Learning Japanese from zero by listening: 2021 Log

[AndyMeg]

It occurred to me that this log might be misleading and/or boring to read, given that I intended to learn primarily by watching TV, but have spent most of my time to date on Wanikani. Of course, I always knew this was likely to happen - you have to build up a base before you can start watching media. So far I haven't found a good way to practice listening skills. I tried watching Peppa Pig in Japanese, but I couldn't even understand any of that. Of course, it's only been two weeks and Japanese is a notoriously difficult language, so it's not all that surprising either.

As you don't seem to be too familiar with kanji yet, and if you have Netflix, maybe you could start by watching some shows/animes with japanese audio-description and english subs. Even if you are more focused on the english subs most of the time, you'll still listen to plenty of japanese with the audio-descriptions (which are played when there's no dialogue going on).

Later, when you are more familiar with kanji, you could re-watch the same shows/animes, but this time replacing the english subs with japanese CC subs (which usually match the audio better than normal subs). Even though japanese is not my focus language at this moment, I'm currently doing this with two shows: a j-drama called "Erased" (僕だけがいない街) and an anime called "Forest of Piano" (ピアノの森); but I'm sure there should be more shows with both the japanese audio-description and the japanese CC subs available.

Also, a great app for learning/practicing the japanese writing system (both kanas and kanji) is this one: Japanese Kanji Study - 漢字学習

[golyplot]

As you don't seem to be too familiar with kanji yet, and if you have Netflix, maybe you could start by watching some shows/animes with japanese audio-description and english subs. Even if you are more focused on the english subs most of the time, you'll still listen to plenty of japanese with the audio-descriptions (which are played when there's no dialogue going on).

The problem is that currently, I basically can't understand any spoken Japanese at all, so I don't think that would be useful yet. There is of course a bit of a chicken and egg problem there.

[AndyMeg]

As you don't seem to be too familiar with kanji yet, and if you have Netflix, maybe you could start by watching some shows/animes with japanese audio-description and english subs. Even if you are more focused on the english subs most of the time, you'll still listen to plenty of japanese with the audio-descriptions (which are played when there's no dialogue going on).

The problem is that currently, I basically can't understand any spoken Japanese at all, so I don't think that would be useful yet. There is of course a bit of a chicken and egg problem there.

The first activity isn't meant for trying to understand japanese yet, it is more aimed at getting exposure to the language while you are doing an activity you enjoy. You just watch something you like in your target language but with subs in a language you already understand (so that you don't get frustrated for not understanding what's going on). And the audio-description helps you to get more exposure even if you don't understand a word of it yet. I'm doing this activity even with languages I haven't formally started studying yet (like thai). The main point here is to get exposed to the language doing an activity you find enjoyable until you reach a point in which you can do more challenging activities in your target language. At this stage, you can see this as a complementary activity to other more intensive activities (like WaniKani or working through a textbook). Exposure helps you to build familiarity with a language, and familiarity helps you to learn faster when you are doing a more intensive type of study.

After you watch something the first time with subs in a language you understand, you already know what's going on, so you can re-watch it without the subs or with subs in your target language and pay more attention to the spoken language (and/or to the TL subs), even if you don't understand anything of it yet. This is a way to continue building familiarity while you reach a more advanced level in the langauge.

And when you have a better level in your TL you can continue doing this activity and other variations of it in order to strengthen/assimilate what you have learned/seen in your more intensive type of language learning activities.

[golyplot]

I'm already watching Sword Art Online with English subtitles. I've also been listening to a lot of Japanese music.

[seito]

I continue to be very disappointed with Lingodeer.

The only app-based Japanese course (as opposed to tools for specific parts of the language, like Wanikani) I've found that I really like is the Jalup app. It's basically an adaptation of their Anki decks, but with all of the words on the backs of the cards hyperlinked to the cards that introduced them. And the linking was done by hand, so it links to the one that introduced the usage that applies to the current card.

[AndyMeg]

I'm already watching Sword Art Online with English subtitles. I've also been listening to a lot of Japanese music.

This is great, then.

Have you tried watching something with japanese audio-description instead of normal japanese audio?

The difference between normal audio in your target language and audio-description in your target language is that with audio-description you get more exposure to the language within the same period of time, because it not only lets you hear the dialogues in your target language, but also describes what's happening in your target language. Audio-descriptions say things like "Hitomi climbs up the tree", "there's a big piano inside the room", etc. all in the target language (in this case, all in japanese)

Though it may take you some time to get used to watching things with audio-description.

I prefer TL audio-description over normal TL audio because it gives you more density of exposure to the language for the same amount of time spent watching it.

Just telling you about this in case you want to try it (if you already haven't).

[golyplot]

I've tried watching things in the past with audio description in other languages, and didn't like it much.

[golyplot]

I started Bunpro on Sunday. It seems pretty nice so far, though I haven't actually managed to learn anything with it yet.

Also, I read that Duolingo got a course update (the v3 tree) several months ago, so it is much better now, and the conventional wisdom that Duolingo is crap for Japanese is probably outdated. There's also a v4 tree in the works, but that's still unfortunately in beta testing. Anyway, I decided to try out the Duolingo Japanese tree to see what it's like. I was surprised that the placement test had word banks enabled, since there were a lot of questions I was able to guess, just based on what was in the word bank and the parts I knew. Anyway, I placed out of the first nine skills. I haven't gone much father yet, since I'm still trying to find a comfortable setup.

I recognized another word (important/taisetsu) while watching Sword Art Online. Though "recognize" isn't quite accurate. I saw "important" in the subtitles and listened to see if I could hear the reading I learned from Wanikani. Still, it's pretty cool to even be able to occasionally recognize words like that at all.

Speaking of Wanikani, I made a slight mistake on one of the kanji readings last night. Luckily, you only need 90% of kanji to advance, but it means I can only afford to make two more mistakes. On the last level, I made two mistakes but still leveled. It's pretty nerve wracking when reviewing level critical items. The stress seems like it might be counterproductive to me, but on the other hand, Wanikani is boring enough even when you're leveling at full speed, at least for the early levels. So far, Wanikani is the most effective learning tool I've found, and I can't wait until I can understand more of the kanji. I just wish it wasn't so slow at the beginning.

[dicentra8]

I recognized another word (important/taisetsu) while watching Sword Art Online. Though "recognize" isn't quite accurate. I saw "important" in the subtitles and listened to see if I could hear the reading I learned from Wanikani. Still, it's pretty cool to even be able to occasionally recognize words like that at all.

I just had the opposite experience. Seeing the english word in a subtitle, my brain expecting one word and then being confused because I wasn't hearing it. Basically I've been watching Terrace House and they were reapeating a lot questions like "what are you going to do this weekend? Do you have anything planned for this weeekend?". The first word that came to my mind was 週末(shuumatsu) but they weren't saying it. Luckily they repeated those questions so often that at some point my brain picked 土日(donichi) and had this eureka moment! Both those words can mean weekend but 土日 is literally just the two days (Saturday and Sunday) while 週末 includes Friday to its meaning. And now I'll probably never forget it! *fingers crossed*

[golyplot]

I just had the opposite experience. Seeing the english word in a subtitle, my brain expecting one word and then being confused because I wasn't hearing it.

I haven't been bothered too much by that since I know there's so many synonyms and different ways of saying things that I can't expect it to always match what I've learned. Heck, there are some cases where I've already learned multiple words for the same thing on Wanikani. It's the rare exceptions where I do recognize it that make me happy.