Japanese Learning

[Japanese Learning]

Anonymous asked:

thank you SO MUCH for recommending an anon tofugu for learning japanese. it was amazingly helpful! i finished hiragana, am finishing katakana, and am on my way to kanji! its so helpful, the mnemonics it uses are great, and connects you to other great resources. i recommend it so much to anyone trying to learn, it made me so excited and so motivated to keep going.

Glad you found it helpful!

[Japanese Learning]

Anonymous asked:

Are there any books you'd recomend for total beginners? its ok if they're separate ones for learning the language, grammar and kanji.

Hey! 

I refer online resources more than books, so I have compiled a mix of both. I hope you find it useful (^0^)

Grammar

1. Tae Kim’s Japanese Guide (Website | pdf)
   Tae Kim has an amazing collection of Japanese grammar lessons. It is available as a pdf, as well as articles on his website, for free. So this can be a cool way to get started before you invest in other books. It’s better than textbooks because he focuses on the practical aspects rather than just teaching bookish grammar.
   He also has an android app, which I find easier to use as compared to the website.
2. Minna no Nihongo
   While Tae Kim may introduce you to everyday grammar. I feel having a real textbook can help to cover the loopholes in your learning and ensure that you do not miss something important. Minna no nihongo has two editions - I and II, and sub-editions for both. At a beginner level, I’d suggest starting with ‘Minna no Nihongo I Translation and Grammatical Notes’. They also have pure exercise books to help test grammar concepts. I’ll write a detailed explanation of Minna no nihongo and the type of books it has in another post as it can get quite comprehensive.

Hiragana and Katakana
For Hiragana and Katakana, I’ll suggest the following resources. I didn’t really use any books for them, because I found these to be enough. Usually, both hiragana and katakana just require investment in terms of time, so as long as you’re regular with these, you’d be cool.

1. Tofugu
   For memorizing, tofugu has starter guides on hiragana and katakana that cover pronunciations and mnemonics to help remember the letters. They have videos as well as text based tutorials.
   Hiragana - https://www.tofugu.com/japanese/learn-hiragana/
   Katakana - https://www.tofugu.com/japanese/learn-katakana/
2. Practice Sheets
   You can also find practice sheets for Hiragana and Katakana which might help you remember the stroke order and make you more comfortable with the script, if you wanna focus on writing too.
3. Flashcards
   Virtual Flashcards are a good way to learn and revise. Just think of these as applications that randomly throw up questions that you’ve stored in them. So for hiragana, say, they’ll display the symbol and you’ll have to guess its pronunciation. One such software is Anki. You’ll find already made Anki decks (sets of questions) for hiragana and katakana. So all you have to do is install Anki (there are both phone and pc versions), then download decks you want and start revising.

Kanji
The only book I’ve ever used for Kanji is ‘Remembering The Kanji by James Heisig’. Like the Tofugu page, it helps to associate the kanji letters and their meanings through short stories and mnemonics. A detailed explanation of how I go about learning Kanji is here. But I’ll suggest being thorough with Hiragana before starting Kanji (just for practical purposes, as kanji is often combined with hiragana to form words). You can learn katakana and Kanji side by side.

[Japanese Learning]

aringoaday.tumblr.com

Just came across this fun blog about Japanese vocab..! The drawings are too cute to forget ^-^

[Japanese Learning]

Anonymous asked:

Just wanted to tell you that you wrote Chi instead of San in your numbers post ! I used to do that a lot too, what I do is think of the symbol >, I draw it in the air with my finger while saying "sa" as I do the first stroke, and "chi" as I do the second one, so I know which one is さ and which one is ち. I'm bad at explaining sorry haha but I hope it helps

Shit. Thanks a lot for pointing that out. I have an internal story to distinguish between the two too but I totally thought that I had gotten it down. So I wasn’t paying attention when I was writing anymore. God this makes me feel like such a noob… which I am, so thanks all the more XD
I’ll practice some more to make up for this. Thanks :)

[Japanese Learning]

[Japanese Learning]

Anonymous asked:

hello! i'm learning Japanese by myself and i would like to buy a notebook to practice writing. what kind of paper is typical in japan? grid paper, lines or should i get genkō yōshi? and do you write from right to left or from top to bottom?

easy-japan answered:

Hi there! Hmm… 

Unless the best method to memorise things for you is by writing, practicing writing kanji isn’t quite recommended, since mostly you will only type/read the kanji and JLPT proficiency test also doesn’t require you to write anything
°˖✧◝(⁰▿⁰)◜✧˖°

If this is the first time you want to acquire Japanese, it’s recommended to check on the pages here and here! 

Now to answer your questions~ 

TYPICAL JAPANESE PAPER

Actually, typical Japanese note book is kinda the same as in English one. (Except if you’re into calligraphy). Although there are indeed various type for specific use such as writing manuscript (the genkou yoshi). 

But for everyday practice, even a blank standard HVS page will do the work!
If you’re using ruled paper, make sure the line is thin so it won’t interfere much with your writing. 

ヾ(@°▽°@)ノ

TYPE OF JAPANESE WRITING

There are 2 types of Japanese writing, the vertical type (yokogaki) and horizontal (tategaki). The horizontal type is written like normal everyday English!

While the vertical type is written like Chinese. Started from top right to bottom and move on to the left. 

When using everyday notebook ruled paper with horizontal writing, you use it normally, and when you write the vertical type, you simply rotate the page so the line on page become vertical

°˖✧◝(⁰▿⁰)◜✧˖°

Hope it helps! 
Happy learning!
(๑•̀ㅂ•́)و✧

[Japanese Learning]

Reading notes
Hakkiri Sasetai
はっきりさせたい

Found a wonderful explanation here

[Japanese Learning]

[nihongo-o-narau]

そうじ: noun/suru-verb - cleaning/sweeping

あなた の へや を そうじ しましたか.
Did you clean your room?

[Japanese Learning]

Counting Money in Japanese

Japanese Currency:  円 [えん] (It is pronounced ‘en’ and not ‘yen’)

So 7300 yen is ななせんさんひゃく えん (nana sen san hyaku en); same as saying seven thousand three hundred yen.

Examples:

Now Japanese currency is counted in 10 thousands. So,
100,000 is 10,0000, that is じゆう まん (ten ten thousands)
200,000 is 20,0000, that is にじゅう まん (twenty ten thousands)
243,000 is 24,3000, that is にじゅう よん まん さんぜん (twenty four ten thousands and three thousand)
4,400,000 is 440,0000, that is よんひゃく よんじゅう まん (four hundred forty ten thousands)
and so on…

[Japanese Learning]