistic understanding of Japanese. The problem is remembering these grammar rules. What I'm doing now (just started) is putting English on the front and Japanese on the back, so far just with Tim Sensei stuff (http://ww8.tiki.ne.jp/~tmath/home/index.htm) on the back. I know this is not what you're "supposed" to do...
-I'm aware that there are many possible translations, but I'm just getting comfortable with the forms, I'm not binding myself to that one translation in the future. I'm only a couple of days into this, but it seems like I can think of the proper suffixes to verbs pretty easily and create my own sentences.
-I can't stand the mass input before output theories - I don't wanna spend months on a language without actually being able to speak. If I use lang8/skype consistently then bad habits, supposedly from a lack of input, will be prevented.

3. For kanji SRSing, how do you ensure you can write the characters, and not just recognize them? Why don't they have the English "definition" on the front and make you write down or at least think of what the kanji is on the back?

4. Are the cloze-delete Tae Kim and Core6k decks recommended over the regular ones?

5. Is there a Google Chrome extension (or something similar) that's a Japanese translator? English>Japanese, Japanese>English, or Japanese>Japanese. If not, I'll try to make one. I haven't found one. There's one that gives English definitions (to English words) and it's extremely useful. You can double click any word on a website and the definition pops up. Or You can click the icon and type in the word yourself and get the def.

6. Which is preferred, intensive/active or extensive/passive reading and watching.

7. There are so many methods and resources out there, what is ONE method for learning that is generally is accepted as good. For example:
----1. Read RTK, make sure to copy down the kanji, do RTK anki.
----2. Go through the Tae Kim deck and....
There's a ton of stuff available, and I have tons of time; however, I want to properly take advantage of them and learn as efficiently as possible.

8. I haven't tried this out, but what if you do cloze-delete like this:
FRONT: Watashi [also] itta.
BACK: Watashi mo itta.
FRONT: Inu ga [like].
BACK: Inu ga suki.
That way any confusion about what goes in the []'s is clear. Tons of context isn't necessary- you just ask for what word you specifically want. This might defeat the purpose of cloze-delete, idk lol...

Thank you.

somstuff Wrote:1. Can someone please explain exactly what you do for the ajatt method? Heh. How do you test yourself, what's to stop you from just recognizing one kanji, for example, which gives away the whole sentence?

These kind of things occasionally happen when you're SRS'ing. Take it as a freebie. You'll have 50+ other cards the same day where this won't work.

somstuff Wrote:2. I really love learning grammar rules and building in my head a more complete linguistic understanding of Japanese. The problem is remembering these grammar rules. What I'm doing now (just started) is putting English on the front and Japanese on the back, so far just with Tim Sensei stuff (http://ww8.tiki.ne.jp/~tmath/home/index.htm) on the back. I know this is not what you're "supposed" to do...
-I'm aware that there are many possible translations, but I'm just getting comfortable with the forms, I'm not binding myself to that one translation in the future. I'm only a couple of days into this, but it seems like I can think of the proper suffixes to verbs pretty easily and create my own sentences.
-I can't stand the mass input before output theories - I don't wanna spend months on a language without actually being able to speak. If I use lang8/skype consistently then bad habits, supposedly from a lack of input, will be prevented.

I'm not sure what you're asking? Don't worry about trying lots of different methods. Find out what works for you and stick with it. If you get tired of it try something else. You'll eventually learn Japanese by spending hundreds (thousands?) of hours reading/talking/listening/watching/studying. It doesn't particularly matter how you spend your time as long as you're using Japanese.

somstuff Wrote:3. For kanji SRSing, how do you ensure you can write the characters, and not just recognize them? Why don't they have the English "definition" on the front and make you write down or at least think of what the kanji is on the back?

You can change the models/templates of your cards to review in a different fashion. For instance, the front of your card might be the keyword "run", and the back of your card will be "走". You have to remember how to write it. There should be many other posts on this forum describing how to study the kanji.

somstuff Wrote:4. Are the cloze-delete Tae Kim and Core6k decks recommended over the regular ones?

It depends on what you're goals are. If you want to be able to produce Japanese, using a cloze-delete production deck will help. However, it's much more difficult. Another possible method would be to just use sentence/recognition decks and get a good friend/girlfriend/conversation partner who you can talk to a lot. See the answer to #2.

somstuff Wrote:5. Is there a Google Chrome extension (or something similar) that's a Japanese translator? English>Japanese, Japanese>English, or Japanese>Japanese. If not, I'll try to make one. I haven't found one. There's one that gives English definitions (to English words) and it's extremely useful. You can double click any word on a website and the definition pops up. Or You can click the icon and type in the word yourself and get the def.

Do you know about Rikaichan/Rikaisama? I would assume someone would have made something similar for Chrome.

somstuff Wrote:6. Which is preferred, intensive/active or extensive/passive reading and watching.

A lot of both. Also see the answer to #2.

somstuff Wrote:7. There are so many methods and resources out there, what is ONE method for learning that is generally is accepted as good. For example:
----1. Read RTK, make sure to copy down the kanji, do RTK anki.
----2. Go through the Tae Kim deck and....
There's a ton of stuff available, and I have tons of time; however, I want to properly take advantage of them and learn as efficiently as possible.

I've laid out step-by-step methods in previous posts. If you look through my post history you should find something more detailed, but...

1. Go through RTK.
2. Mine sentences, vocab, and grammar from Genki I and II.
3. Start going through Tae Kim.
4. Start going through Core 6k.
5. Start watching a lot of dramas/animes.
6...

somstuff Wrote:8. I haven't tried this out, but what if you do cloze-delete like this:
FRONT: Watashi [also] itta.
BACK: Watashi mo itta.
FRONT: Inu ga [like].
BACK: Inu ga suki.
That way any confusion about what goes in the []'s is clear. Tons of context isn't necessary- you just ask for what word you specifically want. This might defeat the purpose of cloze-delete, idk lol...

Some people set up cloze-delete like this. You should be able to find posts on this forum discussing the pro and cons of this method. One con is that there could possibly be many ways to translate the english word, so it really doesn't help you that much.

Well I can't answer all of these, but I can for some:

3) I ensure I know how to write the characters by, well, writing the characters. I'm almost one notebook full of reviews already. This might look like a waste of time but writing the Kanji down while thinking of the story really helps me personally remember it.

5) There's a firefox extension called Rikaichan, don't know if it have a Chrome counterpart

6) I read quite a few discussions about this. The general theme seems to be: Only actively work on stuff as much as you want. If you feel like just reading through something without worrying whether you got it all right, then do that. If you want to stop on every word and particle you don't know and understand it's exact meaning - go for that. Most people seem to find their own line in the middle.

7) It seems like I started learning with a lot less knowledge about learning then you have. I just googled "learning Japanese" and worked from there, eventually getting to Tae Kim's guide and after a while getting to RTK (and here) through a forum rec. Resulting in my learning being a lot more sporadic then usual and me not being able to give that good of an advice here. But for the past two month I've been doing RTK exclusively as far as learning methods go.
I did the following:
- Every morning - do all anki reviews (~1h)
-Read the kanji in rtk and find a good story for it in this site (good meaning - one I can relate to somehow). Add story to anki deck. I don't spend all that much time on new cards, the reviewing is the learning and I'm not afraid to fail a card a few times in a row (though that's very rare). (~30 minutes for 32 cards).
Yep, that's it, less then 2 hours a day. I did add in a lot of Japanese from the side by reading random stuff on stumble upon (explore topic, Japanese language) and a free week membership on Japanesepod101.com. (50/150 lessons of the beginner series in a week. that was fun). Also kept advancing with Tae Kim's (complete) guide without a set pace. As I said, I'm not very good at efficiency.

8) That's how the Cloze delete in the pre made anki and Core decks works already. I never heard of Cloze delete before starting the anki decks so I never thought it's not supposed to be in there .

Some clarifications:

1. Okay, but are you supposed to like, read the sentence out loud when you go over it, or what, exactly? Also, is there an alternative or adjustment to the sentence method that isn't purely input? Is there any way to involve practicing output when SRSing, or do I have to do that elsewhere (lang8, skype, etc)?

2. What I meant by this is that I'm doing English-Japanese cards, which seems to be contrary to the norm.

3. I guess a simple solution to my problem here is just to do the reverse RTK deck as well :].

5. Thank you!

(the rest). Ok.

I guess my biggest concern is that I want to do output/production/active learning while doing Anki, as opposed to just mass input. So I guess, as you guys say and as I kinda already knew, the best method is to just combine input/output and experiment with a bit of everything.

Original question #2:

For grammar, you usually get it stuck and understood by practice, and lots of it:
reading/listening to real-life examples in books, manga, and anime/drama. It also helps to create your own sentences with the grammar, but that usually requires someone to check your work (preferably in person, so you can ask them why they made the corrections they did, usage questions, etc.).

somstuff Wrote:1. Okay, but are you supposed to like, read the sentence out loud when you go over it, or what, exactly?

If you take a couple hours and extensively read through AJATTs blog posts, you will find the answer to a lot of your questions. However it will probably take you 10+ hours, so I'll give you the short version.

This is basically a description of the sentence method:

Find relatively short sentences with at most one or two unknown words or grammar points and put them into anki. The Japanese sentence should be on the front of the card. The back of the card should contain definitions for your unknown words and grammar points. If you can get audio for your cards that's really good. Generally your first couple hundred cards (maybe even a thousand cards) will come from textbooks.

When reviewing the sentences you basically just read the sentence to make sure you know the readings and meanings of all the words. Since there should only be one or two "hard" words on the card, you can mostly just focus on these words. The sentence is there to give you context. Having the sentence should make it a little easier. If you don't know the reading or meaning of one of the words on the card, then fail the card.

somstuff Wrote:Also, is there an alternative or adjustment to the sentence method that isn't purely input? Is there any way to involve practicing output when SRSing, or do I have to do that elsewhere (lang8, skype, etc)?

Cloze-delete and MCDs. Basically what you had described in your first post.

But I would say that output on lang8 and skype is probably more important.

nescio Wrote:5) There's a firefox extension called Rikaichan, don't know if it have a Chrome counterpart.

Yep - it's called rikaikun (heh). I plan to marry it someday.

-J-