七ばん - Overcoming procrastination

Over the last few days I have felt my motivation for learning decrease a bit. The fact that this coincides with me starting a new semester of Japanese classes worries me. Am I wasting my time and money taking these classes when I could be spending this money on other learning resources and time trying to learn Japanese that isn't pre packaged and easy to swallow? The answer may well be yes but since I have already paid for 8 weeks of classes I now have to try and make the most of it...

So as I mentioned last time this post will be all about sentences. The joy of stringing multiple words together into meaningful bits of sound which eventually form a language... ahhh such wonderful things!

わたしのちちはほんをよんむこと、スキーをすること、ゴルフをすることがすきです。わたしはちちとゴルフをすることがすきじゃないですけどかれとスキーをすることがすきです。そしてまたときどきかれはおもしろいほんをもっています。
My father likes reading books, skiing and playing golf. I dont like playing golf with my father but I like skiing with him.　Also sometimes he has interesting books.

そのくるまはとてもちさいでもものすごくやすい.
This car is very small, but it is quite cheap.

きょうあたらしいかんじのポスターをかった
Today I bought a new kanji poster.

そのコンピュターはふるくて、やすくて、ほしくない。
This computer is old and cheap, I dont want it.

わたしたちはおれのうちにちかい、でもあなたのうちからとおいです。
We are near my home but far from your home.

六ばん - Climbing the mountain.

Working through Heisig continues, unfortunately not at the rate of 25 Kanji a day which I hoped to stay up around. Sickness and just doing other stuff have prevented this but progress is still being made so onwards ho...up to number 70 now, phew only 1968 to go! and then learning there readings... But at least Kanji is much more logical then English. It is so nice to use individual symbols with so much meaning attached. Anyways time for some new words and sentences. Since these poss are becoming more spaced out I should go for a few more than usual:

The Family:

おとうさん - (another persons) Father
おかあさん - (another persons) Mother
ちち - (my) Father
はは - (my) Mother
あに - Older Brother
あね - Older Sister
おとうと - Younger brother
いもと - Younger Sister
むすに - Son
むそめ - Daughter

Nouns
　
てがみ - Letter
はな - Flower
パン - Bread
いす - Chair

Adjectives

ちさい - Small
たかい - Expensive
やすい - Cheap
あたらしい - New
ふるい - Old
ちかい - Near
とおい - Far
やさしい - Easy
あまい - Sweet
からい - Hot, spicy
いそがしい - Busy


That will do for this post... next post will be all about sentence, bringing all these together and try and get some flow happening..あさみしまい！

ごばん - Learning the best way

Watched an interesting Lecture by John Medina, a Molecular Physicist who specializes in Neuroscience (I think thats what he is... bah whatever...) and he was talking about how traditional learning environments are so counter productive to the way our brain is designed to learn. So to the point I want to use this process of learning Japanese as a way to understand learning in a new way that's not focused on 'study' but rather a necessary reaction to understand my environment...hmm maybe thats just a way of saying study..

This will be nice to look back on but its not helping me learn, So back to the aim:

NUMBERS (Kanji Time!)

一　いち
二　に
三　さん
四　よん
五　ご
六　ろく
七　なな
八　はち
九　く 十　
じゅう　

百　ひゃく
千　せん
万　まん

NOUNS

天気　てんき　Weather


Adjectives

ようじ - Business / something to do

じつは - Confession/ to tell the truth

しゅみ - hobby

いちごいちえ - Once in a life time chance.

について - about

いつも - always

hmm can I put these all together?

じつはあしたよじがある。あたらしいしゅみをみつけたい。なにかいつもしたい。あとでせつめいする。。

Ok one more new word there:

せつめいする - Explain

Didn't use について not sure about what contexts it can be used in... so follow up I will..
Damn my consistency of posts isn't great but now Im starting to embark on heisigs Kanji Learning books so they will probably be few and far between for a while...がんばって！！

よんばん - Beginning of SRS and finding inspiration

After looking around the internet at the vast amount of resources for learning Japanese I had become slightly overwhelmed. Where to start, what to learn first and what materials to use? There seemed to be so much information it was hard to decide what was going to help me the best. So stepping back and breaking it down I have managed to focus on a few things which I can hopefully keep developing to suit my learning needs:

1. My weekly Japanese class. Although some website have been critical of such classes I find this occasional interaction helps keep me motivated and structure my week by week progress.

2. Mp3 Audio: I have switched from Pimsleur Audio course to www.japanesepod101.com which are so much more interactive and engaging than the pimsleur series. So these will fill in what ever spare time I have, along with listening to Japanese music.

3. This blog and read writing exercises: Probably the most negleted area to date but Im working on this as it is an essential component. I am really keen to get into Kanji and need to strucure in more reading/writing time.

4.SRS: Spaced Repetition System is something I discoverd at www.alljapanesallthetime.com. This idea of inputing key sentences and words and doing reps which vary in consistency depending on your ability to remember them makes sense, so I will continue to add the sentences I create on this blog.

5.Talking:The last and most obvious... practicing real conversation whenever I can!

Enough point making, time for some new words:

VERBS　（ます - form)

かきます - To Write

おくります - To Send

つくります - to

NOUNS

イタリアりょうり - Italian Food

おんがく - Music

にわ - Garden

しょくぶつえん - Bottanical Garden

JUST ONE SENTENCE TODAY:

きょう しょくぶつえんでほんをよみましたそのあとでうちにいきましたそしてイタリアりょうりを作りましたそしてにほんのおんがくをききました

Next time... Grammer, use of original forms and conjagation of verbs. Kanji.. its time to start looking at this... Hooray! :p