« Goals: who needs 'em anyway? | Main | Isseki, nichou »

February 22, 2006

Japanese Status Check

Since I'm starting Japanese lessons again, it's as good a time as any to take stock.

Grammar/vocab: I've been continuing work in "Japanese for Everyone". As noted elsewhere I like the book, and it moves along quickly. Unfortunately due to my new job I have far less study time than I used to. I've been working on vocabulary by copying new words onto index cards, then studying them while walking places in the office, waiting in line at the store, etc. Lunchtime is good for working on the exercises in the book or on kanji. Unfortunately while working on my own I don't have much motivation to push forward (or as my wife says, "competition"), so I've only completed lesson 7. I think that going back to class will be a big help.

Since my birthday is coming up, I've asked for a bunch of those good little Kodansha grammar books. Since Amazon's prices are so good, I even have hope of getting some of them.

Kanji: I'm sticking with Heisig and plan to hit frame 500 by the weekend. I've learned that it's extremely important to follow The Method as he describes it: since Heisig's method depends on visualization and imagination rather than rote learning, it's important to take the time actually to work each kanji into a picture or a story. Simply trying to remember catchy phrases won't do the trick.

As much as I detest "Kanji Pict-o-Graphix", I looked through it again yesterday at the library and found some pictures which might actually be helpful. I'll have to check it out a little more for some of the kanji which are tougher to picture.

Video: As much as I'd like to keep working on the Yan series or "Nihongo de Kurasou", I don't have time to sit at the computer for 30-45 minutes in the evening. Since I can't install Divx on my laptop, I haven't been watching them there either. But now I've found out that mplayer can decode Divx without installing anything, so I've burned the video series to DVD-ROM and plan to start again.

Otherwise, we've started watching Trick, series 2, and I'm looking forward to the 3 new episodes of Lunch Queen. The other night I watched Ultraman with Simon too--he loves the battle between Ultraman and the bad guys.

Audio: Since I'm spending 2 hours in the car every day, I decided to do Pimsleur again, straight from the top, and am just beginning Level 2. Wow. There were some pieces of grammar in Level 1 which never showed up again and I'd forgotten. With as little speaking practice as I get these days, it's really good to be doing Pimsleur again. And that leads to:

Conversation: Hey, isn't that what it's all about? Unfortunately I know very few Japanese people (and none at work) and my work schedule means that my Skype availability is limited to Japanese daytime when many Japanese are at work or school. I need to work harder on tracking down the few who are available during the daytime.

Website: I've worked up a few items for this site, but since I don't have the IME on my work machine I'll need to spend some time on my home system to put in the Japanese. I'll get that done soon. In addition, it looks like I'll be doing a little writing for Japanese! Japanese!

I was thinking about spinning off a new site aimed at beginners, but there seem to be plenty of sites doing a great job already.

Overall I'm satisfied with this year's progress. Kanji learning is on track so far, and I should be moving steadily through "Japanese for Everyone." Now I just need to come up with some bigger and longer-term goals.

Permalink | Posted by Joe at February 22, 2006 01:21 PM

Comments

Post a comment




Remember Me?