Comments on: Book Review: Understanding Basic Japanese Grammar http://www.alljapaneseallthetime.com/blog/book-review-understanding-basic-japanese-grammar How to learn Japanese. On your own, having fun and to fluency. Sat, 22 Nov 2008 12:26:21 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.5 By: ルイス http://www.alljapaneseallthetime.com/blog/book-review-understanding-basic-japanese-grammar#comment-8016 ルイス Thu, 13 Mar 2008 05:22:34 +0000 http://www.alljapaneseallthetime.com/blog/book-review-understanding-basic-japanese-grammar#comment-8016 I completely left out why I was on AJATT to begin with. Did you have a post about how many sentences are in each book? I could have sworn you did. If not, would you consider having the readers submit estimates for books they've used, and books you've used? I completely left out why I was on AJATT to begin with. Did you have a post about how many sentences are in each book? I could have sworn you did. If not, would you consider having the readers submit estimates for books they’ve used, and books you’ve used?

]]> By: ルイス http://www.alljapaneseallthetime.com/blog/book-review-understanding-basic-japanese-grammar#comment-8015 ルイス Thu, 13 Mar 2008 05:18:07 +0000 http://www.alljapaneseallthetime.com/blog/book-review-understanding-basic-japanese-grammar#comment-8015 Sorry about the derailed sentences, I should really read what I write before I hit submit. Sorry about the derailed sentences, I should really read what I write before I hit submit.

]]> By: ルイス http://www.alljapaneseallthetime.com/blog/book-review-understanding-basic-japanese-grammar#comment-8014 ルイス Thu, 13 Mar 2008 05:16:23 +0000 http://www.alljapaneseallthetime.com/blog/book-review-understanding-basic-japanese-grammar#comment-8014 Hi Khatzumoto, I decided to buy this book after reading this review a while back. Thank you! I think it's fantastic. I also picked up Japanese in MangaLand, because, event though I don't read manga, it sounded like a cool concept. About the Nishiguchi book though, it's just like you said it is. Each concept has more than enough example sentences to get the idea. And the concepts return later on in more detailed and complex forms, with even more examples. The last con on your list "only has a few illustrations, these are all small and in black and white," is a pro! That means more room for grammar! About the MangaLand book... Hmm...I haven't started on it yet. I was worried about wiring my brain with manga-speak before I got the basics down. But I did flip through it, and a lot of the example sentences I saw were really rude looking, a few mentioned murder and such. There was a pickup line that made me laugh, but I don't think it would work in the real world. I think there was also a section devoted to how to read katakana onomatopoeias. This section seems fascinating though, because I had no idea that dogs and cats and cars make different speak dog and cat and car-Japanese. Lol... As far as sentence-mining goes, it's about 90% English. I'm not too excited about MangaLand...but that was just my first impression. I hope it's better than it seems... But thanks again for this write-up. This book is much more suited to the method than other books I've seen (Genki, JfBP, Japanese Step by Step <---Abomination!). You should add it to your Phase X pane, definitely! Hi Khatzumoto,

I decided to buy this book after reading this review a while back. Thank you! I think it’s fantastic. I also picked up Japanese in MangaLand, because, event though I don’t read manga, it sounded like a cool concept.

About the Nishiguchi book though, it’s just like you said it is. Each concept has more than enough example sentences to get the idea. And the concepts return later on in more detailed and complex forms, with even more examples. The last con on your list “only has a few illustrations, these are all small and in black and white,” is a pro! That means more room for grammar!

About the MangaLand book…

Hmm…I haven’t started on it yet. I was worried about wiring my brain with manga-speak before I got the basics down. But I did flip through it, and a lot of the example sentences I saw were really rude looking, a few mentioned murder and such. There was a pickup line that made me laugh, but I don’t think it would work in the real world. I think there was also a section devoted to how to read katakana onomatopoeias. This section seems fascinating though, because I had no idea that dogs and cats and cars make different speak dog and cat and car-Japanese. Lol…

As far as sentence-mining goes, it’s about 90% English. I’m not too excited about MangaLand…but that was just my first impression. I hope it’s better than it seems…

But thanks again for this write-up. This book is much more suited to the method than other books I’ve seen (Genki, JfBP, Japanese Step by Step <—Abomination!).

You should add it to your Phase X pane, definitely!

]]> By: Charles A http://www.alljapaneseallthetime.com/blog/book-review-understanding-basic-japanese-grammar#comment-5716 Charles A Thu, 20 Dec 2007 09:41:33 +0000 http://www.alljapaneseallthetime.com/blog/book-review-understanding-basic-japanese-grammar#comment-5716 Yesterday, I went to the mall to replace the two Kodansha books I lost on the bus and happened to see one copy of this book on the shelf. Being only $17 or so (1900 yen), it's not a big dent, so I bought it along with the other three books. I can see the benefit of it flipping through the pages. It's as dense as Japanese for Everyone but without the wasted space of "exercises". Now, I'm finding myself torn. I had just begun using Genki for structure and progression with Kodansha's Verbs, Particles and Adjective books as supplemental sentence sources. This book kinda does all that for me. Oh well. I'll go with UBJG as it's less page flipping. Yesterday, I went to the mall to replace the two Kodansha books I lost on the bus and happened to see one copy of this book on the shelf. Being only $17 or so (1900 yen), it’s not a big dent, so I bought it along with the other three books. I can see the benefit of it flipping through the pages. It’s as dense as Japanese for Everyone but without the wasted space of “exercises”.

Now, I’m finding myself torn. I had just begun using Genki for structure and progression with Kodansha’s Verbs, Particles and Adjective books as supplemental sentence sources. This book kinda does all that for me. Oh well. I’ll go with UBJG as it’s less page flipping.

]]> By: Brett http://www.alljapaneseallthetime.com/blog/book-review-understanding-basic-japanese-grammar#comment-1878 Brett Thu, 26 Jul 2007 09:51:58 +0000 http://www.alljapaneseallthetime.com/blog/book-review-understanding-basic-japanese-grammar#comment-1878 Khatzu - Good on you for this site. I've been floundering for a while and since I stumbled upon this, I've been super motivated to get back on track. While these methods aren't new for me, I admit it never even occured to me to get systematic on the setences before. What I would do occasionally is put some funny sentence (usually from Jim Breen's Jdic) into my flashcard prog to help me remember some new word/piece of grammar. The sentences would invevitably stick and I could often whip them out for fun at opportune moments. One of my favorites was - それから、最後の恐ろしい叫び声とともに、怪物は山から下方の岩に身を投げて死んだ。 I didn't manage to say it too often for obvious reasons, but after the first time it was permanently imbedded in my brain. I'm sold on the children's dictionary. I just ordered it. And the shipping costs more than the book which sucks (I'm in Thailand). I guess I've been laddering Japanese from Thai because I have too. I've never seen any Japanese-J or Chinese-C dictionary here and its kind of expensive to order them from abroad. I have another book to recomend which is rather fun and even a relatively high-level beginner could make use of... ドラえもんの国語おもしろ攻略 漢字・熟語を使い分ける (ドラえもんの学習シリーズ) (単行本) ISBN4-09-253189-3 Its a kids book (Doraemon) so it has plenty of furigana for those characters you can't read yet. It has a bit of everything: idioms(熟語）, Homonyms (同音異義語),　antonyms and more. The setup has Doraemon explaning all these things to Nobita. Check it out. PS - Can you give us some more starter sentences please ? Khatzu - Good on you for this site. I’ve been floundering for a while and since I stumbled upon this, I’ve been super motivated to get back on track. While these methods aren’t new for me, I admit it never even occured to me to get systematic on the setences before. What I would do occasionally is put some funny sentence (usually from Jim Breen’s Jdic) into my flashcard prog to help me remember some new word/piece of grammar. The sentences would invevitably stick and I could often whip them out for fun at opportune moments. One of my favorites was -

それから、最後の恐ろしい叫び声とともに、怪物は山から下方の岩に身を投げて死んだ。

I didn’t manage to say it too often for obvious reasons, but after the first time it was permanently imbedded in my brain.

I’m sold on the children’s dictionary. I just ordered it. And the shipping costs more than the book which sucks (I’m in Thailand). I guess I’ve been laddering Japanese from Thai because I have too. I’ve never seen any Japanese-J or Chinese-C dictionary here and its kind of expensive to order them from abroad.

I have another book to recomend which is rather fun and even a relatively high-level beginner could make use of…

ドラえもんの国語おもしろ攻略 漢字・熟語を使い分ける (ドラえもんの学習シリーズ) (単行本)
ISBN4-09-253189-3

Its a kids book (Doraemon) so it has plenty of furigana for those characters you can’t read yet. It has a bit of everything: idioms(熟語）, Homonyms (同音異義語),　antonyms and more. The setup has Doraemon explaning all these things to Nobita. Check it out.

PS - Can you give us some more starter sentences please ?

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