Howdy all!
I lived in Japan from 2008 to 2013 (JET Programme). I knew 0 Japanese before I went. I studied and had a tutor and got to a pretty decent level – but mostly in talking and listening, which is what I wanted.
During my latter years on JET, I hit a plateau, my priorities changed, and I never pushed on. I sat JLPT N3 at some stage and failed.
It’s 9 years later, and I might be moving back to Japan in the future. My speaking is still decent, as is my listening. My reading (and writing) is atrocious. I used Duolingo over the past 2 years to refresh what’s dormant, and it worked, I even learned a few new words.
But I don’t really know what to do, where to go from here. I’ve reached out to some native teachers in my area, but haven’t heard back. I keep thinking “Maybe I should aim for the JLPT, start with N4 or N5, hit an easy target”, but then some of the grammar etc is easy, so it’s hard to focus on it.
Anyone have any tips?
4 comments
Just start reading visual novels. You seem to be at a perfect level for that
You’re going to have to do something more than play with Duolingo. Jesus, that’s a *toy*. Drop that shit and get yourself some serious learning materials. It sounds like your learning history to date has been filled with a lot of “pretending to study” rather than anything that resembles actual serious study, as well as no small amount of self-delusion regarding the results. *Five years* in Japan on a paid workfare vacation that lots of people use to get themselves to N2 or N1 and you only managed to *fail* N3? Time to be honest with yourself: you half-assed it big time and were content to think you were at a “pretty decent level” mainly because the people here have such low expectations of us and praise us to high heaven no matter what crap our Japanese is.
If your speaking is much better than your kanji, and you have Spotify, sing along to Japanese songs while looking at the lyrics Spotify often displays. It will help you make connections to kanji with words you already know!
I have a terrible memory, so although you don’t need to know how to write, it helps me remember them better so I use an app on my iPad that makes me write the correct kanji for the blanks in a sentence.
Also putting Japanese subs on Japanese tv, works similarly to the song thing.
Using kanji flash cards and stuff doesn’t work for me, my brain needs more context to remember them. I am trying to read more as I’ve been getting better at kanji, but going straight to reading earlier on was really tiring and crushed motivation bc I had to often stop and look stuff up, so if you aren’t even N3, easy shows with subs etc might be a smoother entry point.
Oh yeah I also bought Japanese audio book and physical book and played it as I read!
If reading is your main issue right now … why not read? I am not talking about Duolingo stories. Pick some easy native books (e.g. https://learnnatively.com/resources/search/?min=20&max=26&jlpt=n3&type=light_novel,novel,short_story ) and a dictionary (e.g. Yomichan) and get started.