Finding Movies with Japanese dubs and/or subtitles

So, after much searching on Amazon, I've finally figured out how to find Japanese dubbed/subtitled movies without going to amazon.co.jp.

By going to Advanced Search (which is hard to find, but I have provided a link here: Amazon Advanced Search) and selecting movies, you are able to choose the Language Audio Track and Subtitles for the movies you want to purchase.  I found a TON that I want to buy when I get my next round of school money!  Can't wait!

６日目：Figuring it all out.

I was checking out AJATT today and went through the table of contents, where I found the overview page, which basically breaks down the entire process, including a diagram of what you should be doing and when.  He says on there, that you should do the Kanji FIRST, before anything else.  Just learn the Kanji and their English meaning and don't worry about sentences until the Kanji is completed.  Because of this, I have decided to change my routine back to the original plan. (I haven't really done much with my sentences anyway).

I also figured that I should make a nice diagram of my own, to better demonstrate the method I am using because the one on AJATT, though informative, is poorly designed.

The steps are as follows:

1. Setup an Immersion Environment that is continuous.
2. 2000+ Kanji (Reps are continued indefinitely)
3. Kana until complete
4. An additional 1000+ Kanji (Reps are continued indefinitely)
5. Sentences (Reps are continued indefinitely)

I also plan to setup a progress bar for each of these sections to keep everyone updated on my progress.

So, with this I have kinda figured out my scheduling and can better deal with the workload.
On a side note, I have found that by writing out the Kanji, I turn the learning into a sort of "game", where I try to remember the appropriate stroke orders.  I have also been trying to speed run the Kanji, by going as quickly as I can while writing them to see how quickly I can do my reps.  It's a bit more entertaining.

Kanji Report for 5/25/2014:

Studied 302 cards in 74 minutes today.
Learn: 134
Review: 100
Relearn: 68

Total: 258 reviews
Average: 19.8 reviews/day
Due tomorrow: 94 cards.

I would also like to report that I have completed 302 Kanji, for 16% complete.

５日目：Seems I forgot a day somewhere.

So, it seems I forgot a day, or forgot to post or something...not sure which.  But here is today's report:

Kanji Report:

Studied 554 cards in 122 minutes today.
Learn: 240
Review: 96
Relearn: 218

Total: 270 reviews
Average: 20.8 reviews/day
Due tomorrow: 144 cards.

I think I also forgot to do a day of Kanji...so I had to double up.  This was a LOT of work.  SOOO many cards to go over to get caught back up.  But I'm back on track and right where I need to be.

I've also taken to writing my Kanji out as I get them right, so that I have written practice as well.  Below is today's written practice.

4日目: 私は本を欲しいでした。

本を持っています。でも、私は本を聞くしたかった。

Audiobooks are proving to be an amazing immersion tool.   Just turn it on and "hear" it. No need to "listen", no need to even try. Just have it playing in the background while you do housework, cook, ride in the car, go for a jog. Basically have it playing all the time unless you're doing something else in Japanese that requires you to listen, like watching a TV show, movie, or anime. 

I would also suggest an iPod for this, making your Japanese more mobile. 

Are you in school?  Listen during lunch or between classes.  Pretty much anytime you can be listening to Japanese, you will be learning Japanese. 

Why listen?  Listening comprehension is a major priority for any language. Children learn their language entirely by listening and having things put into context for them, either through questions or by being shown an item and having the word for that item being repeated over and over until it sinks in. 

We don't have this luxury. We don't have a Japanese mama (お母さん)watching over us and pointing at things. We have to be our own mothers and find out for ourselves.  The best method for this is through movies and television shows.  Combine the two and you're a learning machine!

Today's Report 5/21/2014

Reporting in for the day!

Kanji Report:

Studied 281 cards in 68 minutes today.
Learn: 134
Review: 89
Relearn: 58

Total: 206 reviews
Average: 15.8 reviews/day
Due tomorrow: 98 cards.

Day 3: 家政婦のミタ/kaseifu no mita (I'm Mita, the Housekeeper)

Today I stumbled upon 家政婦のミタ on Crunchyroll.com.  Although this television drama is no longer in production, I am really enjoying the plot.  Plus, the show is subtitled, so I actually know what's going on.

I like Crunchyroll.com.  It seems to have a lot of good shows that I'll probably been spending a lot of time enjoying! I even got their app on my iPhone so I can watch when I'm back in school.

Today's report. 5/20/2014

Reporting in for the day!

Kanji Report:

Studied 196 cards in 51 minutes today.
Learn: 105
Review: 65
Relearn: 26

Total: 172 reviews
Average: 17.4 reviews/day
Due tomorrow: 89 cards.

Absolute Zero

I realize that some people are reading these posts that have no background in Japanese at all and want to learn the language as well, so I decided to post something about starting at absolute zero. Or "How to learn Japanese when you don't know any Japanese."

I have the fortune of taking Japanese classes in college and have already been through the elementary level courses.  In those courses the main focus at the beginning was learning to read and write kana.

Kana refers to the Japanese alphabets of hiragana and katakana.  Hiragana is used for the pronunciation of Japanese words, while Katakana is used for foreign words.

Below is the list of all of the Hiragana and Katakana as well as practice sheets for learning to write them.  These would be best used while studying sentences in Anki.  Just write the sentence out to practice the letters.

You will also want to learn stroke order.  I HIGHLY recommend these sheets.
Hiragana Stroke Order Sheets
Katakana Stroke Order Sheets

HIRAGANA:

The basic 48 hiragana characters.

When a " or o is used next to an hiragana character, the pronunciation changes.

Adding a small YA, YU, or YO also changes the pronunciation.

A small TSU means to lengthen the following consonant.

A ー means to lengthen the previous vowel.

KATAKANA:

The basic 48 katakana characters.

When a " or o is used next to an hiragana character, the pronunciation changes.

Adding a small YA, YU, or YO also changes the pronunciation.

A small TSU means to lengthen the following consonant.

A ー means to lengthen the previous vowel.

JAPANESE WRITING PRACTICE SHEETS: Download (right click and save)

Japanese write verically from top to bottom, right to left.

The early stages.

I am finding that, as I start the early stages of my self-study my hunger for the language is growing ever so slightly. I WANT to do more Kanji. I WANT to start doing sentence reps. I WANT to speed up the process and get to the really fun stuff, like: watching Japanese television, reading Japanese books, and listening to Japanese music, all with some degree of understanding of the language.

However, I know that baby steps are required for things like this.

I did decide to start doing sentences. Mostly because I wasn't spending enough active time engaging with Japanese, but also to speed up the process. I figured that if I run across a kanji that I don't know in the sentences,  then I can learn it there and when I see it in the Kanji lesson, I will already have it mastered. "Two birds with one stone" as they say.

Tools of the trade

I thought it would be a good idea to post links to all the tools I am using to study all of this.

First thing you will need is Anki.
http://www.ankisrs.net

I am using the RTK (Remembering the Kanji) deck created by Adam Shapiro at JapaneseLevelUp.com.  This website is a great resource for learning Japanese on your own.

http://japaneselevelup.com/japanese-level-up-rtk-mod-anki-deck/

There is a download link on that page to download the Anki deck.

I have the "8547 Japanese Sentences - from the 日本語文法辞典/Nihongo bunpou jiten (Japanese Grammar Dictionary)" deck from https://ankiweb.net/shared/info/2032035930 that I will be using for sentence reps.

Hope this helps anyone who is also working on learning Japanese, or who wants to get into Japanese!

Am I doing enough?

I have been thinking that I may not be doing enough to hasten my learning and facilitate a proper learning environment. 

Based on my reports from the Kanji, I am only studying for less than one hour each day. 

Although this is probably just fine for my Kanji learning, since I don't want to overdo the number of Kanji I input each day, it still feels like I am not putting in an ample amount of effort. 

One hour is NOT enough. 

I think, that in order to spend more intimate time with the language, I will change my schedule for sentences and start them tomorrow instead of two months from now. 

In light of this new goal, I will also be changing the number of sentences required to reach my goal to 3000. 

This is a hefty increase in my Japanese input and should have me spending more time actively engaged with the language. 

Time to make a timetable!

So, I decided that in order to properly iron out my plan it was best if I wrote up a timetable to keep me on track.

When I decided to do this project, I had made an error in assumption.  I assumed I would be learning 1900 Kanji over the course of 3 months.  To my horror, I had miscalculated and forgot about the 1000 sentences I want to do AFTER the Kanji is finished.

So, in order to keep things in perspective for myself, I am creating this timetable:

Activity	Number Required	Time to Complete	Number Needed Per Day	Estimated Completion Date
Kanji	1900	60 Days	32	7/18/2014
Sentences	1000	30 Days	34	8/18/2014

This is a reasonable goal, considering I am currently doing 25 new Kanji a day.  But if I continued on my current path I wouldn't reach my goal.

New resource: Lang-8.com

So, I found a really cool website, www.lang-8.com, for when I start with my sentence reps.  Its a blogging website, where you post to a journal and have native speakers correct your work!  So once I get more comfortable with the language I can post sentences there and have them polished over by people who already speak Japanese.

Today's report 5/19/2014

Reporting in for the day!

Kanji Report:

Studied 259 cards in 54 minutes today.
Learn: 155
Review: 72
Relearn: 32

Total: 142 reviews
Average: 20.3 reviews/day
Due tomorrow: 65 cards.

Day 2: 映画を検索しています。/Eiga o kensaku shite imasu. (Searching for movies.)

I am on a hunt...

Hollywood movies that have been dubbed into Japanese are INCREDIBLY elusive.

Yes, there are a ton on Amazon.co.jp...but I don't have that kind of money.  Also, I'm not very sure if the movies I would buy from there would have a Japanese dub.  My fluency is just not quite there yet.

I DO however, has an account at NicoNico.jp which is Japan's version of Youtube.com.  They have TONS of short clips that are in Japanese and even have Japanese television shows.

When my proficiency is better, and wallet fatter, I will certainly try Amazon.  Until then, I need the free stuff.

If anyone has any suggestions on another great resource for Japanese dubbed films, please leave them in the comments below!

Today's report 5/18/2014

Reporting in for the day!

Kanji Report:

Studied 225 cards in 46 minutes today.
Learn: 168
Review: 35
Relearn: 22

Total: 110 reviews
Average: 27.5 reviews/day
Due tomorrow: 72 cards.

Day 1: 僕の目標/boku no mokuhyou (My Goal)

Today is the start of my journey and the point where I should laid down my ground rules and set some goals.  But first, I'm going to talk about what I'm doing and why I'm doing it.

So, the point of this blog is to force a degree of accountability for my actions or lack thereof.  My intention is to post daily about my journey to learn Japanese through self study over the course of 3 months (summer session from school).

A little background: 
I have taken Japanese classes in college.  Two of them to be precise, both of which were elementary courses, putting me at the intermediate level of Japanese for the purposes of taking another class.  However, it's been two years since I've taken a Japanese course and I feel like I'm a bit rusty. (That's putting it mildly.  I don't remember a lot of Kanji or how to pronounce it.)

My tools:

• Software: Anki (Spaced Repetition Software used like flashcards to help with memorization of material) 
• Book: Remembering the Kanji/RTK (Used with a deck for Anki to better understand and memorize kanji characters) 
• Anki Decks:  I have RTK 1 and 3 as well as a sentence deck that was downloaded through Anki.

The rules:

• Study daily.
• Blog daily, even if there's nothing to even report. 
• Finish by the start of the next school semester. (August)
• Rules can be added, but not removed.

The goals:

• Learn at least 1900 Kanji characters. I don't have to know the pronunciation of the characters, only their meaning.
• Study 1000+ sentences and learn the Kanji pronunciations from sentences.
• Be able to follow a Japanese television show's dialogue.
• Be able to read an easy Japanese novel without being glued to a dictionary for every word.
• Be more than ready for Japanese classes in August.  (I plan to minor in Japanese).

The process:

• I will be listening to Japanese music and watching Japanese movies for passive learning throughout the whole process.  Much like a child learns to speak, first they listen for a very long time.  Input before output.
• I will start with learning all 1900 Kanji first.  I feel that in order to learn Kanji reading I should be able to associate that reading with its meaning.  
• I will learn sentence structure from 1000+ sentence cards after all 1900 Kanji in the deck have been learned.

Let the learning begin!  Wish me luck!