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 Language Learning Forum : Immersion, Schools & Certificates |  | |
| cameroncrc Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 6523 days ago 195 posts - 185 votes  2 sounds Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: Ukrainian | Message 9 of 12 15 September 2009 at 3:39pm | IP Logged |
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When I say "taking" those classes I mean I am attending them. (I really have no idea what is going on in the classes, and spend most of my time studying) Before coming here I studied almost exclusively with Assimil. I had a college student tutor me for a couple of weeks and that is the closest I came to taking "formal classes". Before coming here I could conjugate a select group of verbs, most adjectives, write hiragana, katakana, and some kanji, and had knowledge of basic expressions and very simple sentence patterns.
I haven't been here more than four weeks, so it is still very early in my exchange. My issues come mostly from a lacking vocabulary. However, each day I am comfronted with fluent, native-speed Japanese. Although great practice for somebody who has taken a year or two of Japanese in school, as a beginner I have trouble grasping any of it. My question is, what are some good ways to break down this constant flow of Japanese into manageable bits that I can study from and improve my communication skills? 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| lancemanion Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 5578 days ago 150 posts - 166 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, Thai Studies: French, Mandarin, Japanese | Message 10 of 12 16 September 2009 at 1:49am | IP Logged |
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Now I get it. Hopefully some other members will chime in too. I'm going to throw some ideas your way, and maybe
one or two of them will be to your liking. Also, I just want to say that I admire and envy you for what you are doing, and I'm sure things will get a lot better. Remember that almost everyone in a total immersion situation, myself included, goes through a bad-feeling period at least once. This is culture shock. I'm not saying that's what you have here. but I hope the fact that almost everyone goes through it and recovers from it will give you some positive thoughts if it happens. 1) Because you are being overwhelmed with passive stuff all the time now, I think trying more active things are what you need most. I recommend Pimsleur, learn in your car, or any program that forces you to respond out loud in a set period of time. 2) Conversation with a language partner who is conscious of your level and needs. 3) Work your way through a good textbook, hopefully absorbing the grammar and vocab along the way. Japanese for Everyone and Genki are very good for self study. 4) Take down words you hear during the day, during your studies, during your conversations, etc and memorize them. An SRS is a good tool for this sort of thing. 5) Take a basic Japanese course. Many Japanese cities have free courses offered for people in your situation, as well as free language partner boards. 6) Probably too early, but reading is very helpful. Seeing the words in writing even once is sometimes all you need to ensure that you will eventually remember it through passive bombardment. And listening-reading as they say on this forum is mighty good for both skills. 7) Podcasts might help you, since they are easier to understand than native stuff. I know you need to understand native stuff, but one step at a time. 8) Post this question on one or more Japanese forums, and collect more ideas. Only take a manageable amount of ideas, ones that you really like. Even doing just one thing may be the catalyst you need to activate all that passive stuff. Good Luck! 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| beaniebabe Diglot Newbie United States Joined 5566 days ago 3 posts - 3 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French | Message 11 of 12 18 September 2009 at 2:24am | IP Logged |
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Hi there Cameroncrc! I was an exchange student too a few years ago at age 15 so I know what you are going
through! Although you are learning a different language than I was (Spanish), it was still much the same for me: sitting in class not understanding much of what was going on around me. I noticed it took 3 months for me to be able to really understand things and give simple answers. That seems to be the general thing, to give it 3 months and then from there things will get easier I promise! I actually remembered there being one day and one incident about 3 months in where things just really clicked and I could understand and respond better. The only way I could see it not get better is if you don't practice and just stay around people who speak English all the time. Doesn't seem like this is a problem since you say you are around Japanese all the time! I don't really know much of a method to speed this up for you since I didn't find one myself. I would say what helped a lot though was listening to music in Spanish. I would play it and repeat it all the time, mimicking the accent used and got a pretty good one from what people have told me. Plus the benefit is that music tends to be slower so you could begin to understand things put together in music more easily and can look up words you don't understand. I used to watch tv with subtitles in Spanish while abroad since most of the shows were in English. This really did help me a lot too. Sometimes I would just do that instead of watching some soap opera that was in Spanish since they would speak way too fast for me at first. So basically it is going to take a while, but I am sure soon you will notice progress. Just keep it up and don't be afraid to use a dictionary when you need to. If you have any other questions I can try and help! Good luck and and enjoy your time as an exchange student! 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Sprachjunge Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 7171 days ago 368 posts - 548 votes Speaks: English*, GermanC2 Studies: Spanish, Russian | Message 12 of 12 28 October 2009 at 5:43am | IP Logged |
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Hello, Cameroncrc! I did a language exchange for a year in Germany, and I just wanted to specifically echo beaniebabe above. Sit tight and give yourself another two months. (Well, now it may just be a month. :) I didn't know any German going in, and although I learned on my own, in class I would sit there, not really understanding anything. Just trust us when we say that one fine day, things will "click" and a lot of things will seemingly come together at once. The trick, of course, is trusting that it will happen, and still remaining diligent enough with the learning to not get discouraged (and also to ensure that the click happens). I also really got into silly German shows where it was clear what was going on from the context. If I could go back, one thing that I would have been more diligent about at the beginning would have been always listening to German, even during "down time," such as sleeping or walking to school. Your ear needs to "train itself" on Japanese. The good thing is that it is a function of the hours of Japanese that you hear, not the number of days you are there. In other words, the sooner you get the critical hours of input under your belt, the sooner that breakthrough will come. Finally, don't stress! :) It's the adventure of a lifetime, even the frustrating parts.
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