Is it possible to be so bad at language acquisition that you’ll just never get good at output?
For some background, I work for a Japanese company but am a programmer based in the US for last 1.5 years. I get the chance to hear spoken Japanese daily during team meetings. Every day I read and respond to emails in (broken) Japanese. 15 years ago I did a four year college program in Japanese, and have JLPT N2. I am planning to test for N1 this December.
I’m tasked to present my work updates in Japanese once a week. But I’m abysmal at speaking. In the last couple of years I can honestly say I haven’t improved at all. I can never seem to hold a conversation without:
\- forgetting words or using the wrong word
\- bad / unintelligible grammar
\- an overwhelming feeling of existential dread because I’m acutely aware of how bad I sound
My Japanese colleagues speak both English and Japanese and often translate in rapid Japanese what they think I was trying to say. Many times when they speak amongst themselves it is so fast I can’t keep up. In comparison I feel like a kindergartener.
Feeling like I was over ambitious to try and learn Japanese and thinking probably I don’t have the brain cells to do this. 🙁
are there tried and true methods to get good at speaking?
4 comments
I think the existential dread is putting you in a place of anxiety so you’re in a cycle of being nervous about not sounding intelligible.
There’s some language exchange apps that I know people mention a lot. You might want to look into doing that. Speaking with someone who will be patient with you. And you might be able to help them with their English.
I was having a hard time with output and I started taking some conversational courses through The Japan Society (based here in NYC, but the classes are online so you can take them from anywhere). But I really made some strides in taking courses that were focused specifically on conversation rather than strictly textbook study.
Good luck to you! I know it’s hard.
Did you do that program in Japan or outside Japan? Tried and true method number one is practice. You have to be shit to get good.
I think a tutor could be helpful. My first conversations were playing a complicated game with a native who didn’t know any english. It didn’t go too horribly but it’s hard to learn in an environment like that. With a tutor you’re focusing on japanese itself instead of some other task, and you can practice grammar you’re unsure about stress free and get corrected, building confidence.
Are you getting active feedback on your Japanese from native speakers?
If no, do that.
If yes, do it more.
If you’ve gotten to the point where you can understand an N2/N1 level of Japanese, output is a matter of practice. But a mistake I see too much of is people assuming that if they just write or if they just speak, they will automatically get better. This is not true.
For output to mean something, feedback is an unavoidable and clear *necessity*. The reason being is you need to know clearly *what* you are doing wrong, not just *that* you are doing something wrong. Once you’ve got that, then you can start to work on it.
And don’t overthink it. Just give yourself the opportunity to improve, don’t shy from it, and you’ll find it’s quite easy to get into a decent habit of gradual correction and upwards improvement.