CerpinTaxt
Member
From: America
Registered: 2008-11-23
Posts: 84
So over the course of three years I've followed the advice laid out here, and from other sources, on how to study Japanese. I've gone through Genki I & II, gone through Tae Kim, done RTK, done KO2001, using Lang8, finished Core6k and finished up an N2 grammar book.
Now I know what I should be doing next. Practicing using native materials, i.e. watching dramas, reading books etc. But before embarking on the push from intermediate to advanced it would be nice to hear some advice on how particularly I should be approaching this. There's a wealth of material regarding studying Japanese up till intermediate but everything seems to disappear beyond that.
So I guess this is an inventory regarding, what's working for you at this stage? What would you advise, recommend, etc. Also since I've been SRSing for three years it would be nice to hear from people on how they studied without SRS or dropped it.
I think, as you move from an intermediate level to an advanced level, you have to move past SRSing using premade decks. At an advanced level, there's no objective standard for what words you have to know, so I think it's counterproductive to be studying something like Core10k when you could be studying words in context.
So, some options for vocabulary study are:
-Sentence-mining native materials
-Intensive reading of native materials, where you look up words you don't know in a dictionary but don't put them in an SRS program
-Extensive reading of native materials, with very little dictionary lookup
I'm a huge advocate for extensive reading -- I think it improves speed and fluency and grammatical intuitions, and it builds up a library of words that are glancing acquaintances, so that it's that much easier to learn them later. Plus, it's a lot easier to get into the storyline of a book when you're reading 20 pages a day than when you're reading just 2. But just because written Japanese isn't phonetic, passive vocabulary acquisition may be harder than with other languages.
So I find it worthwhile to do both a lot of extensive reading and a smaller amount of sentence mining -- doing extensive reading with a book that's fairly easy, and doing sentence mining with a book that's fairly hard.
I haven't said anything about listening, but that's not because I don't think it's important. I just think that so much depends on having experience with listening *and* on having the vocabulary to understand what's being said, so... it's a little bit harder to deal with. Japanese subs make things a lot easier.
erlog
Member
From: Japan
Registered: 2007-01-25
Posts: 518
The reason resources disappear at your level is because gains start to come more from practice with native materials than with explicit studying.
I agree with pretty much everything Fillanzea said. Start diving into things you find interesting, but make sure that you're doing the small things you need to do in order to improve your level. It's easy to get carried away with some stuff, forget to look up words, and then have your ability stall.
Like Fillanzea said, Japanese not being an entirely phonetic language, it's more difficult to pick up words passively through just listening or just reading.
Last edited by erlog (2012 July 09, 12:33 am)
sikieiki
Member
From: No
Registered: 2009-11-05
Posts: 124
I got sick of SRS, removed premade decks and just use the record audio function to insert words into a deck when I dont understand a phrase or something. Simply figure out the meaning and move on. The cards are simply nothing more than a recording of the now known phrase. Its simple, easy to review, and gets away from tedious typing words into SRS. More importantly, its a deck full of stuff that I once didn't understand but now do. If there are japanese subtitles, they get thrown in for fun.
Of course, to fully grasp the meaning of a phrase or word its often needed to hear it in different contexts, so I also sometimes record words that I have heard but dont feel comfortable with.
Can't say whether this is an effective long term solution or not, but it seems just as good as everything else. I think if there is something that was super effective for language learning it would already have been found (and commercialized)
In short, just do what you feel like you can continue doing which involves a sustainable but not aggravating amount of unknown words.
I don't think you should bother yourself with words like "intermediate" and "advanced". The definition varies from person to person and from where I'm standing, you're still in the early stages, so there's a lot to do. I'm also inclined to @HonyakuJoshua's way of thinking.
For example, @Fillanzea tells you to do some extensive reading. From my point of view, reading 20 pages instead of 2 is a lot more easier cause you get all sorts of explanations and stuff, so you really can't call yourself "advanced" there. If you were to converse with someone and he explains you something taking a whole 1 minute instead of his usual 6 seconds, well, then you're not "advanced".
Not using a dictionary feels a bit wrong as well. When I speak in my native language and don't know the meaning of a word, I (and probably pretty much every one speaking his native language out there) usually ask for the meaning or look it up in a dictionary (rarely)/the internet. Why would I want to guess it? It feels wrong... That's why dictionaries exist. The more you know, the less you'll need it, so my advice is to stick to learning words with a dictionary. All those top level interpreters on the TV use it as well.
You said that you write in Lang-8. OK, how are you faring? Do you make grammar/particle/word mistakes often? Fix what you suck at. An average native speaker won't make such mistakes. Is your work coherent enough? Do you make difference between 天才、秀才、奇才、鬼才 and 神童? Do you say 会社に勤めている人 instead of 会社員／社員 or （普段）スープに入れるもの instead of コンソメ (there must be a lot of stuff you can put in a soup anyway)? Etc...
People in this site often say that you should learn things you find "interesting", but I fail to see how you'll learn any politics, unless you have interest in it. I'm not into politics as well, but I can understand everything if I hear it/read it in my native language. You'll naturally pick up words from the spheres you find interesting anyway. After all, you do have interest in them, don't you? So reading articles that bore you to death is much more beneficial from my opinion.
Think about it, if you want.
I didn't mean that Japanese has a lot of homophones; I meant that, if you see Japanese text, you can't derive the pronunciation of the word just from the kanji if you don't know the word. And that's true even if you know the on-yomi and kun-yomi of all the kanji in the word.
There is a great deal of research that has been done on the value of extensive reading in acquiring language:
http://erfoundation.org/bib/bibliocats.php
See also this page by Rob Waring:
http://www.robwaring.org/er/what_and_wh … _vital.htm
To see the 5000th most common word in English once (satellite), you would need to read about 130,000 words. That's a good-sized novel -- a little longer than Sense and Sensibility. To see that word twenty times, you would need to read 2.6 million words -- that's almost as much as reading War and Peace four times. In Japanese, that's 48 books the size of 涼宮ハルヒの憂鬱 *. So, you have to read a LOT. If you are pausing several times a page to look up an unfamiliar word, you are not going to be able to read a LOT. And you will not be able to read as many pages as you need to read if you are pausing to look up every unknown word. (It also makes reading very boring.)
"But," you say, "You can see the word 'satellite' 20 times just by putting it in Anki!"
That's true. But what you can get from extensive reading, that you can't get from an SRS, is experience seeing a word in all of its different contexts, with all of its different nuances. Knowing a word is not just knowing the English word that it translates to; it's knowing how it's actually used in real life. It's getting intuitions about what sounds right and what sounds wrong. You only get that through extensive reading; intensive reading is just too slow.
*Calculated by using the word-count of the English translation to spitball an "equivalent" for the Japanese words-per-page.
Inny Jan
Member
From: Sydney
Registered: 2010-03-09
Posts: 527
I too agree with Fillanzea... and nadiatims. Especially with this one:
nadiatims wrote:
and I'd add listening too
... but why did you mention this in passing? Personally, I value listening even higher than reading - the pace is faster and can be less intrusive.
Last edited by Inny Jan (2012 July 09, 7:57 am)
erlog
Member
From: Japan
Registered: 2007-01-25
Posts: 518
I will third that example sentences do not capture how words are actually used. They may be from native sources in the first place, but removed from their context it becomes difficult to know exactly when and where to use them. There's some words I've needed to encounter quite a lot in native material before being able to use them myself.
Most of the stuff I SRS to learn I only have a kind of fuzzy vague understanding of at first. It's only later when I start encountering it in the context of native material that I get a really solid understanding of the concept.
Fillanzea's example of 'satellite' isn't really the best since it's so concrete, but the idea is definitely true. There's lots of words describing complex emotions that just don't feel clear until you have the context of an entire situation backing them up.
Last edited by erlog (2012 July 09, 8:05 am)
yudantaiteki
Member
From: 東京
Registered: 2009-10-03
Posts: 3008
On the other hand, example sentences are always helpful as an addition to native materials because sometimes they can distill the core expression into an easily digestible nugget. I don't think there's ever a point where you can just say flat-out "I never need example sentences, I have native materials."
Some things are fairly simple and can be easily covered by example sentences. For instance, you might wonder how to express the idea of putting sugar into coffee, since the verb you use in Japanese might not be immediately apparent. This is something where looking up words without any examples isn't going to help, but if you look at a dictionary with an example, it's easy:
add sugar to one's coffee
コーヒーに砂糖を入れる
You don't really need much more context or exposure than that.
EDIT: Also, I did both intensive and non-intensive reading when I was at that stage; it doesn't have to be one or the other.
One more comment:
I meant that, if you see Japanese text, you can't derive the pronunciation of the word just from the kanji if you don't know the word.
While this is true, if you do not know how to pronounce the word you won't understand it in speech (or if it's written in kana). I also think it slows down your overall reading speed when you hit words you do not know how to pronounce.
Last edited by yudantaiteki (2012 July 09, 8:34 am)
Fillanzea wrote:
1. The whole point of being advanced is that you get to read something more interesting than example sentences.
2. For a lot of constructions, you have to meet them many many times in many many different contexts to start to get a feel for what sounds good and what does not. So, are you going to find 20 or 30 example sentences? At that point isn't it easier just to read stuff?
1) If being "advanced" means that you can read a book then start with one aimed for children right from the start?
2) When you read a book you don't know what kind of random words and which of their meaning will appear. You may see 銃を構える in your 1st book, and 店を構える in your 8th. The chance that you'll remember one out of hundreds/thousands of other random words so that you can make a connection is pretty small, isn't it?
Let's say you read 7 books in hope of increasing your vocabulary. Probably novels? I seriously doubt you'll get something with variety. How about history, geography, mathematics, chemistry, biology, etc...? Native speakers (like you in your own languages) go to school and they use textbooks. You probably won't, so in the you'll be increasing your vocabulary in a sphere you're already pretty familiar with. What's the point?
Let's say you speak with someone about some familiar topics like football, drinking, men, women, school, the weather, etc... and suddenly!
J: "Hey, do you know why red meat is bad for your health?"
NJ: "Ah, sorry, I lack the vocabulary for that topic cause I do extensive reading on novels."
J: "Oh. How about politics then?"
NJ: "No, not really my staff, you know. Still lacking that vocabulary."
J: "I see. What about your favorite alcohol? Do you know how to distill it?"
NJ: "What's 'distill'?"
You can still read your books if you want. I know I do when there's time to kill. However, I don't really "read extensively" but for pleasure. Oh, I just learned a couple of random words cause I had interest in the stuff I was reading. Yay!
Last edited by merlin.codex (2012 July 09, 8:44 am)
One more comment:
I meant that, if you see Japanese text, you can't derive the pronunciation of the word just from the kanji if you don't know the word.
While this is true, if you do not know how to pronounce the word you won't understand it in speech (or if it's written in kana). I also think it slows down your overall reading speed when you hit words you do not know how to pronounce.
That was my point exactly; that extensive reading, on its own, doesn't get you as far with Japanese as with languages that are written more phonetically because even if you can get the meaning from context, you can't always get the pronunciation.
--
On vocabulary acquisition through native materials:
I've learned a lot of agricultural and sake-brewing terminology from watching Natsuko no Sake (which is a GREAT older drama, even if you're not particularly interested in sake) and a lot of math terminology from Ogawa Youko's The Professor's Beloved Equation. I learned a heck of a lot of nuclear power plant terminology in March 2011. I read Tensei Jingo and historical novels and current events magazines. But you have to accept, even as an advanced student, that you're not going to learn *all* the words, and sure, you can make up hypothetical situations where you would have to have a conversation about an obscure topic, but why not deal with those hypotheticals after you already have a really solid base in vocabulary that's not restricted to particular contexts?
As an early-advanced student (between N2 and N1, lets's say?) I tried to force myself to read a lot of stuff on politics and economics, and I don't think it was a particularly good use of my time. I think trying to get a grasp on the Japanese political situation and the language at the same time was the main thing that tripped me up. But now that I'm more advanced, I can read that stuff, and even if I don't know the specific political terminology involved, I can understand enough of the rest so that things fall into place easily. Maybe that's a long-term backwards kind of solution, but I haven't been interrogated about the Japanese political situation in the meantime...
There's no question that in order to be able to speak well, as in with good pronunciation, speed and comfort, you have to speak a lot. But in terms of what you're able to say - how you use the language - it's about how used you are to it, in my experience.
Because when you speak, you're not thinking about the technical aspects of language, you're using what you're used to, what you've acquired, what's there and quickly accessible. You can study the technical aspects and pass tests, and analyze the language as if it was a long decipherable code. But you generally can't use it on the fly when you speak. In that case it's what you've acquired through many hours of advanced - dare I say it - exposure.
Last edited by TwoMoreCharacters (2012 July 09, 2:58 pm)
CerpinTaxt
Member
From: America
Registered: 2008-11-23
Posts: 84
Ok woah this got more responses than I was expecting.
Fillanzea wrote:
I think, as you move from an intermediate level to an advanced level, you have to move past SRSing using premade decks. At an advanced level, there's no objective standard for what words you have to know, so I think it's counterproductive to be studying something like Core10k when you could be studying words in context.
Totally agree with this. At the moment I'm definitely not trying to go for another premade deck. Continuous SRS has gotten a bit tiring and I'd rather not plow through another few thousand fact deck.
Fillanzea wrote:
So I find it worthwhile to do both a lot of extensive reading and a smaller amount of sentence mining -- doing extensive reading with a book that's fairly easy, and doing sentence mining with a book that's fairly hard.
So are you suggesting reading two books at the same time. One for just pure exposure with reading and another for sentence mining?
merlin.codex wrote:
You said that you write in Lang-8. OK, how are you faring? Do you make grammar/particle/word mistakes often? Fix what you suck at. An average native speaker won't make such mistakes. Is your work coherent enough? Do you make difference between 天才、秀才、奇才、鬼才 and 神童? Do you say 会社に勤めている人 instead of 会社員／社員 or （普段）スープに入れるもの instead of コンソメ (there must be a lot of stuff you can put in a soup anyway)? Etc...
Definitely something I've neglected. Referring to HonyakuJoshua's comment also I really should go back and identify problems and work to fix them.
dtcamero wrote:
Everyone here has ignored the wale in the room... Speech.
The thing with speech is, or maybe this is just for me, it's quite easy to actually study. I mean just using it regularly should help me improve my speech, right? Since I do have chances to speak Japanese regularly I've tended to ignore practicing it specifically.
