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Languages
Posted On: Oct 18, 2011 22:49:25 GMT -5
Post by Youngster Joey on Oct 18, 2011 22:49:25 GMT -5
Perhaps my instructor doesn't introduce kanji the first quarter because she doesn't want half the class gone after the first week. They'll be gone by the end of the semester or the next anyway. I've heard over and over that Japanese classes always start out large and eventually whittle down to almost nothing. At my last college, they'd typically start out with 25 students in the beginner class and end up with 7 by the third year.
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Languages
Posted On: Oct 19, 2011 0:12:05 GMT -5
Post by Hiro the Half-Elf on Oct 19, 2011 0:12:05 GMT -5
Yeah, my Japanese class in high school started with like 23 and ended with 5, myself included. In Japanese III we had six people... for two weeks, before one guy dropped out of the class.
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Languages
Posted On: Feb 28, 2012 22:50:46 GMT -5
Post by Umbra on Feb 28, 2012 22:50:46 GMT -5
Okay, here's some questions for anyone who has learned a language to the proficiency of being able to speak somewhat fluently with native speakers of that language:
Is learning a language solely in a class or on your own inferior to learning a language by forced immersion? If so, in what way and by how much? Does the success in a foreign language class actually make you more successful with the language in a real setting?
To me, I don't think the measure of success in a foreign language makes one necessarily successful in learning the language, per se. For the most part, you're learning one concept at a time. One grammatical concept, one set of vocabulary at a time. If you're not using these on a constant basis, you're going to forget them. I remember being in German class for two years, and a year after I was out of the class, I forgot most of what I learned.
I'd like to hear your opinions on this.
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Languages
Posted On: Feb 28, 2012 23:21:41 GMT -5
Post by Youngster Joey on Feb 28, 2012 23:21:41 GMT -5
Hm, I think there are merits to both. Personally, if I had to choose, I would choose a classroom first because then I can get the fundamentals down and learn subtleties quickly that I would take a much longer time to learn by just observation alone. After you've learned the grammar, though, I think immersion is much better. It's very hard to become fluent in a classroom. You don't get a lot of speaking opportunity, you're only used to hearing one native speaker (your teacher), and you're not exposed to a wide variety of vocabulary and topics.
Take, for instance, the time I spent in Greece. I went over knowing no Greek other than thank you and hello. I didn't get a lot from the immersion experience; people spoke too quickly for me to pick up on anything, and I was so obviously not fluent that when I did try to speak, bilinguals would just switch to English to make the conversation less painful (everyone thought I was British, hah... got asked so many times what part of England I was from). It was only when in the last week or so that I knew enough Greek to start getting something out of being there. If I went now, I'd get a ton out of the immersion experience because I know all the grammar and just need to work on vocabulary expansion.
As far as success in a classroom translating (no pun intended) to the real world? No, I don't think one necessarily predicts the other. Interacting in the real world is a whole other beast. You're almost running on a script in class in a way. You have a set topic you're covering, you know what the teacher will be asking you, you're familiar with the teacher's way of speaking and accent, and you're probably not going to be having a back-and-forth conversation. None of that exists in the real world.
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Languages
Posted On: Feb 28, 2012 23:46:16 GMT -5
Post by Umbra on Feb 28, 2012 23:46:16 GMT -5
I agree with the "classroom-first, immersion later" point you made. It would save a lot of pain of trial and error and dealing with communication barriers by learning the fundamentals first. But after that, you're not going to get much without experiencing the real world of that language.
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Posted On: Mar 4, 2012 21:01:20 GMT -5
Post by Hiro the Half-Elf on Mar 4, 2012 21:01:20 GMT -5
Speaking of forced immersion, David Sedaris once told a yarn about how he began living in France for a year knowing only the word "bottleneck" and left knowing possibly less French than he began with.
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Posted On: Apr 9, 2012 6:27:43 GMT -5
Post by Umbra on Apr 9, 2012 6:27:43 GMT -5
Question for Japanese language learners:
When learning kanji, do you study the onyomi and kunyomi for each kanji or do you learn the sounding of kanji by learning individual words, possibly not knowing whether one pronunciation is kunyomi or onyomi?
For me, I find it more effective to study just words made up from kanji because a lot of kanji have many pronunciations. Even the most basic kanji like 日 have multiple pronunciations for the onyomi and kunyomi. I noticed that by word recognition, I know the correct pronunciation. I would never get the pronunciation for 日 confused in words like 日本 or 日曜日, for example.
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Languages
Posted On: Apr 9, 2012 9:02:54 GMT -5
Post by Hiro the Half-Elf on Apr 9, 2012 9:02:54 GMT -5
The latter. It's mostly just academic whether a reading is kun- or on-yomi. Much easier to learn the readings through practice with words.
It's also how I tend to learn how to write kanji.
Of course, most of my kanji-reading I learned from SRW, so...
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Posted On: Apr 9, 2012 14:40:40 GMT -5
Post by Umbra on Apr 9, 2012 14:40:40 GMT -5
I think playing games in Japanese is a good way to practice reading.
I remember reading that for the Japanese version of Zelda: Spirit Tracks, touching an unfamiliar kanji with the stylus will show its furigana, which I think is pretty neat.
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Posted On: Apr 9, 2012 17:48:53 GMT -5
Post by supersonic1453 on Apr 9, 2012 17:48:53 GMT -5
I don't memorize both readings. There's usually exceptions anyway.
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Posted On: Apr 9, 2012 19:49:19 GMT -5
Post by Captain Zelar on Apr 9, 2012 19:49:19 GMT -5
I'm learning binary.
Soon I will be able to communicate with Hiro in his native tongue.
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Posted On: Apr 11, 2012 4:54:50 GMT -5
Post by Hiro the Half-Elf on Apr 11, 2012 4:54:50 GMT -5
Oh damn, I'll no longer be able to talk about you behind your back with my computer.
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Posted On: Apr 21, 2012 1:15:18 GMT -5
Post by Youngster Joey on Apr 21, 2012 1:15:18 GMT -5
Yeah, my Japanese class in high school started with like 23 and ended with 5, myself included. In Japanese III we had six people... for two weeks, before one guy dropped out of the class. I heard that the AP exam for Japanese only tests for the equivalent of two college semesters of Japanese. Theoretically, you'd have taken Japanese for 4 years before taking that exam... considering how agonizingly slowly high school language classes go anyway, it's pretty pathetic that people would drop out in high school. You don't even cover that much material in high school.
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Posted On: Apr 21, 2012 11:44:26 GMT -5
Post by Hiro the Half-Elf on Apr 21, 2012 11:44:26 GMT -5
To be fair, at my school, that would be two years of Japanese.
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Posted On: Apr 21, 2012 11:45:10 GMT -5
Post by Youngster Joey on Apr 21, 2012 11:45:10 GMT -5
Still slow.
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