A quick note to everyone learning Japanese

[Elfunko]

The fastest way to learn is to speak. Do yourself a favor and find some Japanese friends you can teach english to in exchange for them teaching you Japanese. Search for "conversation partners". Find a boyfriend or girlfriend. Whatever it takes. Then take all this stuff you learn about here, in class, or whatever and talk about it in Japanese. I garauntee you will find the difference between speaking with a native speaker and studying alone is night and day. So do yourself the favor and go make some friends!

[Elfunko]

And a follow up (always gotta throw those punches in combos!).

Grammar class teaches you one context, one set of vocabulary, and one way to use it. Its neat, its pre-packaged, and its even more useful if you are creative and can imagine new contexts to use the grammar and vocabulary, then write em down and hand em in as homework. However your teacher will correct your sentences in the context that she wants to see, and you may think you were incorrect. However if you talk to any native speaker and explain your sentence you may find you simply didn't elaborate enough, or you missed one part of the equation. You weren't wrong, you were just a little shy of your target.

A conversation partner, older the better because most college aged kids can't do more than teach you slang, will completely and totally eclipse what you learned in the classroom. Show em your grammar book and you can learn 10 new ways to use that one vocabulary word. And best of all, you can discuss everything in Japanese. Discuss the stories, the contexts, the relevence to Japan (should your grammar teacher have been in the US for the last 30 years), new words phrases and idioms. Its one on one language training, and in my opinion its a million times better than a grammar class. And a grammar class is a thousand times better than study alone for the reason that the class will force you to use the language in essays and other ways you wouldn't alone.

I know you guys might think you sound stupid, and you are right, you do sound stupid. Hell, you are stupid. You can't speak any better than the regular 6 year old Japanese child. But get over this little mole-hill and then you can actually start climbing the mountian (and its a big farkin mountian!) that is Nihongo. So speak!

And in final note, I leave you with this; my old soo-bahk instructor used to tell us this about training. "I'd rather have the fighter who practiced one punch a thousand times by my side than a thousand punches one time." I don't care how many vocabulary words you have "learned," until they are incorporated into your spoken vocabulary you really can't use them and they really aren't functional. So build your foundation and get a solid grip on whatever you are learning! And this is much easier to do when you have somebody to converse with completely in Japanese on whatever it is you are learning!

Good luck!

[Elfunko]

Heres the hook. (Don't do a 1 2, do the 1 2 3 combo)

Class is one dimensional. The teacher will try to introduce other dimensions, but she is limited by time and having to teach a syllabus.

Languages are not one dymensional. They are only limited by the speaker.

You decide what is best for you. And you decide how far and how fast you progress.

[GoddessCarlie]

That's why I'm really pleased with the university I am about to go to (classes start monday!) Five hours a week of classes, but they also offer two conversational classes if you want to go to them, and I definatly will. It's where japanese students and students of japanese go to talk casually about whatever. (I'm also a member of the student guild japanese society, わさび, which again has students of JP and JP students, where we will watch movies and have からおけ nights and more.) I'm very excited to be finally be formally taught as well as all the self study I've been doing.

Oh, and after uni, I plan to live in Japan, which will hopefully accelerate my Japanese even more. *fingers crossed*

[Rizu]

You are absolutely right Elfunko - it is like night and day. I just met a native Japanese tonight (been in the US only 3 weeks!) for a language exchange. I thought I knew a lot of vocab, etc., but connecting it to speaking was difficult! I couldn't remember how to say certain words that I know I've "learned". It is completely different than just studying on your own. I can already tell it's going to be a very good learning experience.

Another way to find people is meetup.com. I found out that Boston has a Japanese-English group, which when my speaking skills are stronger I would like to join. There may be Japanese groups in other US states or countries, so check it out if you haven't before!

[Bucko]

I recommend avoiding language exchanges. I've done a heap of them here in Japan and they're virtually fruitless. The conversation is always dominated by English, and if your Japanese is any good chances are the Japanese person will dump you as a language exchange partner. It's in their best interest to have someone who hardly knows any Japanese, and they know exactly that.

Furthermore, unless they've had formal training they will be really bad at explaining their own language and end up confusing both themselves and you. I remember a time when a Japanese woman tried to teach me some Japanese by explaining it in English (I didn't even ask to be taught) and she was wrong. I knew it was incorrect because I'd studied it before, I just didn't have the heart to tell her she was wrong. And on top of that, had I not known she was wrong I would have taken her word for it. FYI, she tried to tell me that the difference between 行く and 行きます was "I go" vs "I will go".

If you really want to try out your conversational Japanese, you should pay a qualified teacher for conversation lessons. You basically just pay for their time to sit have a chat with you. It's all in Japanese, they know that English is a no-no, and you get someone who knows what they're talking about. But please, do yourselves a favour and never try any type of "language exchange".

[Elfunko]

Now Bucko may be right in some respects, but I've found the large majority of Japanese students here learning english, a good 95% of the them will happily speak and explain things to me in Japanese. The KEY is getting the explination in Japanese (which makes more sense if since this is the language we learn). So what you gotta do is do your own research and learn how to say, "Is this the right word?" or "When I say this it means..." or any type of question you may have. Just like we all learned vocab for riding the train or eating food, learn how to ask and answer questions about the language.

Second, the level of conversation teacher depends on that own persons level of comprehension of their own language and their ability to convey the ins-and-outs of it. I've had girls that were as dumb as nails and just good for practicing casual talk, and then right now I have this older woman who is just an absolute dream to work with. I learn more from her in one hour than I could in any grammar class. Then I take this knowledge to class and try to ask questions that will provoke a response from a teacher teaching a point I already learned (I'm trying to give everyone in the class a chance to learn it). She is here to learn english, yet this week alone (in the two days we hung out, I spoke about 6 hours strait of semi-fluid japanese. Don't worry about what level you are now, just set some goals and do some work and look for improvement. And I've seen a whole hell of a lot of improvement. So much so that I can give a 5 minute speech in Japanese on men and women's roles in Japan and the US pretty much off the cuff (ok, I wrote a little 30 minutes before class just to make a nice outline). The reason I could do this, I was speaking and EXPLAINING my thoughts and opinions for 6 hours with that woman and it was just a farkin awesome experience.

Asking the difference of iku and ikimas. Ask in Japanese and you will get a direct and correct answer pretty quickly, you just gotta know the right words to use when you ask. Trial and error and collaberation with Japanese is how you figure this out. Finding someone to collaborate with isn't that hard. I can walk on campus and get a date with even the most drop dead gorgeous japanese girl under the guise of needing a conversation partner. If you haven't realized this yet you just don't have the right technique or attitude. So basically, finding people who want to speak Japanese is one of the easiest things you can do besides finding people who want to speak English. So get at it!

[Bucko]

Now Bucko may be right in some respects, but I've found the large majority of Japanese students here learning english, a good 95% of the them will happily speak and explain things to me in Japanese. The KEY is getting the explination in Japanese (which makes more sense if since this is the language we learn).

No, this is not the key. Whether they try to explain it in Japanese or English is irrelevant. The fact is that without proper knowledge, they won't be able to explain nuances between certain words and phrases. They may make a good listening partner, but I wouldn't trust anything new I learnt.

Just like how the average English speaker can't explain the difference between 'see', 'look' and 'watch'. Or the difference between 'I want to go to France' and 'I'd like to go to France', the average Japanese speaker won't be able to tell you the difference between certain words and phrases also.

[Bucko]

I can walk on campus and get a date with even the most drop dead gorgeous japanese girl under the guise of needing a conversation partner.

Wow, this makes you sound like a very honourable character.

[Elfunko]

Why not instead of asking them to explain the nuances ask them to give some example sentences in context and then compare the differences between the contexts and extract hte nuances yourself using them as your walking talking grammar/dictionary tool?

But you are right, understanding the nuances is what is most important, otherwise you'll use the wrong for for the wrong context. I'm proposing you take a few steps back and put down the microscope looking at the composition of hte line that circles the soccer field. Just go play soccer and ask questions and get tips as you are learning to play. You can analyze in depth, but don't put all the work on your conversation partner to explain things to you. Instead ask questions that will get the explination you seek in a painless and effortless manner. Beyond that, if you can converse on the usages, or at least get an explanation in Japanese and understand it, that's icing on the cake. But who want's cake without icing??

[Elfunko]

I can walk on campus and get a date with even the most drop dead gorgeous japanese girl under the guise of needing a conversation partner.

Wow, this makes you sound like a very honourable character.

LOL, I'm not a knight at the round table, thats for sure. But go through years of choosing conversation partners and you will see you DO have the power of choice so long as you know the right way to approach women. I simply excersise this power. Say whatever you want or feel, but I couldn't really care less. Have fun and worry about your own life.

[Bucko]

Why not instead of asking them to explain the nuances ask them to give some example sentences in context and then compare the differences between the contexts and extract hte nuances yourself using them as your walking talking grammar/dictionary tool?

This actually is quite a good idea. I do it myself with example sentences on http://www.alc.co.jp/index.html

I'm just saying be careful with their "explanations". In fact, don't ask for explanations, just ask for example sentences and work out the nuance yourself.

[Elfunko]

If she is intelligent, you can converse on nuance, just as you and I may converse on nuance in english. Maybe for us its no big deal, but if you asked my mom about nuance in english she wouldn't know where to begin because she's never thought of or studied such a thing before. Same thing for Japanese. From my expierence most college aged kids aren't good references for such in depth and precise meaning of nuance. However, that older woman who is extremely smart, nice, loves cooking, etc. sure as hell can talk about nuance all day long no problem. She really is a natural teacher and she does a great job (for free) teaching me way more than I can learn in school. And conversely I teach her english since I am an ESL teacher. This ESL stuff comes in super handy, do some free work and get lots of free tutoring, perfect for the broke college student.

Rant: School grammar courses (not the conversation classes) are limited by the material they must teach within a limited amount of time, within the one context the use in the book, the length of the class, the teachers need to help EVERYONE understand, and maybe even more. But what if you don't need to spend 30 minutes on that little piece of grammar? What if you can use the grammar in that context, then with our natural human creativity try it out in some other new contexts to see if it fits, discuss topics, etc. Speaking one on one for 1 hour is a whole heck of a lot more intensive than sitting in a 1 hour grammar class and only speaking to a wall for 2 minutes out of the whole hour.