The Origami Forum

what do you believe is the best way to learn japanese

The best way would be to find a Japanese friend (or somebody who speaks fluent Japanese). Then practice practice practice with your friend.

Also, if you have Japanese channels on your cable, try watching those, especially NHK news broadcasts.

the best way to learn japanese is to be Japanese and live in Japan

I learnt by asking my Japanese friend to tech me the hiragana characters. They are the simple characters that each stand for a syllable....
Next I got a phrase book and practised writing words out. If you can read the characters, you can read the words out loud and then find out their meanings, you're halfway there.

I found it easier to learn hiragana characters first because then you know how to pronounce words and write them. Don't start kanji (The word characters) straight away, it will confuse you into oblivion!!!

I think i will go with "~folder~of~papers~" idea ive got a basic kana chart and im trying to learn hiragana and katakana, im going to stay well clear of kanji on the recomendation of someone from www.japanese-online.com as even they didnt know them all im also thinking of getting maybe one of these books to help, which one do you think would be best?, or maybe you could recomend some different books instead thnx.

Books im thinking of getting:

Teach yourself japanese (and maybe the audio cd as well)

Lets Learn Hiragana
&
lets learn katakana

Ive chosen to buy from play.com delibertely but other place's are fine for recomending books

thnx in advance

one of the main reasons for me wanting to learn japanese is waiting for all the deathnote, naruto and bleach anime episodes to be subbed

if you know how to draw kata- or hiragana it becomes easy to read the first simple words (without kanji). and if you keep on writing/drawing and reading kana, you'll probably never forget - but you HAVE TO keep on training.
i've learned my last lesson in japanese in 1998 when i took a ride across hanshu island. today - after more than 8 years without any practise - i can't read even one word. may be i'd realize what is katakana and what is hiragana ...

TheRealChris wrote:the best way to learn japanese is to be Japanese and live in Japan

I think there's some exception.
I think to learn is to imitate. Just imitate and pratice, practice, non-stop pratice until you reach the heigh you want. This is not only the rule for learning Japanese but everything.

Yoku yoku Ginmi arubesi.

Try your best, friends.

I'm pretty sure, that learning languages depends very much on your language learning skill. some people learn languages faster than other. on the other hand it's of course easier to learn a speech that is related to your own mother language (e.g. in sound characteristics).
but I agree 100% with hiba that one of the best ways to get better is always to practice. most of my friends wouldn't be able to do a complete conversation in english, although they learned it somewhen in school.

if you're a fan of anime (japanese animation), learning japanese helps and vice versa: wanting to understand anime in its native language and being able to watch a greater variety of anime drives you to learn japanese, and watching and listening to anime carefully helps you with native speaking (idioms, slang etc).

that aside, some CD-ROMs might be worth checking out, especially Rosetta Stone (although that apparently costs £100+).

when you think about it its a duh but did you ever really know in the front ((well they say back when its subconscious)and well this is to mean like 2 second thinking) that to apply to a Japanese collage in japan your paper has to be in Japanese?

Well, I just what anime in japanese and in english subbs, so I understand it a bit, and also get use to japanese and its style and accent. The more I watch and here it, the easier I can learn and speak it! Arigato!

I too want to learn japanese some day...

I've recently started Japanese tutoring and I'm getting better!
I think you have to find yourself someone to be around who can help you, for example, start learning with a close friend so you can help each other and communicate within the language.
I study and tutor with my friends.
It's a great way to practise!

Hajime mashite!
Doozoo yuroshiku... I think...

Well, I started off by buying a travel guide, in which I could also learn some basic grammar and vocabulary. About one year ago a friend of mine found someone who was able to teach us Japanese. My teacher suggested that we'd get the "Japanese for busy people" books, and I have to say that they're excellent. ( You should be able to get those from Amazon.com )

You can also watch random youtube video's about Japanese pranks, or perhaps the TV Champion, or even Anime, in order to figure out how to pronounce things. It's certainly helping me learn Japanese, anyway.

TheRealChris wrote:on the other hand it's of course easier to learn a speech that is related to your own mother language (e.g. in sound characteristics).

I totally agree chris. I am half german, and My grandfather taught me a few phrases, like, "where is the bathroom" and one I really do not think I should say. When I here japanese It sounds so foreign to my dialect, but when I hear German it seems to make sense to me because it is phonetic.

This school semester I am going to have Spanish pounded into my half-awake brain, so I do not think I have time to learn japanese. It would really confuse me anyway. It would be more interesting to learn it though because I see so much text written in japanese when I search Origami. I try to use google to translate it though, but It is never accurate. The sentences sound like a five year old wrote down his thoughts on origami... with his eyes closed.