Learning Japanese ---- SLOWLY. How about you?

Are you learning Japanese?

Yes	33.8%	[ 22 ]
No	7.7%	[ 5 ]
Trying to...	38.5%	[ 25 ]
Already speak it!	6.2%	[ 4 ]
Speak, read and write it	9.2%	[ 6 ]
Eh, just here for gold	4.6%	[ 3 ]
Total Votes:			[ 65 ]

[MonstersOfMen]

I wanna learn too! It has been my dream since forever haha I took a few classes and have some books, but I'm still not in a high level or anything /don't have much free time at the moment to practice/

I'm going off to japan later this year for a few weeks and I wish I can learn enough to well get me around for that time. I'm sure I won't be able to carry out conversations but, just to ask important things.

[meowology]

I'm in high school, and I am in Japanese 3-4 right now. 4, now that it is second semester.
How much do you know? I know that college level learns at a much faster pace. Do you know some kanji? Can you read this?:

はじめました。メリッサです。私は十五才です。中国人です。暇な時絵を書くとジョギングをしました。猫や犬などは好きですがバナナはきらいです。

I want to learn a lot too. I can read hiragana, katakana, and some kanji. Reading comes a bit naturally now, and sometimes I think in Japanese too. It's funny. 4laugh

[Zale-kun]

J R A T I F I E D

Zale-kun

I've been teaching myself Japanese for the past 6 months or so and I've never taken a formal class and I suppose it helps to be self motivated. I studied with Tae Kim for a while and that helped to learn Hiragana and Katakana, but after a while of learning some harder phrases, I lost motivation.

I then found TextFugu.com and really it's amazing. The first lesson is free and if you get in relatively fast, it's only 99$ for your lifetime. It's definitely worth it. He's much more funny and teaches in a different way, not just taking phrases and having you memorize it. It's very helpful.
I'm on season two now and I can confidently say simple sentences. I'm still learning obviously, but if you need a buddy, I'm online quite a bit. ^^

TextFugu is good! I've heard lots of good things about it. Self motivation is key, and often I don't have it.

I'm currently leaning basic structure and building my vocab. I can say things here and there. I guess out of a small convo I can probably say half of it or less in Japanese! lol It's a start.

That would be great! Can I add you? :3

Sure can! I always need help with motivation as well. It's hard to want to learn Kanji.

[TotallyApples]

CherriChu

I'm in high school, and I am in Japanese 3-4 right now. 4, now that it is second semester.
How much do you know? I know that college level learns at a much faster pace. Do you know some kanji? Can you read this?:

はじめました。メリッサです。私は十五才です。中国人です。暇な時絵を書くとジョギングをしました。猫や犬などは好きですがバナナはきらいです。

I want to learn a lot too. I can read hiragana, katakana, and some kanji. Reading comes a bit naturally now, and sometimes I think in Japanese too. It's funny. 4laugh

That's quite a bit more advanced than I am. I know very little Katakana (because I've always hated it) and even less kanji. I got through the first line with ease, the second I managed to guess mostly and then bam done no nothing. Haha

[TotallyApples]

MonstersOfMen

I wanna learn too! It has been my dream since forever haha I took a few classes and have some books, but I'm still not in a high level or anything /don't have much free time at the moment to practice/

I'm going off to japan later this year for a few weeks and I wish I can learn enough to well get me around for that time. I'm sure I won't be able to carry out conversations but, just to ask important things.

I was going to go to Japan next January, but we changed our honeymoon plans so we can visit my super old grandparents in Florida razz

I hope you have a good time! There are plenty of books/free lessons out there to learn basic phrases if you're just needing them quick like.

My most used questions would be, "Where is the toilet?" and "Where can I get good and cheap food?" hahahahahah

[MikoTanpopo]

I really want to learn too!

Most of the phrases I've picked up from watching animes and such. I can also sing along to Japanese songs.

I would like to be able to start learning to read Japanese though...

[SATSUl]

I've been formally learning Japanese in a classroom setting for 5 semesters / two and a half years.
I spent two of those semesters (one year) in Tokyo and I self-study in my spare time.

My reading level is advanced, I guess. I'm studying for the JLPT N2.
My speaking is kinda bad in comparison, though. u_u

I graduate from college either in the fall or next spring and I'll be moving back to Japan, but until then, I wish I could find someone to practice [exclusively] speaking Japanese, but it's difficult to find someone at my level.

[Omipon]

pardon my hard-on

I've been formally learning Japanese in a classroom setting for 5 semesters / two and a half years.
I spent two of those semesters (one year) in Tokyo and I self-study in my spare time.

My reading level is advanced, I guess. I'm studying for the JLPT N2.
My speaking is kinda bad in comparison, though. u_u

I graduate from college either in the fall or next spring and I'll be moving back to Japan, but until then, I wish I could find someone to practice [exclusively] speaking Japanese, but it's difficult to find someone at my level.

N2? waaah cool!
I've barley just took the N5 last year.
But I do admit my kanji is horrible! But I can speak it pretty good. My tip would be just imitating dramas or w/e sentences or talk to your self when you do stuff . Like when i do things,studying,cleaning,thinking...my family must think i'm crazy hahaha

[SATSUl]

Omipon

pardon my hard-on

I've been formally learning Japanese in a classroom setting for 5 semesters / two and a half years.
I spent two of those semesters (one year) in Tokyo and I self-study in my spare time.

My reading level is advanced, I guess. I'm studying for the JLPT N2.
My speaking is kinda bad in comparison, though. u_u

I graduate from college either in the fall or next spring and I'll be moving back to Japan, but until then, I wish I could find someone to practice [exclusively] speaking Japanese, but it's difficult to find someone at my level.

N2? waaah cool!
I've barley just took the N5 last year.
But I do admit my kanji is horrible! But I can speak it pretty good. My tip would be just imitating dramas or w/e sentences or talk to your self when you do stuff . Like when i do things,studying,cleaning,thinking...my family must think i'm crazy hahaha

It's not my pronunciation or accent or whatever. The words just don't escape my mouth and I can't speak as eloquently as I can write.
I can only really get the right practice when I go back to Japan, which is probably in the winter, and then spring of next year.
I have Japanese friends here, but they almost always switch to English. They're in the US to learn English so I can't really blame them, though.

[Tuah]

I'm studying as well. I know a little basic grammar, but I'm mostly studying kanji right now. I can read and write the meanings (not pronunciation) of ~150 or so. After I finish this first book, I believe the next book is on learning pronunciation.

[Banaanna]

I've been contemplating taking an official course, but those are quite expensive and I don't know how long I'll keep it up..

I'll try TextFugu first, as recommended in this topic!

P.s. Sooo, guess I'm looking for a beginner study buddy?

[Psyxxy]

J R A T I F I E D

I'mma go to Japan

I've been interested in Japan as long as I can remember. I would try to learn phrases here and there while young, but now I'm 20 and long past the point of where I wanted to be language wise. I also now know the importance of being able to read and write Japanese to be able to speak it properly!

My main goal of posting this is to see if there are other Japanese learners out there that are around the same level.

My level?? Oh, well, um... Taking Japanese semester 1 in college excelled me much farther than ever trying on my own! However I'm no longer in school due to work/cost and the few friends I made weren't really that interested in learning. So my skill has completely dropped from 2 1/2 out of 10 (weird) to 1. As in I have the Hiragana down. I am working on basic structure and trying to expand my vocabulary. I'll go back to school next Fall, but Japanese class is not easy to get into. I have basic numbers down, but need to review the higher numbers often.

Basically I want someone to study with.

I have a few books. My main one is Genki Japanese and the workbook.
I also have Elementary Japanese.
A Japanese-English dictionary.
A Hiragana activity book... and I think that's all of them.


Anyhow... Tips and tricks? Study buddy? Anything?

Neener-neener-neener

I have a few of the same books you have, genki being the most useful one to me. My ability in Japanese is a bit higher than you described but I would love to have someone to practice with. I taught in Japan for a few months. It's great. I'm working on a masters in linguistics right now. Add me or send me a message. Let's practice. =)

[year of the monkey101]

I keep trying to get into Japanese but I have no friends around here to study with because they're not interested in learning another language (it's too hard for them it seems). I was learning Katakana (I had already learned Hiragana), and I had a couple phrases down in Japanese. I'd Skype but I don't like talking on my mic to people who I don't know (like I have an irrational fear for some reason so please don't ask to talk on mic). Maybe if I had some really good websites that could give me a guideline to studying it, it would help. Maybe even some games in Japanese.

[pay me in tea]

I'm currently studying for N1, it's awful (´△｀)↓ But hey, if anyone wants to practice Japanese or anything feel free to PM me~~♥

Also, my friends and I run a Japanese learning community called Gaiwa. We have a forum and everything if anyone's interested♥

[Pugnacious Banana]

last time i posted in this thread i was preparing for my JET interview so i thought i'd post again to say it was pretty terrifying but a lot shorter than i expected. sweatdrop maybe that's a bad thing but they made all the appointments 20 minutes apart so i guess it's normal that they only spent 15 minutes with me. i read a lot online about teaching demonstrations but they didn't ask me for anything like that..
i'm guessing it didn't go great since i missed out an answer on the english test and answered "i'm sorry, i don't really know anything about that" to one of the interview questions (they asked me about history and i know 0 about any country's history, even my own).. emo i keep telling myself the rest of the interview was fine but then i think about those. i'm kind of stressing over it since they don't give any results until april.
the japanese interviewer asked me what i was finding difficult about learning japanese, apart from kanji. rofl mostly just remembering kanji is what i'm terrible at though.