I started out pretty late in terms of training my listening comprehension. I’ve been learning Japanese for a long time but listening wise, I only started 8 months ago.
I made friends with Japanese people in my city and I have been meeting up with them while watching anime & youtube on the side with intention to learn.
It’s worked out quite well as it’s almost been a year. It went from everything literally sounding like a blur of slurred words to being able to catch each word being said from videos and during coversations with my japanese friends.
Now the question is what is the most efficient way to learn new words from television?
I have a current method of my own I been using but I’m curious what you guys do?
4 comments
Podcasts going to and back from work. Videogames and anime as much as I can without taking time from other hobbies.
The best way I found is to insert Japanese in my life the same way as if I was already fluent. In the beginning it was hard because I needed to look up a lot of words, but this goes down quickly and I ended up finding a system that works and is quick for me. The language is already part of my life and, while I’m not confident that I understand everything, I get better at it everyday and it doesn’t feel like I’m just grinding for studying.
Seconding podcasts, as the answer for the question in the title. In my case I listened to them every day while going for walks. Some recommendations:
– Nihongo con Teppei. A podcast for learners, with so much content that you’ll only listen to a fraction of it before moving on to harder stuff. Try the intermediate version, but if that’s too hard you can give the basic one a go.
– 4989 American Life. Really easy to understand for a podcast which is aimed at natives (but a bit harder than the previous one). A Japanese woman living in California talks about her life.
I tend to use listening comprehension videos on YouTube, it’s nice because if most of the time they will include Japanese subtitles. So, if you misheard something you can see the word written out and relisten to the sentence whilst having the pronunciation in your mind.
for me, i listened to a lot of BLCDs. i did this on repeat to the point where i was able to say all the lines haha i also listened to a lot of voice actor radios (i still do) but for voice actor videos, i actively shadowed simultaneously