昇平森膣 Wrote:I would gladly set up a thread/forum on here to teach Japanese on a regular basis, if that were possible, but I don't think it is... To be effective, you'd have to teach it in real life with quizes and crap.
It's better to self study at your own pace, taking time out of your day to review and go over new stuff. You don't have to crack down and study hours on end or anything. In fact, that may just make it harder.
It's better to just take it easy and casually go through. If you feel like skipping a day, don't force yourself. But don't procrastinate either, because then you lose interest.
I sent a few PMs already because people asked me to point them into a direction to start learning. I pretty much copypasta'd the same response to everyone, so I'll post some of the tips here.
If you want the full version of this, PM me.
My PM, slightly edited Wrote:The first thing that you'd wanna do when learning Japanese is memorizing hiragana and katakana.
Becoming too dependent on romanized text will just provide difficulty later on the road. Get it over with in the beginning so you can practice as you learn grammar and vocabulary.
Also, I have to say that learning any language, not just Japanese, becomes a hell of a lot easier when you submerse yourself in the language. It's certainly not necessary, but it's a huge help watching Japanese shows (not limited to anime), listening to music, etc. You get a better feel for how words are used. It may sound like a bunch of gibberish when you're listening to it. That's because our minds kinda naturally block out languages that we don't know and kinda just goes "I'm not ganna try to comprehend this, it means nothing."
So to break that barrier, listen to more Japanese stuff and try to pick out what you can from it. If needed, get slower conversations (the torrent comes with some), but it's not good to rely too much on that. It's not the speed of everyday speech, so if you get too accustomed to everything being slow, you'll be lost when it comes to the real thing.
Another thing you should do when listening is trying to spell out what you're hearing in your mind with the kana. Obviously this isn't something you'll wanna do when you don't even know the kana yet, but when you get more used to them it's a perfect method for learning how to decipher the kana faster.
If I think of more tips, I'll tell you. By the way this is the kanji site. The guy really makes it easier to memorize kanji. Again, don't worry too much about the kanji until after you've built up some grammar and vocabulary. Throwing too much crap on yourself just intimidates you and makes you feel like ragequitting.
GMSInfighter Wrote:Oh you know me too well Dyxanije
Sounds good, don't read much manga but I shall check it out.
I'm trying hard not to learn Japanese right now cause I know I'll concentrate so much on it and I'll forget my spanish class and kiss my A goodbye. So junior year I'm definitely going to teach myself.
Yes, definitely not a good idea to study more than one language at once. I wouldn't know from experience, but I can tell you that the last thing you wanna do is spend double the time memorizing stuff a day. You can't learn efficiently that way. Even if you don't get the two mixed up, you'll certainly hinder your ability to learn both languages if you're learning at the same time, rather than separately.