Practice

“How did it get so late so soon? It’s night before it’s afternoon. December is here before it’s June. My goodness how the time has flewn. How did it get so late so soon?” – Dr. Seuss

Let’s practice month related things. First, make sure you can do the following. Try not to peek.

  • Name off all of the months (January – December).
  • How do you say “3 months”?
  • How do you say “for three months”?
  • How do you say “for many months” (think back to the “Time Concepts” lesson).
  • How do you say “this month,” “next month,” and “last month”?
  • How do you say “this year,” “last year,” and “next year”?

If you can do all that, you’re ready to do some practice.

Exercise 1

We’ll start with some sentences. Try to translate these on your own. Either way, study them and understand how they work and try to come up with some of your own variations:

a ５ヶ月前に宇宙から来た。

Five months ago I came from outer space

a この３ヶ月間私は何もしてませんでした。

For these three months I did nothing.

a ３月に日本に帰る。

In March, I will return to Japan.

a 「５月」は「May」です。

“５月” is “May.”

Not too bad, right? Now I want you to come up with some of your own sentences in Japanese, using the following prompts.

Exercise 2

Let’s see what you can come up with:

  • What have you been doing for at least a month (or more)? Anything?
  • What will you do this month?
  • What will you do next month?
  • What did you do last month?
  • Have any plans for １２月?
  • When does school start in your area, normally (or work, or whatever)?
  • Have anything going on in July? Some other month?

Answer all these questions in Japanese to the best of your ability. If you’re not sure, put them into Lang-8 for corrections or use some of the sentences you came up with in Exercise 3.

Exercise 3

Let’s get to using these concepts! As always, I want you to write something and put it into Lang-8. Try to use at least a couple month-related things in your entry. Some ideas:

  • Something you’re doing this month.
  • Something you’re doing next month.
  • Things you do in particular months (for example, in １２月 do you go visit family for the holidays?).
  • Something you’ve done for a while and how many months you’ve done it for.

See how you did. Hopefully you learned something from “Years” and applied it here as well. If not, try to wait until your corrections come in before moving onto the next chapter. You’ll then be able to apply your knowledge over there!

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