Japan Journal

Intimidating? Perhaps. Exciting? For sure! Those are the emotions you might experience as you undertake learning Japanese as a second language – just like grade school or middle school. Japanese, so totally different than many other world languages, is actually quite easy to learn if your follow these four tips I use to teach my own students.

1. Make Mistakes. Yep! That's what I said. And it's true – just like walking, the more you stumble, the better you know how to deal with the path set before you. Fail often! That's the rule! Failures are success waiting to happen!

2. Learn Katakana. Katakana is a sort of alphabet that the Japanese use for words lifted from other languages, especially English. Once you learn to read Katakana, you will be pleasantly surprised that you will be making the sounds of words that are very familiar to you, only they will be written in Japanese. Learning Katakana as you start your Japanese lessons can be a real help to your self-confidence.

3. Take Chances. Speaking in any language, even your own, can sometimes be risky business. Take the risk. The worse that can happen is that you will learn what NOT to do. Go ahead, take a chance. Chances are you'll win, and if you don't – you'll learn. You may be a stranger in a strange land when you visit Japan. You will become less of a stranger if you attempt to use the language; even if you flub a lot your hosts will appreciate your effort. Face it, when you visit Japan you will stand out as a tourist and you're bound to make some mistakes no matter how much you've prepared. Yes, you'll be a tourist and recognized as such. But don't worry about making mistakes. You'll be offered more help than you can handle.

4. Repeat, Repeat, Repeat. It may get boring, but stick with it. Repetition fixes things in your brain so that they become almost automatic in response to certain situations. Hone your skills, especially regarding the language, so you can easily call them up when necessary.

If it happens to rain on the day you were going to the beach or go shopping, use the time to read up on culture or news and practice your phrases or language lessons. You're commute time can double as your learning time. Put some lessons on your iPod to listen to as you walk to work, or while you're riding the bus or train. Play CD's in your car.

A delightful language, learning easy Japanese could give you a career boost, help you make overseas friends, or help you have fun on an already exciting tour of the land.

Don't be intimidated, it's very possible for you to learn Japanese now. With focus, commitment, and especially enthusiasm, you're setting yourself up for a good beginning. Of course, aside from your optimism, it's important to understand a few basics. Japanese employs three different “alphabets”:

* Kanji
* Hiragana
* Katakana

Kanji is a pictograph alphabet using characters taken from Chinese.

Hiragana and Katakana are syllabic scripts, more like the Roman and Cyrillic alphabets, and they are based on Chinese characters. Sometimes used in the same sentence, Kanji and Hiragana are the most used “alphabets” in Japanese writing nowadays. Used chiefly to depict the sounds of foreign words borrowed from other languages, Katakana is also used to depict other sounds like the meowing of a cat.

A running joke is that Asians do things backwards; well, Japanese scripts is written vertically, as opposed to the Western horizontal, and from right to left, as opposed to the Western left to right. The Western style has been adapted to scientific writing and for computer display, but the familiar method remains in use in practically all other Japanese publications.

Japanese is a subtle language, there are differences in tone and vocabulary indicative of the class of the person speaking or spoken to, and degrees of politeness are also indicated by vocabulary and tone. Beyond social class, the use of vocabulary, grammar, and tone of voice, it is possible to determine the gender of the person speaking as well as the gender of the listener.

As expected, the sort of teaching and learning available from certain language schools is always promoted as the easiest and quickest way to pick up another language. Budget, interest level, time you have, these are three important considerations when you set about to determine how and where you'll take up your language lessons. The curriculum or method of teaching must be compatible with your needs to learn Japanese now. Learning to read and write well is one thing. Getting around the country and engaging the natives is quite another. Which do you need to do? Reading and writing is one thing, mastering conversational language is quite another.

If you do want to learn Japanese now by reading and writing, it's always a good idea to get a grasp of the spoken language before tackling the harder reading and writing. Audio files will help you pick up proper pronunciation and wording so find some produced just for that and, of course, employing native speakers. (Even if your focus will be on reading and writing, most books teaching those skills also contain CD-ROMs.) A subtle language, Japanese depends on various intonations, listening carefully and imitating them is very important.

The amount of grammar and vocabulary you need to study is an important consideration. To save time, focus on important, elemental words and phrases and then later start to flesh out your vocabulary. As far as grammar goes, learn some basic functions and sentence forms so you can easily construct necessary sentences for your conversation.

Next to all the matters listed above, patience and perseverance are good companions to have along on your learning journey. Textbooks, teachers, and drill exercises are important, but what you bring to the process is most important. Which classroom is always open? Which classroom can you find almost anywhere you go? Which classroom always has a curriculum suited to your needs? The one you carry with you!

For most people who are suffering the pain of memorizing Kanji, the amount of characters is terrifying and makes you feel desperate for any shortcuts you can find.  I’m not going to sugar-coat it, memorizing all 1945 of these little buggers is going to take some work.  In the whole process of learning Japanese, memorizing Kanji may be the most difficult aspect.  But here, I’d like to share some tricks to make Kanji learning faster, so you can deal with Japanese newspapers, Managa, or those confusing subway signs better.

Tactic #1: Throw the traditional learning order out the window:

The first step is to get familiar with the first 100 to 200 Kanji which are commonly used in Japanese, so that you can get started.  But what you should do next is to learn the advanced kanji as you see them or encounter them when you try to read something in Japanese, and do not worry about how uncommon they are.  When you begin to do this, it will probably not feel easy, but you cut out the part of you that says “Oh that’s a tough Kanji, I’ll wait till later to learn it,” so you will actually find that you learn Kanji much faster this way.

Tactic #2: Memorize the composing parts:

In the dictionary, there are 20 or 30 of the 214 radicals that are used more commonly than others.  Memorizing them means knowing most of Kanji, or at least being able to see the big picture.  You will become quick at recognizing new kanji with less effort.  The radicals which make up the new Kanji will help you figure out what the Kanji means.  This tactic can be named “chunking”, and learning 3-5 radicals is easier than learning 15 Kanji.  Piecing the radicals together to make new meanings and words is the next step.

Tactic #3: Get the tough stuff out of the way first

This tactic focuses on the written Kanji.  Even if you just started, you should try to set aside time for daily readings in Japanese.  This will help you learn the conventional combinations of Kanji and their everyday uses.  With a little practice you should be able to start picking up things naturally.

Tactic #4: Speak Japanese out loud :

Identifying the word, knowing what it refers to, and correct pronunciation are the 3 essentials to learn Kanji.  As long as you aren’t studying in the library, go ahead and practice reading out loud. If you read aloud, you handle the three key components at the same time.

Kanji learning is tough, but you can manage it with some determination.  Follow my advice, and your learning speed will increase.

Will it take years and years to learn Japanese fluently? When a lot of people first start out with Japanese, they want to master the language as fast as possible. There is no quick answer to the question, but it really depends on how committed you are to really learning the language.

People really do not worry about how long it will take to learn Japanese.  In many instances, they really want to know how hard they are going to have to work. Of course there is no conclusive answer for a question like this. The most important aspect though, is how badly you want to learn Japanese.

You can realistically learn spoken Japanese pretty quickly if you are determined about it. With the right desire and motivation, there are people that will master Japanese in under a year, while there are also people that actually move to Japan and live there for several years that can hardly say the word sushi.

Though often quite expense, you'll find that the best way to learn Japanese is with private lessons or language classes. If, like me, you can't really afford to spend thousands of dollars on language classes you can still learn Japanese with books or language software programs. These are all superb ways to get a good comprehension of the Japanese language and kick-start your learning.

The best way to become conversationally fluent very fast is to apply what you learn at every chance.  Schedule the time to practice speaking Japanese with people that are already fluent in Japanese or other classmates too. Begin applying what you learn in your studies and your Japanese will improve so quickly that you will impress your friends. Talking to native speakers gives you the opportunity to learn some useful slang that you won't learn in the textbooks.

A lot of people think that it is very hard to learn to speak Japanese, however this is just a misconception.  If you take the time and effort to learn it correctly you will realize that speaking is not so hard. However, I must admit, that learning to read and write Japanese, is probably going to be more of a task.

Learning all those new characters is going to be hard at first if you've only ever used the English alphabet. Hiragana and Katakana probably won't take you more than a few weeks to learn, but things start getting hairy when you dive into the Kanji.  Are you ready to confront your fears and memorize nearly two thousand characters?

Don't stop trying and throw in the towel though, this isn't any different that learning to speak Japanese. All you need to do is practice, practice, preactice. Don't use Romaji to learn Japanese.  It will only harm you in the end. Another great little trick for learning Japanese is to associate each character to something in your mind that will help you remember. To give an example the Kanji for "kawa" (or "river") looks like flowing water. Be creative and you'll find that it is pretty simple to think of ways to memorize the Kanji.

So how long will it take you to learn Japanese? As long as it takes. Of course some people will naturally learn faster than others, but the most important factor to bear in mind is your level of dedication. Don't stop and make the time to practice everyday.

Learning a whole new dialect like Japanese for example, is often truly gratifying.  It can definitely broaden your horizons when it comes to occupation and traveling around.  There are many people who simply cannot make time to go to any school classes right after they've worked all day due to household responsibilities.  As an option, the choice here is to study Japanese on the web.

Should you want to teach yourself to speak Japanese swiftly on-line, then you need not panic.  These days, this kind of thing can be incredibly painless and enjoyable.  Even though there are numerous Japanese lessons online which usually require a lot of time to complete, there is also an excellent choice of good training which you may genuinely get results from fast.

Many times you just flat-out don’t have time to enroll in boring foreign language lessons.  You may need to take a last minute vacation to Japan or you might well have an urgent corporate meeting with a Japanese business partner in the Tokyo office.  If the clock is running out and you just don’t have time to learn Japanese in a traditional way, then you’d probably benefit most from online lessons.  Can you really learn Japanese online, though?  Isn’t the internet just a place to go when you’re bored and want to pass some time?

If you get started with Japanese on the web, you should weigh a few things over first.  The most important one would be, do these lessons teach you pronunciation?  Be sure the check and make sure that the course you use will show you how to actually pronounce the words.  This will make things much easier for you in the long run.  So with any on the fast Japanese programs you’ll want to be sure that they have some kind of interactive component that shows you how to actually pick up native pronunciation.  The best way to learn a new language like Japanese is to find a way that incorporates both audio and visual images so that you can make associations in your mind.

If you’ve done any shopping around at all, you probably know just how expensive those Japanese classes can get!  If you’re not independently wealthy, learning Japanese online can be a much more reasonable means.  If you put in some effort to your search, you can even find totally free ways to learn how to speak Japanese.  One of the cool things about the internet is that you can find pretty much anything if you look hard enough (even free Japanese lessons).  On the other hand, can you really expect the same quality from free lessons?

Free Japanese Lessons versus Paid Japanese Lessons

It is definitely probable, if you search around enough, to find top-notch free Japanese lessons online.  Just like any other free kind of thing out there, you’ll find that the quality varies immensely when it come to these courses.  However, you may be able to find either good quality or bad no cost lessons while you’re poking around in the corners of the internet.  So if you really want to learn the Japanese language, you should really take the time and commit yourself to learning the language from a paid resource.  The quality is much better and you’ll learn significantly more.

With the free lessons, you get what you pay for and you’ll probably not learn that much real Japanese.  Instead, opt for the paid instruction and you’ll find that you’re going to be dealing with much higher-quality and you’ll actually learn faster.  You’ll probably find that taking a paid-route will give you a personal Japanese tutor to help you with any specific challenges you encounter with learning the language.  More often than not, you notice that these courses also have extra resources to help you learn the Japanese language faster.  The paid lessons will generally give you a much higher value for your dollar.