a.k.a. the Yasuke! Japanese H.A.C.C.Keyboard
OK. Today I am releasing something really cool.
Interesting Japanese websites featuring miscellaneous .
This month’s surfing is related to Japanese testing. Happily the JLPT is now at least partially contested by the J-Cat
Let’s take a look
“Japanese language mode” – is the name I have for the “setting” my brain has to go into before I can really communicate and remember in Japanese. How to get there is the subject of this post, so if you want to know, read on.
Grammar dictionaries, name dictionaries, youtube and more
It happens to all of us at some point… discouragement.
What to do about it?
I’ve posted on this subject many times, but I think I will never address it enough:
everyone (native speaker to non-native speaker, and everyone in between) makes mistakes in Japanese.
Let’s talk about why non-native speakers should not be afraid to teach Japanese; And why you should still use both types of tutors (native and non-native) even if your non-native teacher makes mistakes.
Hi There! This is “Surfing with Yasuke!” – A monthly or semi-weekly posting of interesting links from wandering around the Japanese language related web
And my thoughts on the things found. Here we go…
This book is not guaranteed to make you pretty
It’s not your genie
But it WILL change the way you do Kanji. period.
But how?
While arguably the best way to learn kanji is in context (something that our Yasuke! Versus Japanese series does well), I know some of you are prepping for the KanKen test. Others might want to see where your kanji knowledge matches up to where Japanese learn kanji in school.
Let’s see how this newly released update is for you…
One important thing about listening in Japanese is responding to, or repeating back, a portion of what the person said.
In Japanese there is even a word for this “相づち” （あいづち）.
Let’s learn more…
“Kanji Anonymous”
A proposed decentralized club for learning Japanese that anyone can set up anywhere.
Mission: to fill the world with Japanese schools.
Learning a language is an interesting thing. Many feel that you don’t “learn” a language but rather “get used to” it. And I would agree in sentiment with that. (But for simplicity, let’s say learning Japanese).
Learning often has more to do with the student – the student’s discipline, curiosity, tenacity, and other aspects of personality – than with the environment. (I have met ex-pats in Tokyo who have lived there for 20+ years and can barely get past konnichiwa; whereas there are disciplined language learners who have reached a level of fluid speech before ever setting foot in Japan.)
So location isn’t as big a factor as one might think.
With that in mind I want to tell you about an interesting option for learning Japanese, outside of Japan.
So, between tadoku.org, simplified news websites, and watanoc.com I do article reading lessons often with students. And sometimes interesting things come up.
This is very likely the most important post I have written about learning Japanese.
In a 1996 address, Steve Jobs quoted the statement “Good artists copy; Great artists steal” (which he misattributed to Picasso – but that is besides the point).
What Steve Jobs likely meant – and what we will be talking about – is a fundamental habit of people who master a craft….
Seven slightly-crazy tips to progress to near-native fluency:
| これは、“生徒は尋ねる”という記事シリーズです。(The Student’s Ask series) |
As part of your self-enforced immersion routine you will want to type, web surf, etc. in Japanese. For that you will need Japanese typing input. And this post will teach you how to get it and how to use it.
In this incomplete but initial starter post, JapanTree is proud to present – the fruit of six years of effort – the world’s first kanji system to adapt the Heisig Method for use in the classroom.
THIS IS BIG.
Categories
Pausing and Phrasing
Text of the article
ストレスの対処法
あなたが大切にしている事柄についてまず考えてみましょう。その中には健康，人への接し方，人生の目標や優先順位の高いものなどがあります。この記事では，ストレスにうまく対処し，ストレスを和らげるのに役立つアドバイスを紹介しています。
END OF ARTICLE (more practice below)
(after the shorter phrasing, practice the longer phrase breaks; in green below)
To learn the kanji (& practice writing them)
ストレスの対処法
すとれす の たいしょほう あなた が たいせつ に している ことがら について まず かんがえてみましょう。
1021*against 1288*dispose of/ or manage 1258*law あなたが 398*big 167*cut / important にしている 1665*action/ incident 1346*pattern についてまず 660*consider えてみましょう。
その なかに は けんこう ， にん へ の せっしかた， じんせい の もくひょう や ゆうせん じゅんい の たかい もの など が あります。
その 487*middle には 1683*healthy 1670*health ， 61*person への 306*directly contact し 84*direction / person ， 61*person 470*life / birth の 76*eye 575*sign/ mark や 832*kindhearted/excel 826*earlier/ the tip 869*sequence 154*rank の 1642*tall いものなどがあります。
この きじ で は， すとれす に うまく たいしょし， すとれす を やわらげる の に やくだつ あどばいす を しょうかいしています。
この 727*diary 1665*action/ incident では，ス 121*fortune telling レスにうま YKS5c*katakana ku 1021*against 1288*dispose of/ or manage し，ス 121*fortune telling レスを 371*peace/ Japan らげるのに 1295*role 149*stand up つアドバイスを 206*acquaint 957*introduce しています。
Lots of reasons.
Here are some reasons that I mentioned to a student I started tutoring back in 2015.
The goal of this post is to help Japanese teachers, japanese tutors, classroom students, and self-learners BURN their English language retreat bridges and march on to victory in Japanese.
https://hinative.com/ja/questions/
Don’t want to bother your Japanese friends with grammar questions? Try HiNative
I use lots of different methods to keep up my Japanese.
As I have mentioned elsewhere, I force myself to use Japanese through tutoring, membership in Japanese associations, and other ways.
I also have a few good Japanese friends (but they can be too busy for regular practice).
I also use HiNative to get a native check on my writing in Japanese.
And I read or listen to news (the news I like anyway) daily in Japanese.
Besides these things I have many Japanese-related projects going and these also force me to do something with the language. This website is one of them.
The other Japanese project I am working on as of late in self-learning Japanese Sign Language.
One of the best ways to improve your Japanese is to do web searches in Japanese and skim through the results. It is a habit that can help you immerse yourself more fully into Japanese and at the same time [hopefully] not hate doing so 🙂
But how do we do it? Let’s see!
When my wife makes a phone call she is almost always mistaken for a native Chinese speaker (she often has to tell them that she is a foreign to explain why she doesn’t know the technical term for something).
When she talks to Chinese people in person for the first time they are almost always blown away by how flawless her pronunciation is (sometimes her pronunciation of Mandarin is better than theirs because they have a regional accent).
And I am always jealous of her…
How did her pronunciation get so good?! More importantly, how can we do the same for our Japanese fluidity? Let’s find out.
Erin.ne.jp is super useful and free. It doesn’t get much better than that for a japanese teacher (japanese tutor) looking for online resources. Which is why I already wrote about it being a great Japanese teaching resource (especially for immersion lessons). This Yasuke Tip will show you how to get all of the juice out of it.
As a way of increasing the depth of our Japanese knowledge Yasuke Tips has suggested using Yahoo ChieBukuro.
The following is an example search.