How To Teach Yourself Japanese Part 1 of 2

So I've had a lot of people ask me lately how I learn Japanese. This is how I do it. This is by far not the only way to learn Japanese, but it's how I go about it. If you like self study, and don't want to take classes, then this may work for you. I only included what to do until 2001 Kanji Odyssey. After that there are many other things you can do like kanzen master 2kyu, subs2srs dramas, etc. I'll get more into that when I get there myself.
Click here for part 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vAPldKPEjcs


0. Study EVERY day. You will not learn this language casually, it is going to take a LOT of work.
1. Learn kana
2. Learn kanji
3 Start the sentence method.

During all of this increase your immersion as possible without going too crazy. Don't over do it at first either.

Smart.fm (I talked about using this for kana, some use it for vocab instead of Anki also (core2000-6000)
http://smart.fm/

Reviewing the Kanji (features a link to the Remembering the kanji book site that has a pdf of the first couple chapters. This page also has a great forum for language learners!)
http://kanji.koohii.com/

Anki - The spaced repetition software/system (SRS) I use:
http://ichi2.net/anki/

Tae Kim's guide to Japanese grammar:
http://www.guidetojapanese.org/learn/grammar

Understanding Basic Japanese Grammar:
http://www.amazon.co.jp/基礎日本語文法教本-西口-光一/dp/475740168X

A Dictionary of Basic Japanese Grammar:
http://www.amazon.co.jp/Dictionary-Basic-Japanese-Grammar-日本語基本文法辞典/dp/4789004546/ref=pd_sim_b_1

2001 Kanji odyssey:
http://www.coscom.co.jp/ebook/2001kanji/diskdata/index.html

Remembering the Kanji:
http://www.amazon.co.jp/Remembering-Kanji-Complete-Japanese-Characters/dp/082...

Remembering the kana:
http://www.amazon.co.jp/Remembering-Kana-Reading-Japanese-Syllabaries/dp/0824...

Genki(if you like textbooks, I don't):
http://www.amazon.co.jp/GENKI-Integrated-Elementary-Japanese-初級日本語げんきI/dp/4789009637/ref=pd_sim_fb_3

All about particles:
http://www.amazon.co.jp/助詞で変わるあなたの日本語-About-Particles-茅野-直子/dp/4770027818/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1265890543&sr=1-1

Read Real Japanese:
http://www.amazon.co.jp/日本語で読もう-フィクション編-Read-Japanese-Fiction/dp/4770030584/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1265890562&sr=1-1

Firefox addon Rikaichan (allows mouse-over translation of Japanese)
https://addons.mozilla.org/ja/firefox/addon/2471

All Japanese All The Time (A pretty good blog on learning Japanese. He is a great motivator and his site is worth checking out. I like a lot of what he talks about and very much dislike other things. Be your own judge on it! Either way you will walk away with some good stuff from his blog!)
http://www.alljapaneseallthetime.com/blog/about

Category:

Education

Tags:

• Risumiso
• Japan
• tokyo
• learn
• Japanese
• yourself
• teach
• tae
• kim's
• grammar
• kanji
• kana
• anki
• sentence
• method
• smart
• fm
• remembering
• the
• heisig

[kirion111]

have u heard about learning while sleeping..?? in this case listening japanese while sleeping..??

what u think about that ..??

[RisuMiso]

@kirion111 I don't think there is much, if any evidence of people learning anything while sleeping. It takes lots of hard work while awake to learn a language. You will notice that sleep however does cement what you have learned while awake. So even if something is hard one day, after you sleep it will be easier the next day and so on. The brain loves repetition.

[LordKoKuyou]

thanks for this tips, i want to learn japanese soon but i'm still thinking if need to go to a school or try it by myself.

anyway, i'm trying to use it to improve my English (i'm not a native english speaker) and i want to know what do you thinks is better...many decks with some amount of words in it or just one huge deck?

[RisuMiso]

@LordKoKuyou Definitely try to learn as much as you can on your own. I eventually took a course at a Japanese school and it really helped a lot. If you have a good one I'd go, and supplement it with anki and immersion at home.

I personally used different decks for different things. I have a vocab deck, grammar deck, etc. It's really about your preference though.

[olleryokel]

Try the Kanji Wordsearch iPhone app! Fun, and it tracks your progress.

[RisuMiso]

@olleryokel Sounds interesting

[bluetube147]

@Alkis05 LOL listen u cant learn hiragana that well in 3 hours it takes time and effort there is no magic button or website video whatever watch u may of hit a 98% but as soon as u start to stop learning/studying your gonna forget and please dont bother commenting back cuz it wont make me change my mind buddy =)

[yuriythebest]

@theSVRTV ahahaha you learnt japanese in 2 weeks- good luck

[encarsiaformosa]

What's wrong with Henshall's Guide To Remembering Japanese Characters? Unlike Heisig's nonsensical 'stories', it actually provides the historical etymology, and is therefore much more consistent, and also interesting. Having said that, my Japanese sucks, so I don't really have empirical evidence, but could you at least explain what you have against the book?

[narutoLT]

@RisuMiso I don't know if you'll reply or not but I've settled on learning Japanese like this:

I am currently learning the kanas with the help of thejapanesepage and I am using Rosetta Stone Japanese course for vocabulary.Once I learn the kanas I'll move on to learning kanji.Can you add something to my plan or is it good enough?I can dedicate about 5 hours a day.

[fabo929]

thank you ! :D

[TFbros54]

i have a dictionary and i write the basic words and im starting to learn... i hope i am :\

[bigchickenfu]

Kudos on teaching yourself Japanese. I have been studying Russian on my own for about a year now and it has been a difficult -- but extremely rewarding -- experience ! Learning new languages opens up a whole new world of opportunites .

[jokeboxproductions]

what that thing on your wall in the back..me want lol.

[Vocaloidfannnn]

i like the tips but your so boring ahhhhh torture

[siththomas]

@ChavezMelisa I just read them out loud for a while then I'd quiz myself. I did that numerous times a day. Good luck!