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Kuji’s Krazy Log I

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kujichagulia
Senior Member
Japan
Joined 4644 days ago

1031 posts - 1571 votes 
Speaks: English*
Studies: Japanese, Portuguese

 
 Message 17 of 76
18 July 2012 at 2:36pm | IP Logged 
vermillon wrote:

If I may say something, it seems to me that you have more time than you think: you live in Japan, there's absolutely no way you only have 2h30 of time to spend on Japanese:when you go to the gym you can surely listen to Japanese during that time. I've listened to Chinese music, German audiobooks etc, and it really helps. I would suggest that this also applies when to your cooking time... perhaps not eating, as you may want to share that with your wife.

Oh, yes, definitely I have more time than that. That time I mentioned was my do-nothing-but-study time. But I always have the TV on during meals at home. I listen to audio at the gym, although it's only JapanesePod101 and some Esperanto podcasts. I need to get some better material for my iPod. The CDs that came with my textbook are extremely dry. If you know of a place where I could get some Japanese audiobooks at an intermediate level (preferably free, but I would consider paying), please let me know.

As for music... I tried, but I'm not a Japanese music fan (and neither is my wife!). Well... specifically I should say that I'm not a J-POP fan. I do have one Japanese hip-hop CD by Teriyaki Boyz (a good one, with production by some famous American producers), but that is beyond my level right now. If anyone has any suggestions for some good, under-the-radar Japanese music, let me know.
1 person has voted this message useful



patrickwilken
Senior Member
Germany
radiant-flux.net
Joined 4330 days ago

1546 posts - 3200 votes 
Studies: German

 
 Message 18 of 76
18 July 2012 at 2:43pm | IP Logged 
kujichagulia wrote:


I love that blog post! I'm especially interested in that viewpoint of concentrating on input, not output. I started Self-Talk and a lot of diary writing only this week, precisely because I thought I needed more output. But with my vocabulary being as low as it is, I probably do need to concentrate more on input. That's probably why Self-Talk is so frustrating in the first place.

Besides, that's one thing my wife would gladly want me to do with her every night: watch all her favorite dramas with her.


Glad the post was helpful. I am still not fluent so my ideas are more theoretical (but I have made much more progress concentrating on input in the past two months than in the previous seven years). The Polish guys at Antimoon, who taught themselves fluent English, have some interesting things to say about concentrating on input too:

http://antimoon.com/how/input.htm

I guess, if you are like me, and you have started on and off to try to learn a language, what it helpful is to get a routine going. I do Anki first thing in the morning to get it out of the way (perhaps if you are awake you could do that on your commute?). Then I just concentrate on reading/watching stuff. I watch a lot of TV shows/movies with my wife. At first it was pretty limited, but I was amazed how fast I started understanding what was going on; something I hadn't been able to do for seven years previously.

Why don't you try one of the super-challenges? Or half-challenges? It's not to late to join.

Edited by patrickwilken on 18 July 2012 at 2:44pm

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patrickwilken
Senior Member
Germany
radiant-flux.net
Joined 4330 days ago

1546 posts - 3200 votes 
Studies: German

 
 Message 19 of 76
18 July 2012 at 2:52pm | IP Logged 
kujichagulia wrote:

As for music... I tried, but I'm not a Japanese music fan (and neither is my wife!). Well... specifically I should say that I'm not a J-POP fan. I do have one Japanese hip-hop CD by Teriyaki Boyz (a good one, with production by some famous American producers), but that is beyond my level right now. If anyone has any suggestions for some good, under-the-radar Japanese music, let me know.


I listen to L2 music a lot, but I think music is the hardest to understand if your vocabulary is low, because there is so little context. I have some vague hope that the music is activating the L2 part of my cortex and somehow helping learning, but that's only a hope. :)

I find shows in which there is some expressed action visually much easier to follow (so Breaking Bad is good; Mad Men not so easy). What is really helping is the combination of vocabulary building with Anki in the morning, in combination with active listening via TV or reading graphic novels in the afternoon. It's always surprising how many words you learn suddenly start popping up in shows.

Edited by patrickwilken on 18 July 2012 at 2:55pm

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emk
Diglot
Moderator
United States
Joined 5329 days ago

2615 posts - 8806 votes 
Speaks: English*, FrenchB2
Studies: Spanish, Ancient Egyptian
Personal Language Map

 
 Message 20 of 76
18 July 2012 at 6:42pm | IP Logged 
kujichagulia wrote:
My wife is a wonderful and caring person. But some people are
built to deal with listening to my Japanese, and some aren't. My wife is in that
latter category... at least until my Japanese is respectful. It's not that she doesn't
care. She is my number one cheerleader, always encouraging me to keep at it.


That's really cool! I want to be careful about giving you advice, because French and
Japanese pose very different sets of issues, and every couple is different. So I'll
just offer you some experiences as data points.

I actually tried to learn French from my wife years ago, and we managed about 30
minutes before we were both halfway nuts. Her teaching style and my learning style were
completely incompatible, and there was no way it was ever going to work. But once I
could speak some actual French (badly, like a 3-year-old), we could speak it together.
And once I started speaking, it took me about 3 weeks of evenings and weekends to get
through the worst of it.

As for input, some people will make enormous progress from input and study. But I also
know someone with roughly C1 comprehension and 20+ years of exposure who claims she
can't put a sentence together. Some folks need to deliberately activate their output at
some point, even if they've heard a language every day since birth.

I don't say this to discourage you from an input-only approach, which works great for
some people. I just think that Antimoon and AJATT, for all their awesomeness, are
insufficient for certain students.
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atama warui
Triglot
Senior Member
Japan
Joined 4498 days ago

594 posts - 985 votes 
Speaks: German*, English, Japanese

 
 Message 21 of 76
18 July 2012 at 9:33pm | IP Logged 
kujichaguliaさん、こんにちは。
このフォーラムはよく文字化けが出ますが、 ちょっとあいさつしようと思ってました。
最初、いいな。。家族と一緒に魅了的な国に 住むのは楽しいですね。日本語のできない外 国人がたくさんいます。英語ができたら、日 本語を学ぶ必要はないんですが、そのまま豊 かな文化が殆ど気づけて楽しめませんね。そ の気持、良くわかりますよ。それに。。無理 矢理に日本語を勉強するって大変だと思いま す。さあ。。どうすればいいですね。日本に 引っ越す理由、覚えられますか。その時、日 本語が好きでしたか。それなら、日本語の良 いところはどこでしたか。きちんと考えると 、何とかもう一度勉強したくなるでしょう。
とりあえず、お互いに頑張りましょう :)

P.S.: Bet this forum's gonna rape the entry again. It hates Japanese even more than you.
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ZombieKing
Bilingual Diglot
Senior Member
Canada
Joined 4324 days ago

247 posts - 324 votes 
Speaks: English*, Mandarin*

 
 Message 22 of 76
19 July 2012 at 12:58am | IP Logged 
Okay, A2/B1 isn't bad at all. It's good that you have a solid foundation in Japanese. Perhaps L & R really is the way to go?

Seems like you've already gotten tons of good advice! :D I agree with what the article patrickwilken wrote. Input is what really needs to be focused on in the earlier levels.

The way I see it is, I'd rather be able to understand everyone around me, and be able to reply with short answers instead of not understanding more than a few words people say to me (and be totally lost), but be able to pull out tons of stock phrases I've memorised from language courses.

Of course, the former is an extreme case, and I doubt that'll happen to many people here :P but you get the point. I hope xD
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kujichagulia
Senior Member
Japan
Joined 4644 days ago

1031 posts - 1571 votes 
Speaks: English*
Studies: Japanese, Portuguese

 
 Message 23 of 76
19 July 2012 at 4:53am | IP Logged 
patrickwilken wrote:

I guess, if you are like me, and you have started on and off to try to learn a language, what it helpful is to get a routine going. I do Anki first thing in the morning to get it out of the way (perhaps if you are awake you could do that on your commute?). Then I just concentrate on reading/watching stuff. I watch a lot of TV shows/movies with my wife. At first it was pretty limited, but I was amazed how fast I started understanding what was going on; something I hadn't been able to do for seven years previously.

I do SRS at lunchtime and during other different times while at work. The SRS is the most routine routine I have right now.

patrickwilken wrote:

Why don't you try one of the super-challenges? Or half-challenges? It's not to late to join.

I didn't even realize there were half-challenges! Are those the 6WC? That may be something to consider if I can meet the criteria.
1 person has voted this message useful



kujichagulia
Senior Member
Japan
Joined 4644 days ago

1031 posts - 1571 votes 
Speaks: English*
Studies: Japanese, Portuguese

 
 Message 24 of 76
19 July 2012 at 4:55am | IP Logged 
emk wrote:
As for input, some people will make enormous progress from input and study. But I also
know someone with roughly C1 comprehension and 20+ years of exposure who claims she
can't put a sentence together. Some folks need to deliberately activate their output at
some point, even if they've heard a language every day since birth.

I don't say this to discourage you from an input-only approach, which works great for
some people. I just think that Antimoon and AJATT, for all their awesomeness, are
insufficient for certain students.

I do think I need some output. Plus I do enjoy writing, even if it's just a few lines. But I think I need to step up my input to get more vocabulary.


1 person has voted this message useful



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