| ”にほんごがわかりますか”
| ”はい、すこしわかります。でもまだじょうずじゃありません”
I have long wanted to live and work in Japan. I have been to Japan three times, totally about 30 days, but my last trip to Japan was way back in 2012. For those past trips I learned “traveler’s Japanese” using various resources (Pimsleur, Living Language, etc.). My Wife joined me for one of those trips, and we took a two-term course in conversational Japanese together.
Conversational Japanese resource are useful, and I am using those as well, but this is about obtaining JLPT N3 or N2 certification in the next 24 - 36 months. So, what do you do if you want to start learning Japanese right now? Here’s what seems to be working for me.
- Understand SRS.
- Learn to read hiragana: https://www.tofugu.com/japanese/learn-hiragana/
- This will take less than a week.
- Learn to read katakana: https://www.tofugu.com/japanese/learn-katakana/
- This should take even less time than learning hiragana.
- Some resources suggest you can save katakana for later. I find there’s enough katakana in whatever Japanese text I come across that learning it sooner rather than later is worthwhile.
- Learn how the language works: https://guidetojapanese.org/learn/
- I suggest skipping the hiragana and katakana sections. Go straight to the Kanji section and proceed from there.
- Flashcards: https://apps.ankiweb.net
- Practice every day. It does not take long.
- I installed the deck title “Genki 1, Second Edition Vocabulary.”
- Get started on Genki I.
Visit 100. Progress Log to see how I’m doing.
Hiragana
Learn hiragana with tofugu.com. The mnemonics may sometimes seem silly, or downright strange, but they work. Some work better than others, but they work. Using tofugu.com’s mnemonics, you should be able to achieve perfect or near-perfect recall of all the hiragana in less than a week.
A key point here is, you want to get away from relying on romaji as quickly as possible. While you will encounter romaji in Japan, for example, on street signs, this is for the convenience of those who can’t read Japanese. If your goal is to learn the language properly, you should wean yourself off romaji right away. This is reflected in the popular “Genki” textbooks, where the first book, Genki I, provides romaji only for the first few sections of the text.
Test yourself with Tofugu’s downloadable PDF files, and their online test tool. The online test tool offers the advantage of two different typefaces. Typeface can have a dramatic impact on the look of some kana. Make sure you test yourself with the Noto Serif JP typeface.
A small word of warning regarding Tofugu’s online testing tool: You identify each kana by typing it the way you would if you were using a romaji keyboard. This means that, for example, for ぢゃ, you type in “dya”, as you would on a romaji keyboard, and not “jya”, as it is pronounced. This applies to を、ぢ、づ、ぢゃ、ぢゅ、ぢょ.
A note about device language: At some point you may want to switch your computer or mobile devices to Japanese, to force yourself to use the language. You can also, at least on iPhone, switch individual applications to Japanese. You will need to know katakana and kanji before you do this. I tested switching a couple individual applications (cotEditor, Apple Calendar) over to Japanese, and the menus are predominantly katakana and kanji, not hiragana. Interestingly, trying to switch Slack and VS Code to Japanese via macOS System Systems had no effect, I suspect because they have their own internal settings.
Writing
The emphasis is on reading hiragana. This is the far more important skill. Learning to write hiragana will slow you down. But if you want to practice writing, I recommend the trace sheets from Tae Kim’s website. Tofugu has a writing workbook PDF as well, but it wastes a lot of space, with very little practice per page compared to the Tae Kim practice sheets. If you download the Tofugu and Tae Kim PDFs, you will see what I mean.
Katakana
I recommend learning katakana right after your have learned hiragana. The syllables are the same, so learning katakana should be even quicker than hiragana. You just need to learn the new tofugu.com mnemonics.
Tae Kim’s Guide
A popular resource that teaches you how Japanese works:
https://guidetojapanese.org/learn/complete/
As mentioned above, since you are learning hiragana and katakana from tofugu.com, skip straight to the Kanji section of Tae Kim’s site and proceed from there. You might even skip straight to Nouns and Adjectives.
Anki
A common flashcard app. I’ve only just started using it. Does what it says on the tin. The number of available practice decks is a bit overwhelming. If you will be studying Genki I or Genki II, there are decks specifically for those books. I started with the deck “Genki 1, Second Edition Vocabulary.”
Genki I
Probably the most common text for learning Japanese.
Other
There are of course 1000s of excellent resources out there. I haven’t touched on Japanese media yet … podcasts, news sites, books, etc. Don’t overload yourself. Learn the two kana syllabaries, some “grade 1” kanji, some grammar and, as soon as possible, start practicing reading, speaking, and listening (ear training).
The translation app on the iPhone is great for quickly checking whether the sentence you are thinking of says what you think it says. I’m sure other translation apps are equally useful. It’s also a great way to practice typing Japanese. Try to use the kana keyboard rather than the romaji keyboard.
Most important of all: be curious. Experiment. Take what you have learned and try applying it in new ways. Take a simple sentence that you know and ask how you can expand upon it. The textbook response to:
- Them: “いいおてんきですね”
May well be:
- You: “そうですね”
But ask yourself how you can expand on that to add some colour to the conversation.
- You: “そうですね。でも、ちょっとさむいです”