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@hey – It’s interesting, this process of going from knowing nothing to expertise, eh?
Regarding looking up kanji, I also recommend using Tangorin. It’s a good dictionary, and it has a really handy search-by-radical tool (the “Multi-Radical Search” button on the top right of the page). When I encounter a new kanji in books, in texts from my friends, or what have you, I immediately pop this open. It’s especially great because you can put in radicals from multiple kanji and it’ll look for a matching word. And it’s pretty flexible: maybe you put in the wrong radical, one that looks really similar to the “true” one, but it still finds the right kanji. Unfortunately, it doesn’t work well on phones, but it’s definitely a good tool.
It also goes well with TF, since we’re already learning kanji by radicals, so being able to extract them from a kanji is pretty easy. Plus, it doesn’t have the added overhead of learning stroke order.
Edit: I should note that Tangorin’s “radicals” are like TF’s. That is, although each kanji has a single, official “radical” which you would use to look up a kanji in a paper dictionary, Tangorin searches for kanji based on all of the radicals in the kanji. So if you wanted to look up 音楽, you could search with, say, 日, 立, and 白. It’ll be the first result, even though the official radicals for these kanji are, respectively, 音 and 木.
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This reply was modified 11 years, 2 months ago by
Ben Reilly.
Ah, I am not he, sorry. I see from your introduction post that you are a software developer. Do you work for Microsoft?
@hey — I’m a PhD student in computer science. So by skill set, yes I am (could be) a software developer, but not by profession. I guess it depends on why you’re asking.
Thanks, @Mena! It actually originated from some thoughts about heaven (context: I’m a Christian) and how although I believe that I will eventually experience an eternity of joy and perfection, my existence only (cf. infinity) began 24 years ago, and a necessary, unavoidable lead-up to that eternity is a finite period spent in an imperfect world and body. What’s more, I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be: being mortal at first is part of God’s design for us. So even though things will one day be infinitely better, it is both good and right for me to spend the first 24+ years of my existence here on Earth.
With some reflection, I realized that this was also true for my Japanese studies: although I may experience more time (assuming a long, healthy life) as a fluent speaker of Japanese than not, there is a necessary amount of work that precedes it. And for each intermediate stage, a necessary amount of work before it, too. So since these steps are all necessary, to be at any stage is the right thing to do to get to the next one. Therefore, being terrible at Japanese is a good thing because it necessarily precedes being fluent.
I think we may generalize this view for anything that we anticipate (becoming fluent in Japanese, going to heaven, getting married, the release of the PS3 game The Last of Us, etc.). It’s easier to be patient for such things when we can be content with everything that comes before it. It’s also a healthy perspective because it helps us to not be disappointed if, due to circumstances beyond our control, that thing never comes to pass (well, except maybe with heaven, which would be more than a little disappointing).
I have thoughts a-plenty on this topic, but I think that’s enough philosophy for now. Though I hope this gives everyone a great motivation of heart!
Allow me to add my encouragement (“for great motivation of heart”), too!
Here’s how I like to think about learning Japanese (and anything else, really): if you want to become an expert at it, then first you need to become really good at Japanese. But before that, you need to become good. Before that, you need to become okay. Before that, not bad. Before that, pretty bad. Before that, downright awful. And before that, you need to know nothing at all about Japanese.
Basically, if you want to become an expert, you have to hit every stage of skill between knowing nothing and knowing tons of stuff. You can’t go to bed knowing 10 words, and wake up knowing 1000. You have to sit down and learn each and every word, each and every kanji, each and every grammar construct.
So if you’re “downright awful” at Japanese right now, then good! You’re exactly where you need to be: it’s the first step after knowing nothing. So congratulate yourself for knowing very little Japanese! Because that’s more than nothing!
Yesterday you knew nothing, but today you know hiragana. And tomorrow you will know more. You’re right on track.
This is it for realsies, sans the personal touch. http://goo.gl/maps/Qf3HC
Also, doing this actual search helped me to find the name of the place. It’s called Brand New Way.
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This reply was modified 11 years, 3 months ago by
Ha! Whoops. I realized that before I posted, in fact, then forgot to change the link. Bah.
The image it shows is correct, but it also happens to be directions from an apartment I’m looking at an IBM, yes. Apparently I can’t edit my post, though.
Well that’s silly. Sorry! :S
It would appear that I never responded to you folks for your help. First of all, thanks for your responses: I read and digested them, but never responded. Sorry!
I’ve decided that I prefer to use anime for my fun Japanese learning resource, and would rather use reading as a more intentional, rigorous activity. In time, as my reading, grammar, and vocab improve, I’ll be able to read things more for pleasure, but for now I’ll use the methods mentioned on Tofugu (thanks Joel). Ideally I’d like to have an English translation on hand to help with meaning, but if nothing else I figure it’d be good for learning vocab.
Maggie, I would be happy to tell you! It’s on Isabella St, off of Yonge, and is open M-F, 9-17. It’s tucked into the second floor + attic of 14 Isabella Street: in this Google Street View image, it’s in the same building as Pace Pharmacy, but is the door on the right, with the green sign on it. You just head upstairs, there’s an anteroom where you put your shoes, and then the next door opens into what must be some sort of cultural centre or something. I’m going to be honest, I have no idea what this place is all about, but it has something to do with Japan. To your left and ahead is a stairway that leads up to the (cozy, sunlit) attic, which is where all the manga is. You just need to sign your name and the time into the guestbook to the right of the stairs.
Maybe the person at the computer speaks English and will be able to help you? If not, don’t be afraid to be bold and just go for it. Upstairs there’s quite a selection of manga, and you’re welcome to drink the tea, coffee, and juice in the fridge. There are couches, and a Wii you can use too, but I think you need to ask the staff before using it.
I know, I know, this sounds kind of srange. Honestly, I would have felt totally weird going in there by myself, but thankfully I had my Japanese friend to make sense of things for me. It’s brightly lit and has a welcome atmosphere, so you’ll get over the discomfort soon, I’m sure.
I haven’t been back since my first time, since it’s only open during the day on weekdays: although I’m a grad student and can set my own hours, I work best during daytime hours, so it’s not ideal. But I’d like to spend more time there, so maybe I’ll go there on my days off.
Good luck! Perhaps I’ll see you there!
I’m still halfway through S06, but I have not found that I need to write kanji to learn them: when I learn kanji with Anki I usually get to know 60-75% of them pretty well within 2 days, and about 90% of them within a week. The really similar kanji I’ll mess up with some frequency, but I have a specific cram deck so I can practice them (夫・失・矢：ugggghhhh), and not all similar kanji give me trouble. As such, I’m certain that it depends on the person, which all comes back to Koichi’s warning that all/some of TF may not be suitable for each person. But knowing these things helps you to adapt your studies to your particular needs.
I do agree, though, that one of the great features of TF is learning how to learn.
Re: previous discussions, I don’t find that I need to know why something works, nor have I traditionally needed to know it through my schooling (for context, I’m in grad school). However, I’m certain that this depends on the person, so
In other news, I finished Season 5 at the end of October was too busy and distracted (finishing my Master’s thesis; hooray, etc.) to either post here or continue on to Season 6. But now I am doing both!
Season 5 was definitely the thickest of the seasons so far. I feel, though, that I’m getting better at learning new vocabulary and kanji: I often find that about 60-70% of new kanji and vocab I learn and remember very quickly (within a few days) and soon forget their mnemonics since I no longer need them.
However, I still feel that I need more practice with the grammar. I figure I’ll try to sit down and practice conjugating verbs so that it comes a bit more naturally. Then I also find it interesting to try to mix the various grammar concepts to see how they combine to create more complex sentences: ideally, then, I’d go to Lang-8 to get them corrected. Does anyone else have other methods worth trying?
shiromangetsu: The best thing is to study with Anki every day. Myself, I was pretty quick about finishing the first four seasons, but have been really busy and only manage 1-2 lessons per week these days. However, I never forget to do my Anki reviews—they only take 20-40 minutes anyway. No matter how busy you are, you can afford to take half an hour each day to work on something that’s important to you.
Welp, just wrapped up Season 3. Took me about a week.
It was really nice to start learning real, “meaty” things like verbs. I hear that vocab picks up quite a bit in S04, and I’m fine with that.
Finished Season 2 today and will now be starting 3. Glad to be warned that it’ll get more intense—I’m really enjoying what I’ve been doing thus far.
For those of you who’ve finished, do you have any tips or want to share your experience with The Dip and how you kept going? Thanks!
Koichi says:
Yeah, that sort of thing is on my ever growing list of things to clear up for next version. It’s neat because folks like you tell me about things that confuse them, and then I get to fix them, though there’s a lot sometimes :(
So be patient! Or I suppose we’re no longer affected by this particular problem since we’ve already learned the exception. :)
Very well: I shall do that now. Thanks, friends.
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This reply was modified 11 years, 2 months ago by
