Comments on: learning japanese: a month and a half in http://malvasiabianca.org/archives/2007/08/learning-japanese-a-month-and-a-half-in/ Thu, 16 Oct 2008 00:15:00 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.6.2 By: david carlton http://malvasiabianca.org/archives/2007/08/learning-japanese-a-month-and-a-half-in/#comment-93314 david carlton Mon, 12 May 2008 18:13:22 +0000 http://malvasiabianca.org/archives/2007/08/learning-japanese-a-month-and-a-half-in/#comment-93314 Whoops! Sorry about that. :-) I can report that my learning process has gotten a lot smoother since I wrote this post... Whoops! Sorry about that. :-) I can report that my learning process has gotten a lot smoother since I wrote this post…

]]> By: Matt http://malvasiabianca.org/archives/2007/08/learning-japanese-a-month-and-a-half-in/#comment-93303 Matt Mon, 12 May 2008 16:57:24 +0000 http://malvasiabianca.org/archives/2007/08/learning-japanese-a-month-and-a-half-in/#comment-93303 Wow. I've always wanted to learn Japanese. But after reading this extremely detailed post, the task seems well beyond my abilities regardless of my aptitude for languages. You've successfully intimidated me =P Wow. I’ve always wanted to learn Japanese. But after reading this extremely detailed post, the task seems well beyond my abilities regardless of my aptitude for languages. You’ve successfully intimidated me =P

]]> By: david carlton http://malvasiabianca.org/archives/2007/08/learning-japanese-a-month-and-a-half-in/#comment-72939 david carlton Tue, 27 Nov 2007 05:14:40 +0000 http://malvasiabianca.org/archives/2007/08/learning-japanese-a-month-and-a-half-in/#comment-72939 Huh; honestly, the thought of skipping the individual kanji in my flash cards never even crossed my mind! I wonder why? Probably partly my excessive fondness for reductionism, though maybe my focus on reading instead of speaking has something to do with it: I think focusing more on individual kanji and (partly, though not entirely) deriving compounds from that works okay when reading, whereas it probably falls flat on its face when speaking. The idea of only learning compounds still scares me, if only because I don't yet feel confident in my ability to learn a character at all; I still get this feeling that, when I memorize a compound, I would mistakenly happily identify several other compounds as that word when reading it, unless I were solid on the individual characters. Actually, seeing multiple compounds containing the same character is one trigger now for me to learn a kanji. (Which is nice, because the compounds give me a head start.) Also, seeing a compound with a reading of a character that I didn't know before can give me a boost to visit or revisit that character. Huh; honestly, the thought of skipping the individual kanji in my flash cards never even crossed my mind! I wonder why? Probably partly my excessive fondness for reductionism, though maybe my focus on reading instead of speaking has something to do with it: I think focusing more on individual kanji and (partly, though not entirely) deriving compounds from that works okay when reading, whereas it probably falls flat on its face when speaking.

The idea of only learning compounds still scares me, if only because I don’t yet feel confident in my ability to learn a character at all; I still get this feeling that, when I memorize a compound, I would mistakenly happily identify several other compounds as that word when reading it, unless I were solid on the individual characters.

Actually, seeing multiple compounds containing the same character is one trigger now for me to learn a kanji. (Which is nice, because the compounds give me a head start.) Also, seeing a compound with a reading of a character that I didn’t know before can give me a boost to visit or revisit that character.

]]> By: Jim Blandy http://malvasiabianca.org/archives/2007/08/learning-japanese-a-month-and-a-half-in/#comment-72840 Jim Blandy Mon, 26 Nov 2007 07:37:45 +0000 http://malvasiabianca.org/archives/2007/08/learning-japanese-a-month-and-a-half-in/#comment-72840 (To avoid confusion, I'll confess up front that I skimmed this post.) I learned kanji in two separate ways. I never made flash cards for individual kanji, because they're only semi-meaningful in isolation anyway, and each one has so many pronunciations. I only made flashcards for actual combinations of kanji that correspond to Japanese words. So, for example, I'd have a flash card for 'doubutsuen', but no card for (say) the 'en' by itself. In practice, that kanji's pronunciation and meaning fragment just fall out naturally. When you see a new combination of kanji, you'll recall the other words you've seen those kanji in (kouen, say), and you can generate pronunciation and meaning guesses in a pretty natural way. From watching Vivienne, I don't think native speakers really do any different. For writing, though, I essentially practiced the kanji as they appeared in the book --- so working from the order given in Kanji and Kana doesn't seem like a bad idea at all. (To avoid confusion, I’ll confess up front that I skimmed this post.)

I learned kanji in two separate ways. I never made flash cards for individual kanji, because they’re only semi-meaningful in isolation anyway, and each one has so many pronunciations. I only made flashcards for actual combinations of kanji that correspond to Japanese words. So, for example, I’d have a flash card for ‘doubutsuen’, but no card for (say) the ‘en’ by itself. In practice, that kanji’s pronunciation and meaning fragment just fall out naturally. When you see a new combination of kanji, you’ll recall the other words you’ve seen those kanji in (kouen, say), and you can generate pronunciation and meaning guesses in a pretty natural way. From watching Vivienne, I don’t think native speakers really do any different.

For writing, though, I essentially practiced the kanji as they appeared in the book — so working from the order given in Kanji and Kana doesn’t seem like a bad idea at all.

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