It’d be really fun to do a よつばと group! The more the merrier, we could always coordinate it in the discord group.
よつばと has been next on my list because I definitely think Haikyuu is a bit too tough for me still. I’m really enjoying it so far (Sadly I’ve only been able to attend one reading session due to the time) but I’ve been trying to keep up with the chapters. Maybe it’s because I’ve never seen the anime so I don’t know the characters, plot or context but sometimes in the tougher longer sentences I get really lost and just give up and move on xD But the fact that it’s done as a group has been the main factor to why I’ve gotten as much out of it as I have and made it much more motivational.
Okay! I am PUMPED! Ah yes! The discord group!! I have to go find that post from a while back. I’ve never had a discord account before, but I’ll go ahead and make one. I’m such a grandpa lol. @quimda knows. It took me a half hour to realize I needed a browser extension for user scripts when I first joined this group…
If you don’t mind @MinTako , I’ll go ahead and get this going. I’ll start with throwing out some dates that might work for us for our first read through.
Would it be okay to add a “よつばと！Book Club” channel to the server so we don’t clutter up other channels @neversleep?
@GrumpyPanda Sounds great! Also, February THRU April? Dang, why Uni gotta do you like that?!!?
I have watched the anime a lot and still have this sometimes! As long as it’s not every other sentence I think it’s okay but agreed that よつばと looks much easier! I gave up on learning all the new vocab for Haikyuu because there was so much of it but よつばと might also be better for that too as hopefully should be less unknowns.
I have my first class at the local Japanese school (well, actually online for now) this evening - slightly nervous! Got an email from the teacher with a lesson plan and a few questions last night. It looks like there will only be 3 of us in the class and the teacher is a Japanese native speaker. There must have been previous class sessions as it looks like we’re starting about half way through the textbook. Which is good because it’s not going right back to これはペンです basics but does mean I’m the newbie joining the class haha!
I had heard that よつばと！was relatively simple compared to other manga but I was delighted to find out when I was flipping through that there is furigana for all of the kanji, which will make reading and looking up stuff so much less stressful as I tackle my first manga! And the main character seems really funny, so I am excited to read this together.
And only 3 other people!? That’s awesome! That sounds like the class will be interactive!
Would be great if you’d like to organize it @trombonekun91 ! I don’t mind doing it but I don’t think I’d be good at it so it’s all yours, go ham xD
Also don’t worry, I’m not very good at Discord either. I couldn’t find out how to hang up during the last reading session I attended haha.
@sycamore My hope is also that よつばと will be easier on the vocabulary so it isn’t as overwhelming. Then I can also focus more on learning all those casual ways of speaking they use in mangas with half cut off sentences and words and whatnot.
Also good luck with class! The great thing about 3 people is it’ll be much easier to get speaking practice in and more focus on the individual students. I think the school I go to has a cut off of like 8 students or so, and if you are less they wont even form the class
Thanks! I’m actually just realising that while the teacher only emailed 3 of us maybe there’s only 3 new students and there’s actually more in the class in total I guess I will see.
Also happy to lend a hand in any way!
Oh also, thanks for your tips on HelloTalk @trombonekun91 - I just made my first post today and got some good corrections!
Thank you! I have a feeling we will all be chipping in to make this a success!
My pleasure! I really like HelloTalk. I think it’s a way to actually use what you are learning in a real world application. And it’s a great alternative to spend time on HelloTalk instead of looking at all of the crappy news in my Google feed lol.
I think the textbook to JLPT match doesn’t ever work very well.
I never took N5 or N4 but I failed the N3 the first time (by one point… so essentially a 50%) after finishing the first 5 chapters of Tobira. Several years later when I came back to studying Japanese, I passed N3 (with pretty high marks, 97th percentile), after finishing the first 8 chapters of Tobira. I’m using the rest of Tobira now as my main text to study for the N2 this December. I think if you study and internalize all of the grammar in Genki II, you’d pass N4. But it matters how much of the material you retain, know how to actually use or identify, and can easily recall. I think my own studies have proved to me how much more valuable it is to TRULY know a few things well, by heart, than it is to have studied a textbook on a cursory or surface-level and be like “I did it.” My aim is for total mastery of all of Tobira this year, even if I don’t wind up passing N2 on my first attempt, I’ll have a super strong “gateway to advanced Japanese” foundation to work from studying next year for N2/N1.
Haha yeah I totally agree. I guess the 4 years or something I fumbled around in Genki were at least good for something! xD I haven’t taken the official exam though, only mock ones. I don’t plan to try for any until the N3 level since its super expensive in my country (I don’t know if its like that in general for all countries? But the price isn’t far off what I paid for my lifetime Wanikani account tbh xD)
Right now I’m going through Tobira at the speed of 1 chapter every month ~ month and a half doing all the exercises etc and will also start practicing the grammar points together with my italki teacher from our next lesson Hopefully between this and all the side resources I like to consume, I can pass N3 after just this text book. Guess only time will tell xD
I’ve seen people on reddit and such brag about finishing it in a month or two, my plan is going to have me spend a year and a half on it lol. I feel like if I went faster I wouldn’t retain things as well, especially cause it’d mean cutting exercises, cutting other resources I like to use, or just cutting out more of my social life xD
But good luck on the N2!! That’s amazing! Did you use other resources alongside Tobira when prepping for N3?
If I’m talking Textbook vs JLPT I’m not talking about passing, but having touched upon everything that’s frequently part of the test. And I feel like that’s a pretty easy comparison
I agree that understanding some very well is much better than understanding a lot barely, but from my experience that doesn’t come from studying a textbook really intensely.
For me it’s often been better to just move on to the next thing. You learn something new that makes things fall into place or exposure does it for you.
My favorite example is は vs が. I read so many explanations, but non of them ever clicked for me. Eventually I just moved on to the next thing and after seeing は and が used hundreds of times I have a better understanding of them than from any article.
This is a pretty common theme for me. Some grammar concepts I struggled with a month ago now seem so fundamental that I barely pay attention to them.
So, while a deep comprehension is also my goal, sometimes just studying on a surface level and moving on might be the best thing you can do.
I downloaded the app and find it really useful when I just want to quickly check the pronunciation of something. Sharing in case anyone doesn’t already know it
Scheduled 2 italkis classes for this weekend. Super nervous, I was mentally introducing myself to the sensei and realized that im not sure i even know how to say “ive been studying japanese for 3 months / since november”. But i guess that’s why i need to start talking with natives. Luckly there are quite a few that speak portuguese + japanese natively… And the classes are cheaper than “real life” tutors. Wish me luck!
that’s awesome, all that hard work is starting to pay off! i feel like right now i couldn’t have a conversation at all, so i’m impressed!
i hope it goes well, you’ll have to tell us about it
I will definitely update you guys. For now im thinking about doing only the “conversation” type of classes. But ill see how it goes and what the teachers themselves think its better. I selected 4 teachers to try out (italki gives you 3 free lessons) and I will see which one i can talk more freely w/o feeling like a retarded. The prices vary too much though. The one i liked the most (from the video introduction) is kinda expensive (26U$ For 1h!).
I really like learning grammar by myself (videos + Bunpro + JPZ), I don’t think I really need a teacher for that, and I like to keep my own pace. But Ive come to realize that I almost never make my own sentences, and thats supposed to help a lot with retaining grammar concepts. Im constantly reviewing grammar concepts because I forgot them all the time (even though ive used Bunpro for 76 straight days by now).
Btw, i dropped nativshark (30U$ a month is too much, even though i really liked the grammar learning in it)
yeah, learning with a teacher that makes you nervous probably wouldn’t be the best lol and so expensive! so that’s good to hear that you can have a “free trial” of sorts
it’s pretty pathetic, but right now for grammar i’ve just been doing kae tim’s guide, and reading some other articles, like the ones on tofugu.com, and trying to make my own sentences from the grammar that i learned. having a teacher would be helpful in correcting my mistakes and such. i really want to get a textbook, i haven’t gotten to it yet- i think i’ll end up getting genki. but i’m still unsure >_>
i’ve also just been trying to read things and listening to music, podcasts, youtube videos, etc. for listening and picking out words and some of the grammar concepts that i know.
side note, but-
why do language resources always have to be so expensive? i mean i understand the logic, making profit and all that, but for real. $30 a month? that’s crazy. more than netflix lol
Yea i know right… For me, WaniKani is the most optimized tool for learning i have ever seen. Ok, it may not teach you grammar, but pretty much everything else is covered, and yet they charge only 9U$ a month. While Nativshark tries to be this “complete package” and it does have some pretty good resources, but at the same time it fails in so many ways… And yet it charges you 30U$ a month.
In my country thats 150+ currency, which is like 6x netflix accounts.
i looked at their website, and they really sell it good it sounds too good to be true imo
maybe their style of teaching works for some, but i still think using many different resources that specialize in a certain area of the language is better. i’m no expert, it just seems like it would be (at least for me) because then you have more space to go in-depth
so “the full package” thing sounds nice, but also in a way, less comprehensive. because of the way that they say they teach everything and that they make it easy makes it seem like they wouldn’t touch on some things, and maybe simplify things to make it fit their program
Fantastic! Don’t worry too much about your introduction. My teacher didn’t expect anything from me at our first lesson, so I wouldn’t sweat it too much. And as we say in the theatre, break legs. 頑張ってください！
really excited to hear how it goes!
@quimda I’m using Genki right now, and I like it. The Genki website also has all of the exercises from the textbook and workbook, and you can use the Japanese keyboard available on your PC/MAC to type! Been pretty invaluable! Shoot me a message in the discord when you get the chance.
I guess I will see.
Hopefully between this and all the side resources I like to consume, I can pass N3 after just this text book. Guess only time will tell xD
and so expensive! so that’s good to hear that you can have a “free trial” of sorts
i mean i understand the logic, making profit and all that, but for real. $30 a month? that’s crazy. more than netflix lol
it sounds too good to be true imo