こんばんは。
Good evening everybody! Here I am on day 100 of learning Japanese! It's exciting to see how far I've come over the last 100 days. It's also a little scary to know how far I still have to go. Time just passes so quickly - it seems like I just started studying.
Just a recap of where I'm (approximately) at on my learning:
-I know about 2025 vocabulary words which includes a combination of nouns, verbs, adjectives, etc.
-I can recognize about 555 kanji and the most common meanings associated with them. 555 down, 1581(ish) to go for the joyo kanji! I've still been mostly using the JLPT Self Study app to study them.
I decided to reset my Mindsnacks Japanese app a day or so ago to start through the vocabulary again but this time only use the kanji setting instead of kana. It was a little hard to wipe out all my progress and high scores, but since the point is to really learn Japanese and not get good scores on some games, I decided to go for it. I had been trying for a while to do everything on kanji mode while reviewing but it hopefully will work better for me to just start from the beginning and go one lesson at a time so it isn't as overwhelming.
I have finally been able to start conjugating verbs more fully this week. A lot of things have started making more sense this past week and it has been a big relief! I've been practicing informal and formal verb forms. My comfort zone is definitely the formal ~masu verb forms but I've been working really hard this week to branch out and learn more. I have been working on the past tense verb forms as well. Lang-8 has helped a lot. I was pretty proud of myself for having done an eight sentence post on there the other day about Christmas using mostly past tense speech and I didn't do very much incorrect.
It's been fun to watch some anime and understand more each time. The last couple of weeks I've been enjoying Fullmetal Alchemist. I like to use anime as an unscientific measuring stick to see how much I'm able to understand. Of course most anime is not polite speech, but it depends on the show.
I can't wait to see where I'm at after another 100 days!
じゃ、またね。
Tuesday, December 29, 2015
Wednesday, December 23, 2015
Progress Update - Day 94
みんなさんこんにちは。Hello everyone!
Here I am on day 94 of my Japanese learning journey! I've still been continuing to expand my vocabulary and keep up with the words I've learned so far. I've slowed a bit on how many words per day on average I'm learning for the most part. I know approximately 2000 vocabulary words at this point, which averages out to having learned about 20 words per day even with slowing down a bit. I've been slowly starting to use the Genki 1 book with my husband and I like the it so far. I need to dedicate more time to studying that way.
I've been focusing a lot on kanji even though I haven't learned quite as many per day on average as I would have liked. Life happens. I can recognize the common meanings of about 485 kanji. I started really studying those around November 18th, so I've been focusing more on kanji than vocabulary for 5 weeks. To do the math, out of the total 2136 joyo (common use) kanji and having "learned" about 485 of them so far, I have 1651 left to "learn". That means I'm a little over 1/5 of the way through the joyo kanji. That is super exciting to me! It has been so great to be able to type Japanese words and use the kanji instead of having to do everything with just kana.
I've also started brushing up on my Spanish again and have been doing well with that. I can do basic sentences pretty well in Spanish, so I figured it might help me in feeling more confident and less afraid to make Japanese sentences if I brushed up on my Spanish again. So far it's been working well for me. Studying some Spanish again has taken a little time from Japanese study time but if it helps me move forward to where I need to be in making sentences in Japanese so that I can actually practice and use the language and the vocabulary I've learned so far then it's completely worth it.
I finished my Mindsnacks Japanese app and have continued to utilize some courses through Memrise and Mango Languages. I've been using Duolingo and Mindsnacks to brush up on my Spanish vocabulary again. It's funny how some words just come back without having to re-learn them once the brain gets studying again. To study kanji I've still been using my JLPT Study app.
This past week I have finally been brave enough to do some posts on lang-8.com. I had signed up for the site back in September but hadn't been ready to do any posts until now. I was worried about how the environment of people correcting one another would be and whether the site was safe to use. So far I am really impressed and I like the environment of the site. So far all the people I have connected with that have corrected my Japanese and that I have corrected English have been very nice. No one has said anything mean or embarrassing. I definitely understand why so many people on the internet have recommended using lang-8 to help learn. I have gone from just doing a very simple sentence to doing a 5 or 6 sentence post. I'm excited to continue to do posts and learn how to write and make sentences better.
As I've continued to study Japanese, I've continued to enjoy Japanese culture more and more. It's been exciting to understand various things better and to comprehend names of foods and restaurants that I've been aware of but didn't know the meanings. Also watching Japanese programs and knowing that I understand more of what is being said without needing the subtitles as much is really cool.
Yesterday I drove past a brand new restaurant near where I live that had tonkotsu in the name and to know what that means in relation to a ramen shop was fun. (Pork ramen where the bones have been boiled.) I hope to go try the tonkotsu ramen sometime. Yum yum it makes me hungry just thinking about it!
A couple weeks ago at a local grocery store I found these gummy candies:
I love finding Japanese foods at stores now since I can read what they are for the most part. For those who don't read katakana writing from left to right these say peach gummy, Suika (watermelon) gummy, and strawberry gummy. Why the company used the Japanese word for watermelon but not for peach and strawberry I don't understand, but whatever. They taste really good.
Thanks for reading about my continuing journey of learning Japanese!
Until next time! さようなら。
Here I am on day 94 of my Japanese learning journey! I've still been continuing to expand my vocabulary and keep up with the words I've learned so far. I've slowed a bit on how many words per day on average I'm learning for the most part. I know approximately 2000 vocabulary words at this point, which averages out to having learned about 20 words per day even with slowing down a bit. I've been slowly starting to use the Genki 1 book with my husband and I like the it so far. I need to dedicate more time to studying that way.
I've been focusing a lot on kanji even though I haven't learned quite as many per day on average as I would have liked. Life happens. I can recognize the common meanings of about 485 kanji. I started really studying those around November 18th, so I've been focusing more on kanji than vocabulary for 5 weeks. To do the math, out of the total 2136 joyo (common use) kanji and having "learned" about 485 of them so far, I have 1651 left to "learn". That means I'm a little over 1/5 of the way through the joyo kanji. That is super exciting to me! It has been so great to be able to type Japanese words and use the kanji instead of having to do everything with just kana.
I've also started brushing up on my Spanish again and have been doing well with that. I can do basic sentences pretty well in Spanish, so I figured it might help me in feeling more confident and less afraid to make Japanese sentences if I brushed up on my Spanish again. So far it's been working well for me. Studying some Spanish again has taken a little time from Japanese study time but if it helps me move forward to where I need to be in making sentences in Japanese so that I can actually practice and use the language and the vocabulary I've learned so far then it's completely worth it.
I finished my Mindsnacks Japanese app and have continued to utilize some courses through Memrise and Mango Languages. I've been using Duolingo and Mindsnacks to brush up on my Spanish vocabulary again. It's funny how some words just come back without having to re-learn them once the brain gets studying again. To study kanji I've still been using my JLPT Study app.
This past week I have finally been brave enough to do some posts on lang-8.com. I had signed up for the site back in September but hadn't been ready to do any posts until now. I was worried about how the environment of people correcting one another would be and whether the site was safe to use. So far I am really impressed and I like the environment of the site. So far all the people I have connected with that have corrected my Japanese and that I have corrected English have been very nice. No one has said anything mean or embarrassing. I definitely understand why so many people on the internet have recommended using lang-8 to help learn. I have gone from just doing a very simple sentence to doing a 5 or 6 sentence post. I'm excited to continue to do posts and learn how to write and make sentences better.
As I've continued to study Japanese, I've continued to enjoy Japanese culture more and more. It's been exciting to understand various things better and to comprehend names of foods and restaurants that I've been aware of but didn't know the meanings. Also watching Japanese programs and knowing that I understand more of what is being said without needing the subtitles as much is really cool.
Yesterday I drove past a brand new restaurant near where I live that had tonkotsu in the name and to know what that means in relation to a ramen shop was fun. (Pork ramen where the bones have been boiled.) I hope to go try the tonkotsu ramen sometime. Yum yum it makes me hungry just thinking about it!
A couple weeks ago at a local grocery store I found these gummy candies:
I love finding Japanese foods at stores now since I can read what they are for the most part. For those who don't read katakana writing from left to right these say peach gummy, Suika (watermelon) gummy, and strawberry gummy. Why the company used the Japanese word for watermelon but not for peach and strawberry I don't understand, but whatever. They taste really good.
Thanks for reading about my continuing journey of learning Japanese!
Until next time! さようなら。
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