Author Topic: Learning Japanese (Read 7411 times)

KnowsNothing · « **on:** August 21, 2003, 04:58:35 PM »

I have decided to learn Japanese at some point in my life. Since I know we have few Japanese speaking people on the boards I have a few of questions.

1) What's the best way to start? A book, or an actual class with students, teachers, and nerds?

2) Difficulty. Everyone says it will be hard. Right now, I have to take a language in school. My choices were Spanish, or French. I took, and now hate, Spanish. I don't hate Spanish because I don't understand, not counting to people who already knew some Spanish, I was the best in my class. I am pretty confident of my language learning abilities, but will two languages, one being Japanese, confuse me and/or overload my brain causing me to explode? If that is the case, I can pretty much forget learning Japanese until about, 4-5 years, because no school around here teaches it. Once I get to high school, I’m ditching Spanish for Latin.

3) My age. I am currently 13 years old, 14 all the way in January. I know asking if I’m too young isn’t really an important question because I could be a really smart little kid, with a knack for picking up languages, or I could be a really dumb thirteen year old who just discovered Japan wasn’t the same as China. Who knows? But that’s what I’m asking anyway, am I too young?

Well, what do you guys think? I’m not going to solely go by what you say, though, because I’m going to give it a try anyway. I really just want to know what to expect.

Ms.Pikmin · « **Reply #1 on:** August 21, 2003, 05:12:05 PM »

My sister took Japanese and it helped her to be in a class situation where you can interact in a dialogue situation. You said there was nowhere to learn it in you area though, so I would think an audio lesson would be good. Check out what's available for your PC. The pronunciation is very important so I wouldn't start off with a book.

Also, they say that it's good to teach new languages while you are young as possible. So this would be an occasion when your youth is working for you. I guess us old farts just can't handle it as well as you younguns.

Ms.Pikmin · « **Reply #2 on:** August 21, 2003, 05:13:15 PM »

D'oh! *shakes fist at computer*

kennyb27 · « **Reply #3 on:** August 21, 2003, 05:13:47 PM »

Well, I don't speak Japanese, but I know the answer to your third question, so I thought I'd offer my input. It's been proven that the brain picks up languages quicker in younger minds while they are still developing. That's why some pediatricians say its easier to teach your children a second language even before they master their first language (around age of 2/3).

S-U-P-E-R · « **Reply #4 on:** August 21, 2003, 06:15:41 PM »

It's not so much hard as it is insanely time consuming. To get started on learning Japanese, do these things.

Step 1: Get the Easy Kana Workbook, I think it was authored by someone named Lampkin. I can check. This will teach you hiragana and katakana. And practice, practice, practice.
Step 2: Get in a class. Get in a class. Get in a class. Practice practice practice.
Step 3: Practice kanji and vocabulary with flash cards. Do this every hour of every day until your muscles severely atrophy. Practice practice practice.
Step 4: Start talking with Japanese people. Practice practice practice.

Grey Ninja · « **Reply #5 on:** August 21, 2003, 07:55:22 PM »

1) Get in a class. Teaching yourself with books strikes me as a very dumb idea. With languages, you need to be around people who know the language you are trying to learn, and a class will seriously help motivate you.

2) I am currently taking Japanese, and I find it to be a fairly logically constructed language. I don't have too many problems with it, except for trying to memorize a whole lot of Kanji. (You will learn all about kanji, and learn to hate it as much as I in good time)

3) With languages, you tend to lose the ability to learn new ones with time. At a young age, it will be much easier to learn and speak.

ThePerm · « **Reply #6 on:** August 21, 2003, 09:07:53 PM »

they taught spanish, french, and german in my school. I took German...i wish they had offered Japanese. Id like be so awesome right now. I understand german when its spoken. I cant speak it very well. I get caqught up on Germans enormous compound words though....

PIAC · « **Reply #7 on:** August 21, 2003, 10:45:14 PM »

well, on the subject of japanese people, i bought some sake yesterday to try

is it better warm (how your ment to drink it im lead to belive) or chilled? i had some at room temperature and it has quite a nice after taste.

i also want to learn japanese (importing here i come!) that and dutch, which im half assedly learning from people over IRC, hoi! hoe gaat het?

ThePerm · « **Reply #8 on:** August 21, 2003, 10:52:38 PM »

omg i found this today..this makes it fun lol

http://www.bigtrouble.com/kana/

remmber to adjust the settigns...and practice practice practice

Grey Ninja · « **Reply #9 on:** August 22, 2003, 05:20:17 AM »

Come to think of it, I can't believe that nobody has posted this link yet. It's essential to planning any sort of Japanese education.

KnowsNothing · « **Reply #10 on:** August 22, 2003, 05:49:24 AM »

Haha. I just read that, Grey, the other night.

My school did offer German, but for some reason they stopped. That's ok though, I still would've chosen Spanish.

Seems like alot, ALOT, of work. I'll try to find a class somewhere. The chinese class I took a few years back was horrible. All I remember was how to say hello. Oh yeah, we played a ton of chinese checkers there, ver educational

Grey Ninja · « **Reply #11 on:** August 22, 2003, 05:58:11 AM »

Chinese is just messed. Japanese is SO much easier to both speak and write.

KnowsNothing · « **Reply #12 on:** August 22, 2003, 08:32:31 AM »

Yeah, I was young(er) then, and I thought it would be cool, and I always thought China was very cool. But now I see Japan as much more interesting, and the language would be fun to learn, and useful for a Nintendo gamer.

yellowfellow · « **Reply #13 on:** August 22, 2003, 10:48:46 AM »

japanese is a very difficult language to learn, especially if English is your first language. i highly suggest taking a course. i believe doing so will facilitate your comprehension of the word order and case markers which are quite different compared to English. As for reading, characters are difficult to read but it wouldn't be as difficult as say a Japanese person learning the orthography of English. Speaking of messed up, look no further than English orthography.

ThePerm · « **Reply #14 on:** August 22, 2003, 11:35:06 AM »

i was learning kana at a snails pace....but now im leanign it much faster thanks to that website.

also when it ocmes to learnign languages...iv created this model of a box of words you can use to learn a grasp of any language. I call it the warrior culture language. Warrior cultures are very simple. And if you can learn the words of the warrior then you iwll have a very good grasp on any language. Anything else you add is an addition to the warrior language...ill post it up soon.

chinese...meaning by tone...........aaaaaaaaaaaaaah!

S-U-P-E-R · « **Reply #15 on:** August 23, 2003, 02:32:39 AM »

Japanese strikes me as being a very logical language, in the sense that the grammar rules are generally pretty simple and pretty much never have exceptions. (As opposed to English grammar rules, where pretty much everything has a ton of exceptions and it's more like a game of Calvinball :S)

It's just that memorizing that much vocabulary and kanji, well, is hard. I kinda like having kanji now, though, because it helps you speed-read.

Grey Ninja · « **Reply #16 on:** August 23, 2003, 02:58:10 AM »

Quote
Originally posted by: S-U-P-E-R
Japanese strikes me as being a very logical language, in the sense that the grammar rules are generally pretty simple and pretty much never have exceptions. (As opposed to English grammar rules, where pretty much everything has a ton of exceptions and it's more like a game of Calvinball :S)

It's just that memorizing that much vocabulary and kanji, well, is hard. I kinda like having kanji now, though, because it helps you speed-read.

I remember being completely shocked when my Japanese teacher was teaching us adjectives, and she said: "Kanji wa benri desu." I mean, to me kanji is a complete nightmare, as you have to learn how to read and write hundreds, even thousands of the little bastard things to even read a simple webpage.

But ironically, I am finding that even though I have failed horribly when it comes to writing them, I can actually use them to kind of figure out what a sentence is talking about at a glance, which is something I can't do with hiragana, or even english characters.

mouse_clicker · « **Reply #17 on:** August 23, 2003, 08:54:01 AM »

I used to live in Japan- well, really in Okinawa (the Okinawans get pissed off if you call them Japanese). I was pretty thing, though- I moved there when I was 3 and left when I was 6, but I learned a bit of Japanese. I also know some Okinawan numbers, which are a bit different than Japanese.

Quote
3) My age. I am currently 13 years old, 14 all the way in January. I know asking if I’m too young isn’t really an important question because I could be a really smart little kid, with a knack for picking up languages, or I could be a really dumb thirteen year old who just discovered Japan wasn’t the same as China. Who knows? But that’s what I’m asking anyway, am I too young?

Actually, the younger, the better. Younger people's brains are more apt to learning things like languages than older people's and the sooner you start learning Japanese, the easier it will be for you. Ever wonder why babies pick up their native language so fast? The German teacher at my high school was trilingual by age 5 or 6 because kids that young pick up things like languages so easily. Don't wait until you're older to start learning Japanese because it will only be harder.

ThePerm · « **Reply #18 on:** August 23, 2003, 10:15:26 PM »

if only our parents had really thought it through to teach multiple languages. Im goign to try to teach my kids a few languages. I will also make sure i have a few foreign channels with kids shows. Myself theres quite a few languages i wish i knew. German, Italian, Spanish, French, and Japanese. I can understand german like i said above because its very close to enlish and iv taken classes. Im not fluent but i understand it pretty well. Im learnign japanese and well iv just really been studying kana. Eventually i will move on to the actual language..but thats going to be a battle.

Grey Ninja · « **Reply #19 on:** August 24, 2003, 05:28:59 AM »

I would be careful with that Perm. It's often the case that kids who learn multiple languages in their baby years never really master any of them. A working knowledge of all them, but no mastery over any. There is a biological basis for this theory, because learning the one language will deepen the neural pathways that relate to that one language, but when multiple ones are learned, there will be more pathways, but many will be shallower.

I learned all the Hiragana characters in a week though.

My Japanese teacher was quite the slave driver, and wanted to remove english characters from the classroom as soon as possible. Katakana I still haven't really learned, but it's not really that required when actually learning the language, as it's only used in English words. I can generally make do with Katakana, but I don't know it NEARLY as well as I know Hiragana.

ThePerm · « **Reply #20 on:** August 25, 2003, 07:28:32 AM »

oh english of course will be their main language. I just want them to have a huge grasp on language in general. I mean really all language is the same. Words are spoken or written and people understand them. The idea behind this is that if they only speak one language but they have huge vocabularies and understand differnt rules ( -_-)

Caliban · « **Reply #21 on:** August 25, 2003, 07:35:08 AM »

What is the difference between Katakana and Hiragana? BTW I'm also interested in learning japanese but because I'm the Lord of the Lazy i haven't even started yet.

Grey Ninja · « **Reply #22 on:** August 25, 2003, 07:47:38 AM »

Hiragana = Simplified form of Kanji. With Hiragana, you can spell any Japanese word, and the character set only has 47 characters, making it very easy to use and learn. It lacks the preciseness and meaning of kanji however, meaning that you must learn kanji in addition to hiragana, but hiragana will your crutch on the way there.

Katakana is a way of spelling foreign words that are integrated into Japanese language. For example, a computer is called a konpyuutaa in Japan. Katakana is easier for the Japanese to spell and read, thus it's used in place of the roman alphabet. It will result in HUGELY different pronunciations though.

S-U-P-E-R · « **Reply #23 on:** August 25, 2003, 09:59:53 AM »

Quote
learned all the Hiragana characters in a week though. My Japanese teacher was quite the slave driver, and wanted to remove english characters from the classroom as soon as possible.

OH SH
I learned hiragana and katakana in the three most hellish, sleep-deprived days ever. My professor was pretty cool huh hey guys

Grey Ninja · « **Reply #24 on:** August 26, 2003, 05:29:36 AM »

lol... 3 months to learn Hiragana... your teacher does seem quite cool.

My teacher gave us Monday and Tuesday to learn 21 characters, Wednesday and Thursday to learn the next 21, and Thursday and Friday to learn the last of them. We had the weekend to review, and a test on Monday. After that, there was no more english characters in the classroom except for english words.

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Author Topic: Learning Japanese (Read 7411 times)