Hrm hum hrm: New Approaches

Heisig has once again lost his luster. By the end of the book he becomes way less helpful, offering only some key terms instead of full breakdowns of stories. Obviously it gets harder the more complex the characters get, but studying kanji is hard anyhow, so you might as well be absorbing some actual Japanese along with it.

In the meantime, I've also discovered the limitations of learning from Japanese materials for kids. Not that they aren't obvious from the beginning, but basically, you're learning at a kid's level when you need to be gearing up to speak as an adult. It's a fundamental paradox of social venue (or something).

Enter the Kanji in Context books from The Japan Times. As it turns out, The Japan Times is my best friend. I think of all the textbooks I have used, theirs have felt the most targeted to my needs. I used the Genki books in college, and although the sitautional conversations are useful, I felt like for a beginner, themed vocab lessons work better (for instance, I still don't have a good grasp of "around the house" type of words). The intermediate --> advanced pair of books they have on grammar and vocab will be a big help, I think, and I'm finally almost ready to start using them. (It's been slow going, clearly, over the past year, but I'm intending that to change.)

*Vocab tangent* Think about a word floating in space. Say, 雲。So you have 雲 just hanging there, in the sky, say. This is speaking generally, not with specific reference to Genki, by the way... If you learn it with a bunch of random words like "chair," "lawyer," "puppy," and "DVD" (but 50 words instead of 5) you may not remember it as well. But if you learn 雲　with words like 晴れ, 雨, 天気, 空, then you have more of a picture (of the weather/sky). Then you can do lists for furniture, professions, animals, and movies. Incidentally, I think you can benefit from this kind of training no matter what level you are at. There are always gaps in vocabulary that can be filled in... *end tangent*

Anyways, I think I was going to talk about Kanji in Context. It's yet another book that I feel is intended exactly for me. Let me quote a bit from the introduction (bold is mine, italics are theirs):

"...created specifically for learners who have just completed a beginning course or have already learned a fair number of kanji at the intermediate or advanced level but would like to amplify their knowledge of kanji and kanji-based vocabulary in a systematic fashion."

Theoretically, I should know way more kanji than I do. I DID complete a beginner's course, and I used to be THE MAN when it came to kanji. What happened? Well, I didn't use them enough. I think this book will be a pretty big challenge for me, but I also am beginning to think that that is what I really need. I've done enough beginner style review to know that it isn't kicking my ass over the intermediate hump.

"At the intermediate level and above, the number of kanji needed by learners rises sharply. In order to effectively meet this growing need, it is not adequate to learn each new character randomly..."

Couldn't. Agree. More. This is one of my main problems, just the way that regardless of what goals in communication you are working on, regardless of what vocab you are trying to acquire, kanji has always sort of been its own beast. Hopefully this system will help give me some...CONTEXT ;)

"...traditional kanji textbooks have focused excessively on the study of characters one by one, providing only a sprinkling of vocabulary which , more than often , have little practical use for learners."

I'm really excited to get some practical use out of kanji. That is the only way to keep them around.

"The frequent contact with a particular kanji or word will reinforce its acquisition, while at the same time relieving learners of the pressure experienced under the single-presentation approach."

It is really hard to learn kanji or vocab when you only see them in one example.

I also picked up "the" Shadowing book (that you may also see everywhere, tempting you, the one with green all over it), and from initial exposure last night, I am really exited. The speakers sound pretty energetic, but also follow the intonation patterns I know already. I'm especially psyched to get into more complicated conversations, because it seems like the longer the sentences get right now, the more my intonation breaks down (which makes sense, which is why the book is arranged like it is.

So, (...as usual) I am really really really ready to just study forever. More than anything, it's about time, and I have taken some additional steps to free some up (like quitting my last freelance writing job). I really believe that if I make this as high a priority as possible, that I can really accomplish something. I must be able to! Gotta just...do it.