Name: How I Learned Japanese
Uploaded: 2018-05-10T09:13:23.000Z
Duration: 8 min 18 s
Description: Thousands of YouTube videos with English-Chinese subtitles! Now you can learn to understand native speakers, expand your vocabulary, and improve your pronunciation...

I get a lot of questions on my main channel about Japan

and Japanese and lots of different things

gets to see that response. Or maybe like 10.

So I thought I would just do a short series of videos

on this channel answering your questions about Japan.

and the most popular questions I'll make a video about.

So today's video is one of my most frequently asked questions,

And it's going to get a little bit long, so hang in there!

First of all, my Japanese is not perfect.

It isn't super amazing, and I'm still learning, so ... yeah!

and I don't think that's the most efficient way to study a language, necessarily,

but I definitely think that being in a classroom situation

where you have to memorise things for tests

really helps when you're learning a language.

because I'll tell you how I self-studied Japanese.

First thing you've got to do is learn kana, hiragana and katakana.

Just get down and dirty and learn those beasts quickly

I once knew someone who had lived in Japan for a year

and still hadn't finished learning katakana

and that's just - no! You only need a week to learn them, trust me!

You could learn them in a day actually. It's rote memorisation.

Memorise it, learn how to write it - you're done!

OK. I know that sounded a little bit crazy but I'm serious.

Now we're going to go on to my favourite Japanese textbook.

The best textbook for learning Japanese IMHO

It's very very structured, which I really like

but if you learn a different way from me,  you might not like it so much ... and it is

Genki.  So this is the second one, the first one is red.

You can find it on Amazon and I'll put a link below.

I've never really used the CD but I think that would be really beneficial

and it has amazing structure, like I just said.

You get a list of vocabulary and you have to memorise it.

because all the chapters integrate the vocabulary as you go on

so it's a great way to motivate you to actually memorise

I'm dropping things left, right and centre here!

it has grammar, pages of grammar, explains it really well in English

and then  - more stuff I used to practise -

and for each lesson, at the back there is a list of kanji.

Even if you don't have a teacher in a class

or a friend to study with or a language exchange partner

I think you can learn so much from this textbook alone.

Obviously, start with the red one if you're a beginner.

and then move on to Genki II if you enjoy the red one.

but if you have a friend who's going to Japan

or a friend in Japan, it's only 3000 Yen,

which is actually quite cheap, I think, for this kind of book.

I think I paid 90 dollars for it in New Zealand.

So, yay! Not yay for that price, but yeah.

The only downside is - you don't have a teacher to check your answers

You really have to self-check, and you can accidentally learn things wrong.

There's also "Minna no Nihongo", which is another series of beginner textbooks

and advanced and intermediate textbooks, I think.

I've never really used it but tons of universities use it, I think.

So there's that, if you don't like style of the Genki textbook.

OK, my recommendations if you've finished Genki II

It's so much harder to find solid study books

I did sankyu (N3) first and then I got the nikyu (N2) ones

after I'd memorised everything in the sankyu ones

so just choose which one looks good for your level

And these are really good for reinforcing stuff like kanji

It helped me with my kanji and reinforcing grammar.

It has grammar, reading, kanji and also vocabulary.

These are pretty good. I'll put a link down below.

The drill is really noisy, sorry about that.

English books in Japanese, Japanese movies

Supplement your learning ... that's so fricking loud!

So the last step is immersion, which you can achieve by coming to Japan

or you can do it by surrounding yourself with Japanese things

Japanese music, Japanese cartoons, Japanese dramas,

Japanese movies, Japanese people and Japanese stuff.

Subtitles ListPlay Video

How I Learned Japanese

stuff

vocabulary

structure

reinforce