Japanese study materials review.

[Pencilslave]

Having half heartedly tried to learn Japanese these past few years, I've accumulated quite a few books,and tapes on the subject. I think I've finally come to the point of wanting to buckle down and really seriously study and would like to get your opinions on the materials I have.

Dictionaries
Random House Japanese-English / English-Japanese dictionary.
(Includes Romanization and Japanese Characters)

Langenscheidt Pocket Japanese Dictionary English/Japanese and Japanese-English.

Grammar

Japanese:The Spoken Language by Eleanor Jorden and Mari Noda

Master the Basics: Japanese by Nobuo and Carol Akiyama

Living Language-Conversational Japanese


Audio lessons

Pimsleur Introductory Japanese(Trial course, has first eight lessons of their Japanese One course.)

Barron's Japanese on The Go.
(Has two cassetes and a booklet with dialogue script and word list.)

Reading and writing characters

Essential Kanji by P.G O' Neill.

Kanji and Kana by Hadamitsky and Spahn

A Guide To Reading and Writing Japanese
(Charles Tuttle company)

Also any suggestions on other materials to get would be greatly appreciated.

[Charles]

To be quite blunt, your selection is mostly crap, especially Jorden, which was written in the 1960s and is hopelessly obsolete by modern pedagogical standards. I am assuming you will have to start from the beginning.

What you have that's OK:

Kanji & Kana
Langenschiedt dict (ok, barely. You'll need a better dicts eventually.)

What you need:

Basic Kanji Book, Vol. 1 by Chieko Kano (and onwards with that series)

A textbook. I recommend "Nakama." Expensive, but it's two full years worth of college level courses, comes with CDs or cassettes (get the CDs, rip em to mp3s).

A Dictionary of Basic Japanese Grammar, by Makino & Tsutsui

All About Particles, by Naoko Chino

A Dictionary of Basic Japanese Sentence Patterns, by Naoko Chino

There are plenty more books that are useful, but that kit is what I'd consider the minimum essential beginner's library.

[cenic]

My "Must-haves" that I've accumulated over the years:


Kodansha's Furigana Japanese Dictionary Very robust dictionary that provides example usage and grammatical context for the majority of the words. I've found it very useful.


A Dictionary of Intermediate Japanese Grammar Provides an in-depth and organized listing of grammar, with usage and examples.


A Guide to Reading and Writing Japanese its really just a kanji dictionary, but its been a great study aid as well as providing an easy index for me to lookup kanji.


Japanese Vocabulary Cards Perhaps more for the beginner. I know when I first starting learning these came in very handle. Particularly because I am a lazy bastard and these provide a fundamental base of vocabulary without me having to research and create my own vocab cards.

[Charles]

My "Must-haves" that I've accumulated over the years:

A Dictionary of Intermediate Japanese Grammar Provides an in-depth and organized listing of grammar, with usage and examples.

That's going to be way over the head of beginners. This book wasn't published until I was in 4th year, and I thought it was just about right for that level. One excellent feature of this book is that the index covers both the Basic and Intermediate volumes. But start with the Basic book if you're a beginner or intermediate level. Note: the Intermediate volume really should be labeled Advanced, but Makino told me he's working on a third volume, A Dictionary of Advanced Japanese Grammar.

Japanese Vocabulary Cards Perhaps more for the beginner. I know when I first starting learning these came in very handle. Particularly because I am a lazy bastard and these provide a fundamental base of vocabulary without me having to research and create my own vocab cards.

I have this set of cards, but I hesitate to use it. I can't bring myself to shuffle the whole deck of about 2000 cards and get them out of order, and it's not much practice to go through the deck from front to back when everything is in alphabetical order. What I really want to do is get a business card scanner and put them all into the computer, and drill them in randomized order.

[Pencilslave]

Thanks for the reviews and suggestions , Charles and Cenic. Do any of you longtimers(Taro, Ultra, Steve ) have any additional suggested study material you could recommend?

[Andocrates]

Books are to learning Japanese as threadmills are to losing weight.

Books on Japanese are a hindrance to learning Japanese. Japanese isn't an intellectual pursuit, it's a life skill.

It's like opening a cook book, memorizing all the recipes, writing them out by hand 10 times then entering a cooking contest. No where is the failure of Japanese education more evident then in Japanese text-books.

It's like reading all about how to play guitar, memorizing the chords and all the famous guitar players then trying out for Aerosmith. Just as bad as Japanese text-books are the Otaku Japanese learners who can't say anything in Japanese but who insist you use proper stroke order and try to confuse you with words like like "gerund." Give me a break. My 2 year old had no idea what a gerund was and she can talk fine now.

People have it ass backwards. You can't learn Japanese from a book. Speak Japanese, mimic Japanese, hear some Japanese then use your book to figure out why.

[jingai]

Just as bad as Japanese text-books are the Otaku Japanese learners who can't say anything in Japanese but who insist you use proper stroke order

And is your Japanese writing legible? Or do you forget certain strokes and magically invent characters. Maybe you'd like a tattoo artist who does the same?

http://www.hanzismatter.com/

[jingai]

I'd recommend getting an electronic dictionary by 2nd year, as it's a much more natural way to look up characters and figure out connections between words than a normal dictionary. I use a wordtank.

Also, make your own flash cards- buy a metal ring and holepunch some index cards, and write down new words on the front, definitions/readings on the back, and if you're adventurous, look up other words using the same characters and put them smaller in the corners.

[Charles]

People have it ass backwards. You can't learn Japanese from a book. Speak Japanese, mimic Japanese, hear some Japanese then use your book to figure out why.

Ah, but you are not looking at it from the angle of a typical US student. You've got the one thing they don't, immersion in a 100% Japanese environment. You've got the lucky break that they don't, you're IN Japan. You could hardly fail at learning Japanese in that environment. For those that aren't IN Japan, access to native speakers is usually difficult, classes lead by native speakers are expensive, so you've got to use books to maximize whatever learning you can get access to.

No, books won't teach you Japanese, but I always tell students, they are the key that unlocks the door. But you still have to walk through the door on your own.

[cenic]

Books are to learning Japanese as threadmills are to losing weight.

Books on Japanese are a hindrance to learning Japanese. Japanese isn't an intellectual pursuit, it's a life skill.

It's like opening a cook book, memorizing all the recipes, writing them out by hand 10 times then entering a cooking contest. No where is the failure of Japanese education more evident then in Japanese text-books.

It's like reading all about how to play guitar, memorizing the chords and all the famous guitar players then trying out for Aerosmith. Just as bad as Japanese text-books are the Otaku Japanese learners who can't say anything in Japanese but who insist you use proper stroke order and try to confuse you with words like like "gerund." Give me a break. My 2 year old had no idea what a gerund was and she can talk fine now.

People have it ass backwards. You can't learn Japanese from a book. Speak Japanese, mimic Japanese, hear some Japanese then use your book to figure out why.

I come from a technical background, and there is one mantra I've held over the years, "We have bookshelves for a reason." Technical books are merely reference material. Sure I own a lot of books on programming, abstract data types, algorithms, and programming languages. I've never read a single one of those books cover to cover, but if I need to remember how to do a red / black binary search tree I'll get one of my books. Just like I've never read a Japanese Dictionary, or english dictionary for that matter, Japanese Grammar Dictionary, or Flash Cards cover to cover. They are merely references to aid in my learning or for me to go to when I have a question.

[Red Floyd]

I plan on going to Japan to study abroad for a while in college (Maybe Tokyo, though I hear Osaka is more liveable). To prepare, I want to teach myself as much Japanese as I can. The problem is that there are so many programs, books, CD-Roms,, and such, I don't know which to get. Any reccomendations would be greatly appreciated.

[Ketou]

Definately, as Charles mentioned, the Basic Kanji Book series.

Basic Kanji Book Vol 1
ISBN4-89358-091-4

Basic Kanji Book Vol 2
ISBN4-89358-119-8

[GuyJean]

For someone with NO Japanese skills:

http://koukeisha.net/nihongo-bin/misc.htm

This might have been posted already but didn't come up in a search..

GJ

[Adhesive]

[ichigo partygirl]

Hey Charles you said that Michio was planning on releasing an Advanced Grammar Dictionary - Have you or anyone else heard if/when that will be released??
I actually find the intermediate volume a more beginner/intermediate than leaning towards advanced.

Also just a question - although my Japanese is getting there im still making stupid mistakes with particles(mostly just ni and de) so if anyone could tell me a good book for just particles that would be great

[Charles]

Hey Charles you said that Michio was planning on releasing an Advanced Grammar Dictionary - Have you or anyone else heard if/when that will be released??
I actually find the intermediate volume a more beginner/intermediate than leaning towards advanced.

Also just a question - although my Japanese is getting there im still making stupid mistakes with particles(mostly just ni and de) so if anyone could tell me a good book for just particles that would be great

I have no idea when the Advanced volume would ship. I met Makino when he gave a grammar lecture at the school I attended in Hokkaido in 1996, I told him the 2 books were invaluable and asked if he was planning any more. He said an advanced volume was in the works, and I haven't heard anything since. I can only guess that this isn't a high priority project, or else it was more difficult to collect new advanced material than he expected.

If you want a really good book on particles, there was a book in the Kodansha Power Japanese series called "All About Particles" but I think it has recently been republished under a different title.

[Greji]

If you want a really good book on particles, there was a book in the Kodansha Power Japanese series called "All About Particles" but I think it has recently been republished under a different title.

If you're are referencing Chino's book, it is probably most easily available at Amazon athttp://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0870119540/104-3246216-9543112?v=glance&n=283155, or at The Japan Shop at http://www.thejapanshop.net/books/allaboutparticles.htm

[Charles]

If you're are referencing Chino's book, it is probably most easily available at Amazon at http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0870119540/104-3246216-9543112?v=glance&n=283155, or at The Japan Shop at http://www.thejapanshop.net/books/allaboutparticles.htm

That appears to be the one, it's under a new cover and no longer part of the old "Power Japanese" series. I relied heavily on "All About Particles" during my introductory years of study, but it is hard to judge the impact of this book alone, as my teachers were relentless in particle drilling. AAP is mostly examples of particle usage with short explanations, if you learn well by simple, straightforward examples, this is the book for you. I consider this book one of the 2 top recommendations to beginning students, second only to Makino's "A Dictionary of Basic Japanese Grammar."

I noted her new volume linked to that page, "How to Tell the Difference Between Japanese Particles." From the brief description, this looks more like an intermediate book with further explanations on particle usage, might be better for brushup at non-beginner levels. But you can't go wrong with All About Particles, if you ask me.

I have a few other book recommendations along this line I could make, but alas my Japanese books are all boxed up and in storage at the moment, so I'm unable to look up the titles.

[ichigo partygirl]

Thanks for your help gboothe and Charles. Im not a beginner by anymeans but there is just one little mistake i always make, so i thought it wouldnt hurt to have a book to reafffirm the basics to me

[turkhunter]

[Charles]

Instead of "A Dictionary of Intermediate Japanese Grammar" I would start with "A Dictionary of Basic Japanese Grammar." The intermediate dict is volume 2 of the series. Makino told me there is a volume 3 coming, advanced grammar, but that was about 10 years ago and nothing new has been released since then. The intermediate book is great, but you could be fairly fluent if you only mastered the contents of the basic book and didn't know anything from the intermediate book. Similarly, if you haven't mastered everything in the Basic book, you have lots of work to do before you can even try Intermediate levels. If you really want the Intermediate book, buy the Basic book too, as the index for Intermediate covers both volumes, they are really intended to work together.

I would also seriously recommend against the Jorden book. It is excessively focused on speaking, and is considered obsolete by modern standards (AFAIK it hasn't been revised since 1968 ). Jorden would be worthless outside a classroom led by a native speaker since it is solely focused on speaking and pronunciation. It relies heavily on romaji, and even worse, uses the infuriating kunreishiki system instead of the more widely accepted Hepburn romaji system.

The modern pedagogical method is "4 skills," you must equally develop all four skills of speaking, listening, reading. Try one of the more recently released textbooks like "Nakama" that are based on 4 skills.

[omae mona]

The modern pedagogical method is "4 skills," you must equally develop all four skills of speaking, listening, reading

... and counting!

[milQuetoast]

Hi all,

I'm still very new on these boards, but at the risk of stepping on any toes, here are my own thoughts-

I started learning Japanese back in the day with the Learn Japanese textbook series, which is pretty darn boring but true to its name, we learned enough Japanese that by the end of our first semester our class was giving presentations in the language.

For vocabulary-based dictionaries, I'd avoid romaji altogether and go for a good kana-only E->J / J->E pairing that uses lots of examples. (I used to use Kenkyusha's College and College Lighthouse books.) Over time you'll want to graduate to a good kokugo jiten (my current fave is daijisen), but even then the E->J / J->E books are good to keep around for when you know what something means but you can't seem to get the right wording.

(And of course there are always online resources like Yahoo! Japan jisho.)

For kanji dictionaries, a lot of people like Halpern's Kanji Learner's Dictionary, but frankly I'm a grouchy old man and it annoys me, as does the SKIP system that it employs. I personally went The Kanji Dictionary route before moving on to using kanjigen as my primary lookup tool. That being said, you might want to take a look at JWPCE, a nifty freeware kanji-lookup program for the PC.

IMO, you should also have something around that you can read for fun; I'd recommend getting some back issues of the now-defunct Mangajin.

To address some of the other comments-

What I really want to do is get a business card scanner and put them all into the computer, and drill them in randomized order.

Charles, have you seen this site? (Joyo kanji set is still incomplete, but the different drill options are kinda nice.)

People have it ass backwards. You can't learn Japanese from a book. Speak Japanese, mimic Japanese, hear some Japanese then use your book to figure out why.

I would respectfully disagree. Having lived in the country and being married to a non-English-speaking Japanese spouse for five years has done many things for my language skills, but I can guarantee you that in all that time, none of our conversation has veered to topics such as, say, exothermic reaction or heat transfer coefficients. In areas such these I was on my own, and I had to crack lord knows how many books to get the knowledge I needed (and I still have to crack those books, as I'm a far sight from where I want to be with this language).

Anyway, I guess that's all. Hope this helped in some fashion or other.

[Charles]

The modern pedagogical method is "4 skills," you must equally develop all four skills of speaking, listening, reading

... and counting!

Amongst the THREE skills of the Spanish Inquisition are speaking, listening, reading, writing and.. uh..

Charles, have you seen this site? (Joyo kanji set is still incomplete, but the different drill options are kinda nice.)

It's a nice drill program, but that wasn't quite what I was talking about. I was describing a set of vocabulary cards. Quite a different matter. I usually switch back and forth between a little straight kanji study, and vocabulary study to emphasize learning kanji in context.

[milQuetoast]

I was describing a set of vocabulary cards. Quite a different matter.

Whoops, sorry about that. In that case, have you seen this site? (See bottom of page for tab to select between different levels.)

Amongst the THREE skills of the Spanish Inquisition are speaking, listening, reading, writing and.. uh..

Ruthless fanaticism to the pope, I think. Yes, that was definitely the fourth and last of the FIVE skills needed for ... uh-oh.

[Charles]

In that case, have you seen this site? (See bottom of page for tab to select between different levels.)

Pretty nice, I think that bookmark is a keeper. But overall, I don't think these sorts of "naked vocabulary" drills are very effective. It's hard to just memorize lists of words. I'm more used to classroom studies where you had lists of vocabulary taken from readings, so you learned the vocabulary in context. There are many books out there with reading material and "glosses" for study alongside the reading. One of my favorites was "keizai de manabu nihongo" which had rather intensive economics essays with glossaries of important terms at the bottom of each page. Each section of the essay introduced related economics terms. That's the perfect way to do it.

[jingai]

What Charles describes is exactly what I do. I make flashcards that are big enough to put a word and example sentence from where I found it (manga, movie, newspaper, etc) on the front and the meaning on the back. That way I learn how to use it and as I read the same text or watch the same movie a few times, it gets reinforced naturally.

[Charles]

What Charles describes is exactly what I do. I make flashcards that are big enough to put a word and example sentence from where I found it (manga, movie, newspaper, etc) on the front and the meaning on the back. That way I learn how to use it and as I read the same text or watch the same movie a few times, it gets reinforced naturally.

Well don't forget the 4 Skills philosophy, if you practice recognition you must also practice production. If you practice reading, also practice writing. It is really helpful when practicing vocabulary to not just practice flashcards for recognition, you should also practice writing simple example sentences, speak the words aloud, etc. A good flashcard method is to do them in reverse, look at the meaning in English and then try to write the kanji down on paper before checking your answer.
One useful flashcard tip: the big problem with flashcards is that you have to practice 3 things, kanji, reading, and meaning, and nobody's making 3 sided flashcards. So what I do is get those little ring-bound booklets of thin strip flashcards (like .75 in by 3 in) and write the English meaning on one side, then on the other I write the kanji in the middle but the reading small and on the end. That way, I can cover the reading with my thumb when flipping through flashcards, and just see the kanji, and move my thumb to check the reading. Does that make sense?
Or you could just practice with 3 column vocabulary sheets, using the Check Sheet method.

[milQuetoast]

I don't think these sorts of "naked vocabulary" drills are very effective. It's hard to just memorize lists of words.

I never advocated these sites as the be-all, end-all of language resources -- I only referenced them as I thought they might be useful additions to a language-learning curriculum.

That being said, if one can't pass the occasional "naked" drill these sites offer then IMO it's time to start analyzing why one even began studying this language in the first place. The JLPT and its ilk -- to say nothing of simple everyday life in Japan -- couldn't care less how you learn Japanese; it's whether or not you can speak and comprehend the language that matters.

[Charles]

Well, welcome to the human race.

Do whatever kind of study it takes to learn Japanese on your own. I never advocated these sites as the be-all, end-all of language resources -- I only referenced them as I thought they might be useful additions to a language-learning curriculum. That being said, if you can't pass the occasional "naked" drill these sites offer then it's time to start asking yourself what you're even studying this language for.

Don't get cranky, I'm just musing on the relative merits of various study methods. And believe me I've seen a gazillion of them, as my school used a lot of experimental methods. And remember, I said I LIKED that site. But like everything, it has its limits and better to recognize them and be able to use it for what it's worth. And I use just about everything, especially if it's a convenient interactive gadget.
I played around with the vocab drill site a little more, and it seems to tell me more about what I don't know, than it helps me learn anything. And I was astonished at some of the simple 1st year stuff I had forgotten from lack of practice, but that stuff all comes back quickly with a little drill, so that's good. And then I found stuff it never even occurred to me to learn, words like "vinegar" and "pepper." I think part of my problem with this sort of drill is that it's based on JLPT crib sheets, which are just accumulated lists of vocabulary that has been known to appear on past JLPT exams. That always seemed to me to be a rather weird way to study for the exam, the material varies from year to year and while most of the simpler stuff appears regularly, lots of it does not. Just mastering the list isn't going to necessarily help you ace the exam, let alone help you master the language.
IMHO a more systematic approach is useful, it gives your studies a little structure so you feel like you're accomplishing something when you get mastery over a subject, even if it is a small subject. One of my favorite vocabulary books was titled something like "Useful Vocabulary Divided by Subjects" (it was some huge 12 character jukugo so I forget the exact title). It had lists of vocabulary words and example sentences divided by subjects (duh). For example, under the heading Science it had little subjects like ecology, energy, etc. I thought it was really practical to study this sort of vocabulary list with at least this minimal sort of structure, they could mutually reinforce the words by using them in related sentences, building up a general knowledge of how to speak about that subject.
Vocabulary is one of those weird things, obviously how we express ourselves is limited to what vocabulary we know, although there are strategies for working around holes in our vocab, when we stumble upon something we don't know how to say. There's a really good essay in the Dictionary of Intermediate Japanese Grammar about this, it's called "Conversational Strategies." It suggests a few useful methods like ways to grope for words you don't know at all like "what's that word for the thing that does X when you YZ?" and also methods to easily draw out further explanations when someone says words you don't know. And that is when you REALLY start to stand up on your own two feet, linguistically, you don't need a dictionary or to study so much because you can get what you need directly from the person you're speaking to. We do this a lot in our own native languages, we encounter new words all the time but new language acquisition in English is second nature to us, so it's sometimes hard to figure out appropriate conversational strategies in Japanese.