teach watashi wa nihongo!

[C0kaCoLa]

How to say teach me japanese in japanese?

is it watashi wa nihongo ga teach desu?

can you see if my sentences is correct:
Winter in japanese is very cold--->Nihon no fuyu wa totemo samui desu.

I went to the beach---->Watashi wa hashi ga ikimasushita

thanks

[spank]

hehehe......japanese is a strange language in which many things can be omited and taken from context - usually the topic/subject. also, there are various ways to ask for "favours" and receive and give actions from and to others.

in my opinion, if you wanna be polite
"please teach me japanese"

"(watashi [ni wa]) nihongo wo oshiete kudasai"

watashi = I, me
wa = particle denoting topic
watashi wa = as for me, as the topic
nihongo = japanese language
wo = particle denoting the object of the sentence
oshieru = verb: to teach, instruct, inform
kudasai = please give me

when a verb is conjugated to its "TE" form (oshieru -> oshiete) and followed by kudasai, it roughly means....."please do [that verb] for me"
if anything, remember this grammar, its useful.

matsu = to wait
matte kudasai = please wait (for me)
taberu = to eat
tabete kudasai = please eat


hope it was helpful.

[natemb]

And as for your other sentences, I don't see any problem with the second about Japanese winters, but I'll take a stab at correcting the last one.

First the verb should be "ikimashita". When you're forming the past in polite Japanese, you have to take off the "-su" before adding "-shita".

Second, the particle for to should be "ni", instead of "ga".

And last, I'm not too sure about the word for beach, but I believe that "hashi" just means edge in general, and for beach you can say the English ("biichi"), or "kaigan", which means coast. So I would rewrite your last sentence as follows:

(watashi wa) kaigan ni ikimashita.

As Spank said, the topic (watashi wa) is usually not needed because you get the information from context.

[tgmerritt]

Good information Spank I'd like to expand on what you wrote just a bit if I may.

spank wrote:

wa = particle denoting topic
watashi wa = as for me, as the topic

The particles は and が denote the subject of a sentence. The subject is the "doer" or the causative. A topic is a little bit different. I'm nit-picking your grammar, but that's because it becomes important the more you study Japanese.

nihongo = japanese language
wo = particle denoting the object of the sentence

Again - を does denote the object, but the object of the verb, and I pick this point only because an indirect object may appear in a sentence and confuse a beginner.

when a verb is conjugated to its "TE" form (oshieru -> oshiete) and followed by kudasai, it roughly means....."please do [that verb] for me"
if anything, remember this grammar, its useful.

This grammar is very useful, and it's very good that you're pointing it out. Another important grammar point learned very early in Japanese classes is the triplet:

あげる、くれる、もらう

These are the 3 terms that give a sentence the idea of "doing something for someone else."

~て　ください absolutely means "please do X" - you explain it very well in your example.

I'll give you two examples of how the sentence meaning changes when adding くれる.

A boss may say to his/her employee:

この手紙を送ってください. kono tegami wo okutte kudasai. Please send this letter.

But a wife may say to her husband:

この手紙を送ってくれる？ kono tegami wo okutte kureru? Will you send this letter for me?

Very slight change in tone, but くれる makes the sentence mean "will you do this for me?" as one might do a favor for someone else.

I hope I've only expanded on what you were saying. I think your examples are excellent and to-the-point.

[spank]

thanks merritt. i remember all those "kureru, morau, itadaku, ageru" verbs. man, i always get tripped up over the ha, ga, ni rules when applying these, but yeah, you make good points too. thanks for your words.

spank

[C0kaCoLa]

for the teach me japanese thing , can i use ga to mark the japanese or i can only use o?is there any difference between o and wo?

[spank]

hey cola.....just remember,
ga = is a particle used to mark the subject that does the verb.

in this case, as merritt mentioned, "nihongo" is the direct object because it gets the verb "oshieru".

think back to english in high school.

I [subject] teach [verb] japanese [object].
watashi ga [subject] nihongo wo [object] oshieru [verb].

so, you have to mark it with "wo" which is actually the same as "o".

the reason for this wo/o difference is because the particle is written as "wo" with hiragana but pronounced as "o" in speech. but essentially, its the same thing.

any better....?
spank

[Infidel]

The particles は and が denote the subject of a sentence. The subject is the "doer" or the causative. A topic is a little bit different. I'm nit-picking your grammar, but that's because it becomes important the more you study Japanese.

It's important to diffrentiate that はis the topic and が is the subject. Often the topic and the subject is the same, but they aren't always so it is a good idea to start drawing the line as early as possible.

[mandolin]

ishnar wrote:

The particles は and が denote the subject of a sentence. The subject is the "doer" or the causative. A topic is a little bit different. I'm nit-picking your grammar, but that's because it becomes important the more you study Japanese.

It's important to diffrentiate that はis the topic and が is the subject. Often the topic and the subject is the same, but they aren't always so it is a good idea to start drawing the line as early as possible.

Agreed.

Another website I learned from threw the word "subject" out the window entirely, because it is easily confused with a different iteration of subject in english -- that is to say, subject vs. predicate.

He used "topic" and "focus", because 'ga' will denote something that must be emphasized due to lack of clarity or as new information. Stolen from the mentioned website is the following:

Gaka wa e o kaita. An artist drew a picture.
artist - topic marker - picture - accusitive marker - drew.

Simple enough. Artist is our topic, and happens to be the subject.

E wa gaka ga kaita. The artist drew the picture.
picture - topic marker - artist - nominative marker - drew.
As for the picture, the artist drew it.

The picture is the topic, but not the subject of the sentence.

The topic marker overrides the accusative marker in this sentence. The preceding question might be "Who drew the picture?". It doesn't matter whether such a question is actually asked. You can introduce new information to conversation yourself.

You can read the entire thing here.