Too many books? Materials?

[hamsterfreak4evr]

same here, i used TJP's page on hiragana and learned it all for good in under an hour...lol...for some reason katakana is a bit more of a struggle...

[sushi4ever]

hamsterfreak4evr wrote:
for some reason katakana is a bit more of a struggle...

i wonder if that's been the same for everyone because i had that too, lol
but since some katakana resemble their hiragana-"siblings", it's only harder in the beginning, but you get them down in a jiffy as well ^^

hang in there, TokyoRoze, it's not as hard as it looks like ^^

[TokyoRoze]

I will try my best

[Infidel]

katakana is harder because you see it used less. Keep looking for stuff with japanese writing and souding it out. All the kana are easy if you keep plugging away at it.

[clay]

ishnar wrote:
This is what I recommend.
1. Get a good textbook with workbook. Figure out what your specific reasons for learning Japanese are and state them to others and yourself when getting recomendations.
2. Shelf the extra books. They just slow you down.
3. Keep study sessions to 30 mins increments.
4. Review once and no more than twice per session. What I do is write all the words I'm having trouble with at the beginning of my session one time per word. After about 4 days I usually remember the word. This is why I tell people, "writing a word once a day for 10 days is easier to remember than writing a word 100 times for one day or even 2 days."

Well said! I think this is great advice. Writing helps the memory more than just reviewing flashcards. (using 2 senses instead of just one) I need to take your advice. I mainly review flashcards on a electric dictionary.

[AJBryant]

What I always did was this:

Write the word while saying it. Repeat about ten times. Then write the word while saying the English meaning. Repeat about ten times. Move on to the next word. About every five or ten words -- without looking back, if possible -- I'd rewrite and say all the words I did in that specific batch in random order. Then I would repeat that cycle of ten words in exactly the same way. That would be that set, and I'd be done.

Before starting the next set of words, I'd write from memory (while saying) all the words I learned in the last set, and then compare that list to the list from the last session. If I forgot one or wrote it wrong, it would get added to the new list.

You can do 20 or 30 words a day that way if you break it up into three half-hour periods spread over the day (one in the morning, one in the afternoon, and one in the evening).

Tony

[ashitaka]

i just read a japanese-english dictionary over and over again. im on my 13th time and i juts retain odd things like feces and coathanger

[IkimashoZ]

ashitaka wrote:
i just read a japanese-english dictionary over and over again. im on my 13th time and i juts retain odd things like feces and coathanger

That's really impressive. I once told my German professor that I wanted to just read a German-English dictionary straight through sometime because I was sick of running into words I don't know and the gist of his responce was that I would have to read through it too many times to retain everything.

I think reading stories or news or something would be better, but still, 13 times? That's impressive. How many words is this dictionary you're reading comprised of??