Japanese can be a difficult language to learn. But it doesn't have to be a painful process if certain steps are taken. I provide directions that break down this process into easily manageable chunks.
First, you want to get a good Japanese book. Don't worry, I have a good one for you. It's called: Genki 1: An Integrated Course in Elementary Japanese 1. It's a well-rounded book that will give you a good foundation in Japanese. The text is light and casual - it's not your typical dry, textbook.
Once you start getting into a few of the book's lesson, you'll want to start learning hiragana. Hiragana is the basic Japanese writing system and it's essential that you master it early. One of the best ways to master it is to write the hiragana over and over again until it gets burned into your brain.
If you want some extra help to get you going, check out the book: Jimi's Book of Japanese: A Motivating Method to Learn Japanese (Hiragana).
With your hiragana now mastered, going through the rest of the book should be a lot easier. Katakana is the next writing system you need to learn. It's related to hiragana so mastering it should be relatively painless. Just like before, write them over and over again but they're second nature.
At this point, you should try your hand at learning kanji. This is the third and most challenging writing system. It's also the last writing system that you'll need to learn. There are 1,945 kanji that you'll need to learn. Don't worry! If taken in stages, it's not an impossible task.
A book that will get you started on your first thousand kanji goes by the name: Kanji Pict-o-Graphix: Over 1,000 Japanese Kanji and Kana Mnemonics. This books gives a good visual representation of the various kanji.
Another good book recommended by many is: Remembering the Kanji, Vol. 1: A Complete Course on How Not to Forget the Meaning and Writing of Japanese Characters. It's a tough system but many people swear by it. If you have an iPhone or iPod Touch, for a few bucks, you can get a kanji flashcard program called Kanji Flip. If you want to improve your vocabulary, I also recommend the sister application, Japanese Flip.
By now, you should know your hiragana, katakana, and 200 - 300 kanji. Now let's take a fun detour. We're now going to dive into the world of manga. This is the world of Japanese comic books. Due to the wide variety, you can find a manga on almost every imaginable subject. You can find manga on Ebay and Amazon Japan.
I recommend the manga Slam Dunk. It has a great story, memorable characters, and fantastic artwork. Basically, anything by Inoue Takehiko is going to be great.
As you're reading your manga, this is now a great time to copy down vocabulary words and sentences that you find interesting/useful. Put them on flash cards and go over them on a regular basis. You can also use an online flashcard program like Anki to further streamline the learning process. A simple Google search will get you to the right page.
From here on out, you can do some freelancing. You can stick to a textbook if that's what you like, but I want you to go out and watch Japanese movies, tv shows, read magazines, and start having simple conversations with native Japanese speakers. If you feel uncomfortable with this, it's OK to wait. But when you start coming out of your shell, you'll be amazed at how much Japanese you know.
Exposing yourself to outside Japanese stimuli will further accelerate your rate of progress. Not to mention that it's also a lot of fun. You've put in the hard work in the beginning, slowly building your foundation. Now you can learn at a more casual pace if you want. It all comes to a point where your knowledge of Japanese gets to a threshold where exposing yourself to Japanese media is much less confusing. By now you should be more than halfway done with your kanji and you should have a good fundamental understanding of Japanese. Keep using this method and soon, reading and understanding Japanese novels will be within your grasp.
In closing, it's important to have a plan in life. Not only a plan but a goal. With a goal, all you have to do is go backwards through your plan and you'll soon know the intermediate steps needed to accomplish your goal. And finally persistence goes hand in hand with accomplishing your goal. Regularly expose yourself to Japanese and you'll be amazed with the end results. I wish you the best of luck!
For more information, you can reach Jason through his blog, Apple Otaku. It covers a weird mix of Apple products and Japanese culture. |
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