#soz anon. my jap ability doesnt go much further than ‘understands enough basics to read things’

[endless-season]

Hello! I’ll be spending a minimester (Jan 4-18th) in Japan next year and I’m sort of new to the language, do you have any advice on how to improve (at least make coherent sentences, learn the alphabet)??

Oooo nice! And ooo so prepared :’)

Someone who can’t actually string a proper grammatically correct sentence together in Jap probably shouldn’t be answering this…. (My En>Jap ability is almost nonexistent) so I suggest finding someone more suitable to ask t b h!!!

With that in mind, take the below with a grain of salt!!

Disclaimer: the following are hacky tips for making the most of your limited knowledge at various stages rather than a recommended way to learn Jap properly. If you have the time to learn Jap properly, please follow a set textbook (with audio sections you can refer to else YouTube works) or course and also find a native Jap speaker (either someone you know or maybe through one of those online language learning penpal portals) to practise conversations with (doesn’t need to be verbal, can be written if your pronounciation is decent)

If you’re super new then obviously memorizing hiragana and katakana is important. (How else will you search things up in a dictionary :D /bricked) If you don’t have much time then flash cards a minute a day could be a start… there’s also a bunch of visual cue cards out there if that’s what works for you.

Basic life living and conversational vocab is important! Even if your grammar is super basic, there is more chance of someone understanding you if you’ve got the keywords down!!!

There’s a bunch of learning apps and websites out there that are useful especially (imo) the ones that follow JLPT levels for learning grammar points… after you learn common particles/grammar it gets a lot easier to break sentences up so you know can fudge your way through with a dictionary if necessary…….. I have no advice on grammar bc my grammar sucks :| if anything just randomly think of normal sentences you say on a daily basis and attempt to translate them bc it feels more relevant and fresh.

Kanji is important and you should memorize them as you go and put in some effort to memorize idk the most commonly used 300 or something to start with but if you’re not gonna be doing any writing then you can just try to recognize them for reading purposes rather than ROTE learn how to actually write them.