久しぶりですね？

I've been in a rut lately with studying Japanese, but I've found a new motivation! I want to take a class whose prerequisite includes the first Japanese course. Therefore, I need to study effectively and fast in order to pass that benchmark.

I've moved on to trying more structured courses including Rosetta Stone and Genki textbooks.  This way I feel as if I've actually learned something with my studies.

An introduction of myself:
はじめまして。ライラともします。大学院生です。二年生です。専門はコンピューターです。今年、十八歳です。　家族は六人です。父と母と兄と姉と姉と私です。どうぞよろしくお願いします。

S2 Day 4: Progress!

Wow, I think my approach this year is far better than last year.  I feel as if I can really see progress! I mean, I can actually read parts of a sentence and roughly know what it's talking about!

I took a sample quiz or two on the Meguro Learning Center page and my marks weren't bad! I feel motivated all over again to really pass that N5 landmark and I think I'll only need a month at this rate (assuming I don't fall back) and then after that maybe I'll be motivated still to get through the N4 material? I really hope so! One of the things I'm really lacking though is being able to remember how to write the kanji.  I can read and recognize them, but I don't remember how they look when I go to write!

I do feel a little embarrassed that I still don't have the katakana re-memorized.  I'm really lazy though to learn them all again, so I mainly just kind of guess at what they are (it's pretty easy if the particular word comes in English).

昨日はとってもあつい！

S2 Day 3: Conjugations!

It's about time I got down and finally learned how to conjugate things properly. I'll probably compile this into an Anki deck when I stop being lazy, but for now, here it goes.

na-adjectives

好き
positive non-past: 魚が好きなタイプ。
negative non-past: 魚が好きじゃないタイプ。
positive past: 魚が好きだったタイプ。
negative past: 魚が好きじゃなかったタイプ。

So in this case, the sentences above describe Type and whether the type is one that likes, doesn't like, liked, or didn't like fish.

i-adjectives

高い
positive non-past: 高い
negative non-past: 高くない
positive past: 高かった
negative past: 高くなかった

With these, we can add the conjugation directly to the front of a noun. So 高い男の子 would mean tall boy and 高くなかった男の子 would mean boy who was not tall.

The only exception to the conjugation is いい which means good.

いい
positive non-past: いい
negative non-past: よくない（良くない）
positive past: よかった（良かった）
negative past: よくなかった（良くなかった）

The adjective かっこいい, cool, behaves the same way.

一段動詞 Type II -ru Verbs

見る（みる）
positive non-past: 見る
negative non-past: 見ない

五段動詞 Type I -u Verbs

飲む（のむ）
positive non-past: 飲む
negative non-past: 飲まない

I don't know if I want to tackle memorizing the past forms for the verbs since I feel as if I already have enough to memorize for today.

S2 Day 2: Japanese Learning Communities

I really want to get a study partner (someone who is also natively an English speaker (or even French might be acceptable) and is learning Japanese, so I've been exploring different language learning communities.

Some of the well-kept secrets I found were http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum and http://www.alljapaneseallthetime.com/blog/.

Other resources I found today were http://jisho.org/ which is an online Japanese<->English dictionary and https://chrome.google.com/extensions/detail/jipdnfibhldikgcjhfnomkfpcebammhp which is the rikai extension for Google Chrome.

I've also been taking a new direction and trying to follow the AJATT way of mastering Japanese by just exposing myself to as much Japanese listening as possible as well as learning as many sentences as possible.

Sentences for today:
ベジタリアンです。だから　肉はだめだ。
I'm a vegetarian, so meat is no good.

この傘は幾多ですか？
How much is this umbrella?

静かな彼女は馬鹿ですね？
The quiet girl is stupid, isn't she?

S2 Day 2 Grammar Review

Since it has been about a year since I've studied any Japanese, I'm reviewing grammar points for today so that I can write sentences!

I'm starting off with Tae Kim's Guide to Learning Japanese.

I went through the chapters through the i-adjectives.  I keep forgetting how to conjugate those ones.

There's also a publicly available Anki set for Tae Kim's Guide to Learning Japanese which is an excellent study supplement!

Study Plan Session 2

I'm going to work on building up writing and reading skills for this session. Previously (last year), I was trying to tank my way into Japanese by learning as much vocabulary as possible.  However, learning vocabulary without learning much grammar and sentence structure really hinders applicable language learning and becomes discouraging in the long run (as I cannot see the results of my efforts).

This session, I'm aiming to be able to write something a little less basic than just the standard introduction.  It's good that I've built up some vocabulary, but I also need to learn how to apply what I've learned to something meaningful.

The study plan goals are:
- Learn grammar points from http://thejapanesepage.com/grammar.htm
- Learn grammar points from Tae Kim's Guide to Learning Japanese
- Retain vocabulary by writing a few sentences everyday
- Learn vocabulary related to talking about oneself

I'm keeping the study plan free form and only including the goals of this session. Because I have a full-time job, I don't want to plan out my study habits and find that I cannot follow through on them because of not having the time to complete them.

Session 2 Day 1 Kanji

In order to make the kanji for the JLPT N5 (formally known as JLPT 4), I thought it would be better to have phrases with the specific kanji in it along with sentences that apply that phrase. This list was gathered from http://www.jlptstudy.com/N5/ which I highly recommend for studying the JLPT.
一

一握り （ひとにぎり）n. adj-no. handful, small handful

近所には一握りのいたずらっ子がいる。
きんじょにはひとにぎりのいたずらっこがいる。
There are a small handful of naughty boys in my neighborhood.

近所（きんじょう） n. neighborhood

一員（いちいん） n. person, member

君はいまやエリート集団の一員だ。
きみはいまやエリートしゅうだんのいちいんだ。
You are now among the elite.

集団（しゅうだん）n. group, mass

Revival of Journey to JLPT

I will be trying to go back and study Japanese again this summer (mostly only for this month), but again, I'll be documenting my study of Japanese and perhaps trying to optimize other beginners' learning of Japanese later.