Please dont remove my post. I am really stuck here as I’m having a hard time struggling here. I know most of the basic Hirigana and Katakana now. I’ve also been using the Renshuu app its been a huge help for me especially me being a slow learner etc with a mild learning disability etc. Im not a fast learner but at least Im learning the language and I can remmeber symbols some what so I hope thats impressive for someone with a disability. I have a huge question. Where should I start learning words like how to say hi, how are you doing, etc in basic sentences? Im also starting to remember how to write the characters which is cool but im struggling with Kanji also. I also want to speak Japanese words also till I get them right. Etc. Should I also get a Japanese keyboard on my phone and PC and can playing games and watching anime help along meeting Natives on VR Chat etc using a VR Headset? They got language exchange stuff on there so I was wondering if thats a good idea to improve my Japanese. Hope someone can point me where I need to go. Thanks. If there are also books I can buy from Amazon that would be great too. Can someone DM them to me if you know anything? Thanks! I want to be able to read more symbols and I know you can’t do it over night but Im getting there. 🙂 Some what.
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The methods and tools everyone uses to learn vary wildly by the person. My recommendation is to try out any resources that seem appealing to you (hopefully with free trials if available) and see what clicks. There’s no perfect resource out there and sometimes the “best” ones just don’t work with how you learn. I have a small graveyard of books and apps that just didn’t work out for me while I was trying to find what would. Good luck to you!
Maybe start with videos on YouTube and later get a textbook.
Try the videos etc here: https://www.erin.jpf.go.jp/en/
Hey, you’re probably at the stage where learning basic vocabulary now is probably a good idea! It’ll help you learn the hiragana and katakana you’re not too familiar with too.
for instance げんきですか means how are you? using the knowledge you’ve already built up of how to read those hiragana, then double checking the ones you’re not sure of, you’ve just learned a basic phrase!
My advice would be, at this stage, don’t worry about kanji until you’re confident with hiragana and katakana. also don’t worry about sentence structure and just focus on set phrases. you can work up to something a bit more complicated such as “xがすきです” which means “I like x”, and you can replace x for any noun you like.
katakana can be a bit more tricky than hiragana since you’ll only really encounter it in foreign loanwords. however, a video my teachers sent my class to practise some katakana with was the song “Tokyo Bon” – the chorus involves lots of foreign brands + shows how they’re written in katakana.
so, a small challenge if you’d like! using that video, and the “I like x” example I gave, how would you say “I like Starbucks” in Japanese? feel free to just write the romaji if you don’t know how to type in Japanese characters yet!