Update and Reading

I recently received my JLPT certificate in the mail! Many of my friends also took the JLPT and passed their exams as well. This year I would like to take the JLPT N2. I heard it’s more difficult to pass than the N3, so even if I do not pass this year, I will not be discouraged.

Lately, I have been thinking about language learning a lot. I finished reading a book called ‘Fluent Forever,’ which is about concrete steps a language learner can take to learn a language. I really enjoyed reading the book and its appendixes. It helped motivate me to use Anki again. I like using Anki, but the deck building process can be a little convoluted at times.

‘Fluent Forever’ introduced and reminded me of many aspects of the language learning process. Specifically, it mentioned the developmental stages of a L2 (foreign language) learner, pronunciation, frequency lists and Anki. I want to explore the concept of developmental stages of language more. Basically, the developmental stages of language refers to the process of learning a language. For example, we learn present tense before past tense etc. Of course, this is not the best explanation of this concept, but I think if I understand these stages for L2 learners it will make me a better L2 learner and a better English teacher.

Pronunciation is something I struggle with, not so much with Japanese, but there are some sounds that I need more training in. The book talks about how to tackle pronunciation, so I am going to try to incorporate that advice into my studies.

Frequency list are something I keep hearing about in passing, but I have not used them very much. For Japanese, I mostly use JLPT vocabulary list or vocabulary list provided by my textbooks. I would like to try out learning vocabulary through frequency lists, because I have heard a lot of good things about it.

Anki is a free online SRS (spaced repetition system) flash card website and app (the iTunes app is not free and cost about $25, while the Android app is free). You can build your own flash cards with whatever features you want (audio, text, pictures etc.) or download and use flash card decks shared by other people. I do not use Anki regularly so, I had to look a lot of things up to figure out how to build a custom deck. Also, Anki uses HTML when you create fields or question cards, so that can be confusing. It helps to know HTML, but you can use Anki without knowing it. Anki is a great free resource that is customizable, so I am going to try using it again.

Japanese with Video Games (part 2)

Recently, I mentioned using non-traditional study methods for my Japanese studies. While it may be a no-brainer to many people to do things in the foreign language they are studying or rather look to material, that native speakers of the foreign language use, for foreign language study material, it is still a fairly new concept for me. Lately, I have decided to use my love of video games as study material for Japanese, since I really like Japanese video games. In this post, I am going to discuss watching other people play video games and how you can learn from that.

What do you do if you do not have time to play video games or you enjoy watching others play games more than playing them yourself? There’s the internet. There are people playing Japanese video games online on websites such as YouTube and recording themselves doing it. Some of them talk while they play the games, so although the video games themselves may not have audio for their characters’ conversations, you can just listen to the person playing the video game talk about it or sometimes even read the text on the game aloud as they play. Another option is NicoNico, a video streaming website and app (available on Japanese Nintendo 3DS and PSVita) similar to YouTube which has plenty of videos of people playing video games, sometimes in groups, and you can get the bonus benefit of listening to speech from the video game and the person(s) playing the game.

Another way to watch people play video games is the video game streaming website and app, Twitch. Twitch is worldwide, so you can find channels from countries other than your own that play video games you are interested in watching and there is the added plus of the chat feature. You do not have to participate in the chat, although it would be good written practice, but you can look to it as a form of reading practice and the chats usually revolve around the video game being played, so you have some context to go off of no matter when you begin watching the channel. I actually have not used Twitch a lot in terms of Japanese practice, but I have watched games played in other languages. There are plenty of gamers on Twitch playing video games in Japanese. Many of them are using the Japanese versions for speed runs of the game, but it still is good reading/listening practice, even if the pace seems a bit fast, but even in speed runs, there are some portions of the game (i.e. movie scenes) that cannot be skipped through.

Can you think of any other websites where you can watch others play video games in Japanese?

Japanese with Video Games (part 1)

Recently, I mentioned using non-traditional study methods for my Japanese studies. While it may be a no-brainer to many people to do things in the foreign language they are studying or rather look to material, that native speakers of the foreign language use, for foreign language study material, it is still a fairly new concept for me. Lately, I have decided to use my love of video games as study material for Japanese, since I really like Japanese video games. In this post, I am going to discuss using Japanese video games as listening and reading practice.

How do you make video games into listening practice? One obvious idea is to play a video game in a foreign language that has voice actors and listen to what the characters in the game say. Although not everything will be vocalized, when you do hear audio, it will a good opportunity to test your listening skills at native speed or your ability to keep up with the speech as the subtitles (if offered in the game) flash by. (Of course, playing a video game in a foreign language usually requires buying said game or game system or both! depending on whether or not the game/game system is region locked. I will discuss some of the ways you can get Japanese video games in the third part of this ‘Japanese with Video Games’ posts.) Many games, especially home game systems have narrator or character audio. You can watch Japanese tv commercials for video games online or videos that Japanese game companies create to discuss their latest games and systems.

Playing video games in another language is mostly reading practice rather than listening practice. There are a lot of games that do not have audio, which makes for good reading practice. Games marketed towards children have furigana above kanji or may be written completely in kana! While video games are not books, they can have a surprisingly large amount of text. I like playing RPGs, which usually have long storylines and subquests. Some RPGs (role-playing games) allow you to do things not possible in other types of games such as sub-plots, which can help you build your vocabulary beyond the usual parameters of the game. Playing games in Japanese will expose you to a lot of vocabulary that you may not be exposed to in Japanese classes and can be a good supplement to using textbooks or studying kanji. While I was studying for the JLPT N3, I played Youkai Watch 2 Honke, which exposed me to not only vocabulary and kanji from the JLPT N3, but also from N2 and N1! Seeing the kanji and vocabulary in use in the video game helped solidify them in my memory more than just studying them from a textbook.

Have you used video games as listening or reading practice? What kind of games do you play and how was it effective?

 

JLPT N3

Yesterday, I took the JLPT for the first time. I have not mentioned the JLPT before, but I feel it is appropriate to write about it, since I just took the test. I decided to take the N3 earlier this year after completing my Japanese major. At first, I wanted to aim for the N2, but I quickly realized that would not be a realistic goal; thus, I decided to take the N3 instead.

I remembered hearing about the sou-matome (日本語総まとめ) JLPT (日本語能力試験) prep series from somewhere and purchased all of the N3 books (kanji, vocabulary, reading comprehension, grammar and listening comprehension). I used that series in addition various other non-traditional study habits and apps on my phone such as sticky study to prepare for the exam. To make a long story short, I did not finish any of the books I purchased, although I did put a huge dent in many of them. I also was not as diligent in my studies as I originally planned to be, hence not finishing any of the textbooks I purchased for the test.

Luckily, I was able to do a day before the exam cram session with a friend, which was fairly productive. Walking into the exam, I did not know what to expect besides the general three tests (vocabulary/language knowledge, reading comprehension and listening) we were going to take.

As I did not study vocabulary as much as I originally planned to, that section was fairly hard for me. It started out deceptively easy and then I saw kanji I knew individually, but I did not know them in the compounds they appeared in the test. It was not super hard; it was doable and if I had studied more, it would have been easy since the JLPT books and material I used sufficiently prepared me for the exam.

Reading comprehension also started out easy and I quickly became overconfident believing I had plenty of time (70 mins) and soon the proctor called out 5 more minutes and I had not even read the last reading!

I was a little nervous about the listening comprehension, because the JLPT book I used had some quickly spoken dialogues and business dialogues that I had to refer to the transcripts to understand. But it was not really bad and some of the dialogues were actually funny! The only problem I had was that we only were able to listen to each dialogue once and then the test was over.

I am not sure if I passed the exam or not, but I think I did well considering it was my first time taking the exam. We were told our results will be available in February. Even if I did not pass, I plan to complete the N3 books I purchased and begin studying for the N2 so I can take it next December. Have any of you taken the JLPT? What was your impression of the test?

Japanese 3DS

A Japanese 3DS is not that much different from the US version of the 3DS. I admit, when I first bought mine, it took a while to set up. Things that were easy to read for me in English, I did not understand in Japanese. But with my American 3DS and my Midori (Japanese-English dictionary app on iPhone) in hand, I managed to do it after what was probably a few hours. I also managed to learn a lot of technical vocabulary as well.

One thing that I noticed about my new Japanese 3DS was that games on it were very expensive. It shouldn’t have surprised me, because I had seen prices of video games at electronic stores and Book OFF. But compared to video game prices, games in Japan can be about $20 more expensive. A lot of new games cost around $50 or $60, whereas on the US 3DS, games are around $40 or $30. Physical games and downloadable games can be around the same price. Some games are only available through download and a lot of games on Japanese 3DS do not make it to America or take about a year to be released for American 3DS systems. Some games are relatively cheap for download too, less than $10.

Having a Japanese 3DS is great for studying Japanese. Not only can you buy Japanese games and play them in Japanese, which is great for reading practice and broadening your vocabulary, but you can watch videos on it as well. About every week, Nintendo comes out with Nintendo Direct videos and other Nintendo videos, which you can watch either on the 3DS or on their YouTube channel. I was also able to sign up for a NicoNico (ニコニコ動画) account through my 3DS and start watching videos in Japanese on it. Also, when you view games on the Nintendo eShop, many of the games have tv commercials or other videos that introduce the game that you can watch.

There is also a lot of free applications and games you can download and use on the 3DS. Although they have many in-app purchases available, there’s still a lot you can do for free.

JLR: Verbling

Verbling is another website you can use to practice your speaking and chatting (instant messaging) skills in Japanese, or whatever language you’re studying. I don’t remember the first time I heard about Verbling, but I recently rediscovered it when I decided that my language skills in both Japanese and Spanish wouldn’t improve very much if I didn’t practice speaking in addition to all the other type of studying I do. Speaking is a valuable skill that I have been avoiding practicing because it’s really nerve-wracking to think about. But that’s just something you have to get over as a language learner.

What I like:

• Chat box (send text messages/instant messages through the chat feature)
• Video feature, if you want to see who you are talking to.
• Audio only feature, if you don’t want to share your face and background or if you don’t have a webcam.
• English lessons (this is only good for people learning English, but I like this feature too.)
• Conversation starters are suggested to you in the language you are learning (with English translation) to help promote actually talking in both languages in the exchange and avoid awkward pauses in the conversation so that you make the most of your time.
• Congratulatory stars under the video screen to encourage your partner as they speak in your native language (good grammar etc.), which will flash across the screen in real-time.
• Add friend feature after you’ve talked with someone over Verbling if you want to continue speaking with them as a language partner.

What I dislike:

• I wish they had lessons in other languages besides English.

Conclusion:

I’m still learning how to use this website, so I can’t say much about it seeing how I’ve just started using it. But, some things I noticed during my first few attempts were: your connection on Verbling depends on each person’s individual Internet connection so you may experience problems and it may take you some time to find a partner (I had to wait a few minutes before someone else was on the site). I didn’t speak with any Japanese speakers, so I don’t know how many are actually on the website. But, it is listed as a language on the website.

Resource:

http://www.verbling.com

JLR: The Japanese Page

I haven’t written about a website JLR in a while, so here’s another one: The Japanese Page. I haven’t used this website, but I discovered it in the past and wanted to write about a JLR website instead of an app for a change.

What I like:

• It’s free.
• Beginner lessons
• Intermediate and some Advance lessons
• Free ebooks
• Free downloads
• Kanji practice (stroke order, multiple kanji lists such as JLPT N4 [I think the website goes by the old JLPT levels])
• Listening practice and audio for ebooks
• Seems like there are ways to connect with native speakers for language exchanges (you teach English and they teach you Japanese according to the Japanese advertisement on the right side of their website)
• Teaches kana (hiragana and katakana)

What I don’t like:

• I don’t actually use this website so I can’t really say I dislike anything, but I would like for them to update their JLPT level lists in accordance with the new levels (N5-N1)

Conclusion:

This seems like a good, free resource. If you have used this website, please comment below and tell me about your experience with it.

JLR: Japanese for All Occasions

Yesterday, I rediscovered a book I bought a while ago to improve my Japanese called Japanese for All Occasions: Mastering Speech Styles from Casual to Honorific by Taeko Kamiya. It’s published by Kodansha International, which makes a bunch of Japanese culture and learning books. I haven’t really used the book, but I skimmed through it and decided I’ll make it a part of my study plan for the next three months.

What I like about this book:

• No romaji! This book is not for beginners. You need to at least know kana and some Elementary Japanese (vocabulary and grammar) to really benefit from this book. So, it’s for Intermediate learners.
• Conversations/Dialogues. This is the majority of the book (19 dialogue lessons, 57 dialogues) with pictures, explanations of new phrases, English translations and grammar notes.
• Charts. Although some programs give you organized charts for reference, most of the ones that I’ve seen are not as nice as the ones in this book. There are vocabulary charts, conjugation charts (for verbs, adjectives) that are more complete than any other charts I’ve seen in other books. The verb conjugation charts include all (I think) of the conjugations covered in both Genki I & II textbooks.
• Audio CD. This covers all of the dialogues in the book and the example sentences in the first section of the book, none of  the charts though.
• There’s Furigana! If you don’t know what furigana is, I’ll explain. It’s small kana characters that appear above kanji to help you know how to read the kanji they accompany. Most of the kanji have furigana, but it doesn’t hurt to know some kanji before picking up this book.

What I dislike:

• While I was skimming the first section of the book, I did not see any mention of using じゃあ instead of で（は）. Actually, this contraction is explained later on in one of the notes in the dialogue section, but I think it should have been put in the beginning of the book with the conjugation charts. 
• I did find a small English translation mistake in the front of the book, where the word “after” was typed instead of “every” . But from what I’ve seen so far that was just a typo and most of the book’s English is correct.
• Sometimes the print seems a bit small (furigana, charts and in the appendices).

Conclusion:

This seems like a great book and if you want to work on your 警護（けいご）formal language and other speech styles and levels, this is a good book to purchase.

Resources:

http://www.kodansha-intl.com

JLR: iStart Japanese

If you are new to learning Japanese, then iStart Japanese may be for you. It is an iPod/iPhone application that teaches basic Japanese.

What I like:

• 51 lessons
• Culture lessons/information
• Learn 250 Japanese words
• Learn hiragana and katakana
• Flashcards
• Quizzes
• App dictionary English>Japanese/Japanese>English
• You can get it on sale for half off throughout the year.

What I dislike:

• Slow pace
• Only teaches Beginner/Elementary Japanese
• Kind of dry, but pretty thorough (but not as thorough as Genki I textbook)

Conclusion:

It’s a good application for beginners.

Resources:

App Store

http://www.miraijapanese.com

JLR: Thumbelina and other stories

I recently posted about アカン日本語, which was made by DICO Co. Ltd. Their company also makes story book iPod/iPhone applications such as  Thumbelina.

What I like:

• There’s audio in multiple languages, including Japanese.
• There’s text in multiple languages, including Japanese.
• Record and become your own narrator feature.
• You can create multiple narrators.
• Music.
• Touching pictures activates special effects (such as noises and movement).
• Pop-up book screen for skipping ahead or going back in the story.
• Some of their apps are free.

What I dislike:

• Nothing.

Conclusion:

I like the concept of this application and hope that its producers come out with more applications such as this one. I definitely recommend it.

Resources:

http://www.dico4u.com/en/

App Store