Please don’t answer with “don’t do it” or anything of the sort. I am in a unique situation where I need to learn fluency by December, enough for n3. I probably have 1500 words (or more) in the bag at this point. I have this time and this time only to take advantage of it where I have time to learn full time.
I apologize for the stiffness but I wanted to make it clear that advice like “it won’t work” or questions like “maybe you’re not really in the position you’re saying you’re in” won’t help.
So I hope for those who are experienced with learning Japanese, if you would be given a chance to learn it full time, how would you go about it and stay sane by the end?
4 comments
If you’re serious about wanting to relatively fluent by December, your best chance of success is going to be some kind of immersion program. If there are none accessible to you for whatever reason (cost, location, etc), hack together one.
* set your devices and accounts into japanese
* any media consumption should be in Japanese rather than any current languages you have
* set some number of hours per day to actively learn and review (eg 4 hours in the morning, 4 in the evening)
* if there’s a Japanese market in your town, try to do your shopping there; if there’s a whole Japanese section of town, try to spend at least one day per week there
* look for a Japanese tutor and/or pen pal
It doesn’t really matter how many words you know. You can know every word in the dictionary and still not be fluent. The important thing is to be able to communicate, to talk around things you don’t know how to say and to get clarification on what the person you’re talking to is saying.
Why not hire a tutor and let them create a personalized study plan and monitor your progress?
I guess I would study 8 hours a day.
Currently I study 2 hours a day and studied about 1800 hours so far.
My breakdown would be:
25% vocab & kanji
25% listening
50% reading
But I’m not sure if I have it in me to study 8 hours. Maybe I could build to that. Japanese is very intense for me, probably because I’m so bad at it and I have to think so hard to do it.
That’s very interesting.
Read/listen/watch as much Japanese stuff as possible, and learn everything you come across that you don’t already know. Start speaking practice towards the end