A few weeks ago I started studying Japanese again, this time by myself as I’m not a student of the University of Gothenburg anymore. Studying at a university was really good because the beginning is always the hardest part for me. I learned the basics and now I feel like I can continue on my own. During the year I was studying we finished Genki 1 and 2 (including the workbooks), Basic Kanji Book 1 and 2, a history book and a grammar book, besides all the other stuff that studying at a school involves. The first two Genki books are very much recommended for beginners.
Quitting after a year wasn’t originally my plan, when I first started the first course I planned to go to Japan as an exchange student, but I eventually realized that that wasn’t for me. I like to have the freedom of choosing what I want to study, even if that means it’ll take me longer to become fluent in Japanese.
I will be focusing on vocabulary and reading Kanji from now on as that’s what’s most useful and important to me. I’m currently reviewing the JLPT 4 vocabulary list as we didn’t study JLPT specific things at the university. I know most of the stuff in the list though, so it won’t take long to finish it. I’m also enrolled to Japanese for Techies as it has words that are useful to me as I’m kind of a geek. I won’t be adding any other lists before I’ve finished these but if you have any fun/useful lists to share please feel free to do so.
What lists are you currently studying?
If you haven’t already added me as a friend on smart.fm, you can find my profile here.
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{ 14 comments… read them below or add one }
Wow, that app looks awesome. I think it would be very useful for me as a traveller. Thank you!!
No problem! It’s my favorite language learning app :)
Yes, you’re back with the people studying Japanese!! glad to see you here, there’s punch and dip :D. I’m also studying the JLPT 4 list, very useful vocab and do you really recommend the genki books?
I do really recommend the Genki books, the workbooks aren’t really necessary but the first two textbooks are really great. They have good explanations of all the grammar you need to know as a beginner/intermediate student of Japanese.
As with most books like this they work better in the classroom but they’re quite fun to use if you use the audio CD’s with it.
…i should also start using Smart.fm again, mainly going for Kanji study now
Yeah you totally should, just studying Kanji is boring T_T
I didn’t know about this site, now I am using it, It’s nice.
I don’t know what I would do without smart.fm, seriously. As an absolute beginner, there are a lot of individual study programs that can lighten your wallet but not teach you very much. And these folks did all this research and programming for free use. Amen to them!
Interesting that you mention uni being the best start for a Japanese language newbie, because I’m starting to believe the same. I’m doing total immersion at the moment, but there are just too many questions I have about grammar and pronunciation to keep going on my own.
You can definitely do it on your own, but you have to be determined. And know your goals! It’s probably easier to do the first six months or the first year to get things going but if you use the right tools you don’t need to. Smart.fm is good but nowhere near enough. Other good or maybe even essential tools are Edufire and lang-8 :)
Yeah, as I’ve already said to you, I’m back to studying at Smart.fm, too.
Smart.fm rocks.
Smart.fm ftw!
Just really felt like praising them.
Studying kanji is boring?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Remembering_the_Kanji#Remembering_the_Kanji_I
http://www.alljapaneseallthetime.com
http://www.kanji.koohii.com
Yes, studying Kanji is boring imo^^
Thanks for the AJATT site, man, looks really nice… so much to read there ^^
I completely agree with you about the Genki book. I’m in my third semester of Japanese study here at Uni and we’ve been using the Genki books thus far. Although I’ll say we go at a kinda slow pace (Only going be be finishing Lesson 20 after the 2nd year of study), I think it’s a really good starting place to learn the grammar at a good pace. I just read through the JLPT4 list and realized that I knew… probably 80% of the words just from me being at Lesson 14 (just barely into the second Genki book). I’m planning on studying abroad next year in Japan and I believe that the Genki books have given me a good enough introduction to the language to continue learning on my own. Also, about what you said about learning Japanese at Uni. I agree somewhat. I see it more as, learning a language cold-turkey is VERY hard, but having someone who can speak it to help you along the way helps. So it doesn’t necessarily need to be Uni, but just anyone willing to help you learn. Lang-8 is a great source. I always post all my in-class writings there to see how I could have improved it a little.