
Things I Wish I Knew When I Was A Beginner Japanese Learner, Feat. Ian Battaglia
The Tofugu Podcast: Japan and Japanese Language
Learning Japanese in a Japanese Community
Learn hidagona and katakana first, then learn congi. Derneye used an ap on her phone to do a quiz every time she had a free moment. Adandaye: "There's just like, different new ants and different things that you miss" You can start learning japanese at about the same age as reading manga or watching pepa pig in japanese.
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Speaker 1
That's g emersion though, first. Adandaye, there's just like, different new ants and different things that you miss, you know. Ya, i think translators work really hard and do a really good job, but a, when you play something that's translated, you know, a lot of times the meaning that i come away with isike slightly different from what the english version might be, or something like that, you knowand it's kind of interesting to see, see those things and compare them, right? Yo. But i guess, like, to get to the level, like, of getting the most out of h immersion, i guess you'll have to be, you'll have to do some like heve left ting t loi at what point with you ecommand to start something like that, i guess you can do that right off the bat, to but to get most out of it, yes, it's funny because, like, adeline, especially ind like internet base, japanese learning communities, like immersion is really strongly encouraged. And i thinki that's great. You know, lik, like i said, tat, that's pretty much all i do to study now. But like you said, you have to, you have to get a foundation of knowledge in before you get to that point. So, you know, i think with japanese, of course, one of the hard things is just three different scrips, kana and conji and ya. First and foremost. I think you need to learn hidagona and katakana. And you do that, i would try to learn some of just the way the the language sounds, just the, you know, hows eels and things like that. I don't think you necessarily have to go ike into a deep dive with that. But what i did is that i used an ap on my phone. There's these two aps i really like, called hiragona pro and catacona pro. And they were just, like, just like little quiz aps where any time i had a free moment, i would just open it up, and they'll just show a heragona character and say it out loud, and then youd just can either pick from three options in romagi what it is, or you can type in. But so i just went through, you know, i just did that all the time. Ended up for a couple, i mean, i think for about ike a week or something, until i just had gottn super good and could i just, you know, could read hetagonand and catakana, even though, you know, at that point i didn't even know like, very many words at all, but i just knew how to read the the scrim and i think that's like the first thing you need to do. O, it's like learning alphabets for japanese, like yo. I dont think you can do that, like, as a second long age. Londer ah, some one who started running japanese, like, at a later age, like can do like, learned of from watcint were you no reading manga? Id seen youotival e, i think amost possible to ei, get that right from mi consuming or emergion. Derneye, i mean, i think, i think you can start, depending on what you it's hard, because i think that the way that immersion works best with things that you're personally interested insoi i devily think it's possible for you to just learn kana and then just start watching, like pepa pig in japanese, with japanese kana of titles. And o, like like dive in. I wouldn't say that's the only thing you should do, but i think you could try to start incorporating that pretty early. But i think a lot of the things that would be accessible to you at that age are probably not superinteresting if you're an adult as a second age learner. So, ye, i mean, what i would recommend is, is, learn cona and then start some kind of system for learning congi at the same time. You know, i i used anicone just because i liked the the promise that you could do it in two years, andso that everything was set up. I'm a really technical person, like, i'm very particular about things, but i didn't want to, like, fuss around with like, unke and getting flash cards set up. I didn't really have any interest in in remembering the conge thatum, you know, i think there's a bunch of different ways that you can learn consy and and just vocabulary words in general, but i would just find what works for you and just start doing that.
In this episode, Ian Battaglia, a Japanese resource review writer at Tofugu and an enthusiastic Japanese learner who’s still actively working his way to the advanced level, discusses all kinds of things he wishes he knew when he was a beginner Japanese learner.
Ian covers topics like:
- Learning Japanese is not a race! Go at your own “sustainable” pace
- A recommended learning order for self-learners to have the foundation for immersion
- Reading practice is surprisingly beneficial in general
- Focus more on practice, not process
- Be okay with not understanding everything in Japanese
and more.
Make sure to give it a listen for Ian’s Japanese learning wisdom!