Here are off-the-top-of-my-head impressions of my second and final semester at Waseda University's intensive Japanese program.
Kanji learning through the media 5-6
This class was consistently interesting and useful. I'm not sure how much "through the media" was involved per se, but we did look at a couple news articles and viewed a couple TV clips. Honestly I guess I'm glad we focused mostly on "kanji learning" and less on "media" so what I am even talking about? After the halfway point in the semester we suddenly had to do some group assignments and a couple writing tasks, which seemed kind of random, but the main formula of studying a bunch of kanji and having a quiz was upheld throughout. The final is tomorrow morning, so I'll be at the local study pit flashing them cards at about 5 am or so ;D
Japanese Sentence Patterns for Communication (1) 6
This class ended up being a super downer. I don't think it's the fault of the student teachers, I think it's because we raced through material, were tasked with a lot of homework that was never individually checked, and that the single test we took (yeah, no quizzes, no tests, no midterm) was the final exam. I get the results tomorrow. Should survive, but man... I liked the the grammar class I took last semester much better just in terms of the fact that we got feedback on homework and had a midterm. Just overall less frantic. Also, I hate writing assignments where you have to shoehorn in a lot of specific grammar structures. You end up thinking in a small box that tends to skew you towards using the grammar in a way you think you can than just expressing yourself or concentrating on sounding most natural.
Writing Correspondence: Letters and E-mails 5-7
Glad I dropped the Miyazaki class in favor of this. It was indeed challenging, and sometimes painfully boring (the teacher often just read handouts to us), but the information we received will be great reference material for...ever? I kind of wish our prof had just had us buy the textbook instead of receiving loose copied pages every week.
Explore the Essence of Japanese Classic Novels 5-6
This class went exactly as I expected. Totally worth the effort, but the extra cultural activities made it more stressful than it needed to be. Over winter break I read Botchan in the original Japanese. Pretty sweet achievement. Giving a final presentation on that with a group on Monday.
Kanji in the Contemporary World 6-8
I feel like...I did not get to put as much time into this class as I wanted. There were a lot of kanji I had never seen before and although I managed to perform for the exams and mostly kept up with the homework, actually studying (outside of cramming for the two exams) did not really happen in a timely way, and even the studying I did was not as in-depth as I wanted. Luckily, I have the entire rest of my life to keep studying kanji. THAT is exciting. Other than that...each class had some kind of kanji related lecture, mostly given by student teachers. Some of them were more interesting and useful than others. My favorite one was about the markers they used to put next to Chinese characters to read them in Japanese. I may look into that some more on my own.
Intensive Japanese 6
Welp. I have mixed feelings. I think after improving an insane amount last semester things were bound to slow down a little bit, and since we were using the same textbook, the stuff we were studying was not dramatically different or harder, and in fact, lots of it ended up being review. The end of the semester we spent about a month on the same topic and that was really, really boring. We wrote a paper, read everyone's papers, then rewrote, read everyone's new papers. So we have already been through our own and everyone else's content twice. It was not that interesting to begin with. Then we had to do a speech. By that point my attitude was sort of bending in the wrong direction and I didn't have a whole lot of motivation left. I drew some cool visual aids, but the speech itself was pretty slapdash. I think overall my grade will be ok. Anyways, part of me wishes there were more of a clear difference between the levels...
Critical Reading 5-6
This class was horribly misnamed, lol. We basically read some essays or excerpts from non-fiction books and used them as a foundation for class discussion. So really, it was a critical thinking/discussing class and had very little to do with reading or learning Japanese. We practiced our Japanese a lot, but we practiced thinking a lot more. Questions involving country, nationality, how we define and practice friendship, etc. Some people found it really difficult to think about these issues, and the discussion was pretty interesting, but honestly I was hoping we would read a lot more.
Refining Your Japanese Pronunciation with Ondoku & Shadowing 6-8
The first time I ever took a translation class. It was pretty depressing, haha. Pronunciation is a grueling road. It was interesting to get to practice a lot of different types of reading/shadowing, from short stories, to radio dramas, news, commercials, etc. For my final project I edited a monologue about what a pain in the neck children can be to 90 seconds and gave it my best shot. I think most likely the reflection worksheet will be scrutinized harder than more than our performances.
Listening Comprehension: Improving Accuracy in News Listening 6-7
Our teacher for this class was so amusing. Leading the class play-by-play like a sports newscaster. Things were a little frenetic, but we certainly did dictation every week. Not sure how much I really learned from this class. I guess some vocab, and kept an eye on Abe's return to the Prime Minister-ship than I would have otherwise...maybe.
Reading and Discussing Novels by Contemporary Writers 6-8
I liked this class. Unlike Critical Reading it was almost perfectly true to its name. We read many pages and we discussed a ton. We also had to create leaflets at the end. So many of my classes this semester turned into art classes at the end it was a little goofy, but so it goes. The project was more fun than I thought, even though again we had to take a month with one topic. But no, thinking over it, that was fine in this case. The only thing that genuinely annoyed me about this class was that for the fifth short story we all had to read something and then propose it to class. In the end, two works were chosen and we could make our decision which group to be in for the presentation. Alas, BOTH of the works that got voted up were Murakami. Even though we read Murakami as the first story of the class. I seriously think there needs to be a rule that it can't be an author we already read. That's slightly hypocritical because I was interested in reading the sequel to Kitchen (Banana Yoshimoto) but I'm fine with doing that on my own. I think in a survey class you need variety. Plus everyone knows Murakami and everyone has probably read him thoroughly in their own language already. No one needs to learn who Murakami is and what kinds of things he writes. Not that I didn't enjoy reading more of his stuff in the original Japanese, just that there are so many writers I have never heard of...
Japanese Idioms 5-7
This class was a little strange. The teacher had this sort of spacy personality. We learned a lot, but then the quizzes always felt a little unsettling, like we really had to try to get inside our teacher's head and think what she would want us to put. Like one day she was explaining an answer to a question lots of people missed and was like, "So Japanese people think [x] when [y] happens, therefore this is correct." And it's like ok but remember we are not Japanese so we would not necessarily think the same way...it was not something we could have known from the lectures in class. Anyways, it was a good introduction to idioms. I'll look forward to doing more on my own.
Overall this semester was wayyyyyy more time consuming in terms of studying and homework than the first one. In the first semester we were often reading IN class and then there was no homework. This time all the reading was shoveled to the afterschool hours. Taking both lit surveys at once was a little nuts. Taking both kanji classes at once was a little nuts. I don't regret it, but it was a challenge. Part of me wishes I could do another year, but the rest is really ready to get some work experience. I'm gonna post some more random thoughts/advice to prospective study abroaders after school ends for real on Tuesday.
Thursday, January 24, 2013
Friday, October 05, 2012
Fall Class Impressions
I meant to do a summer wrap up post first, but time is killer. Here are post-orientation impressions of my fall classes [in Waseda University's year-long intensive Japanese course]:
Kanji learning through the media 5-6
Feeling really good about this class. Study a list of kanji before class every week and put it into practice using newspapers, magazines, and I think even some TV shows. It's actually a big focus on kanji VOCAB so that is really helpful. I'm stoked.
Japanese Sentence Patterns for Communication (1) 6
I pretty much knew what to expect here since it is just the continuation of the grammar class I took last time. Well, sort of. I flipped through the latter half of book 5 over the summer, so it's technically the continuation to a class I skipped.
Learn Japanese Through the World of Hayao Miyazaki 5-6
This could be good or bad. I'm really excited that we're supposedly getting the scripts for each movie. We're watching Laputa, then either Totoro or Kiki's Delivery Service, and Ponyo. Really hope we do Kiki, as I have not seen that in a while and feel it would be really nostalgic. I love Totoro and all but I don't really need to WATCH it again for a while…
I actually just dropped this to take Writing Correspondence: Letters and E-mails 5-7...which I imaging will be really hard, given that writing letters in Japanese is...hard. I need the business unitsI didn't get to go to orientation since I was screwing around in the Miyazaki class,
Explore the Essence of Japanese Classic Novels 5-6
This class is going to be a pain in the neck, I can tell. For one, there are all these cultural activities that are not really necessary. Like we have to go on mini-field trips or learn to play cards or wear kimono. Are you kidding? I just wanna read a book >< There are also various things we need to memorize, which I suck at. But I think it'll be worth it for the lit survey in Japanese so….suck it up. But damn, I hate reading excerpts XD
Kanji in the Contemporary World 6-8
The first guy teacher I've had at Waseda. This class is going to be hard, but that was on purpose. Looks like we basically cover the N1 kanji? I don't know. I hope that between the two kanji classes I am taking that there will not be m/any gaps left in characters I have covered. I am wellllll aware that just having looked at the kanji and even won points by using them on a test does not mean you have mastered the character, but at least having a basic idea (or having at one time had a basic idea) of all of the daily use characters would be nice. The thing about what you are missing though is that you are missing it, so you can't really identify it…
Intensive Japanese 6
Just the continuation of last time. There were only six kids in class. Would be nice if it stayed that way XD [Update: I guess there are seven.] It seems somehow easier than last semester, but I guess when you use the same textbook (and the textbook is just essays) you're bound to feel like you've improved. I got almost a full score on the pre-test, but it's not like I'm going to mess with my schedule now. I think there is still a lot to learn in this class, esp when it comes to vocabulary.
Critical Reading 5-6
Well, I guess it'll be ok. I like to read essays and whatnot :P
Refining Your Japanese Pronunciation with Ondoku & Shadowing 6-8
This should be and somewhat challenging. I bought the teacher's new pronunciation textbook. We're not technically required to for this class, but it seems like we'll be doing some supplementary lessons out of it since the feedback from the first semester (probably mostly from people who hadn't taken a pronunciation class before) was that they didn't really know much about pronunciation in the first place. And also probably a good warm-up for the class that comes after it.
Eating a parfait and wondering why there are no translation classes.
Listening Comprehension: Improving Accuracy in News Listening 6-7
This class should be pretty good, I think. It's kind of similar to the news class I took last semester except without the discussion time (which honestly was mostly just us and the Japanese students talking about summer vacation plans anyhow…) Anyways, I hope I can keep up. I want to get better at listening to the news…
Reading and Discussing Novels by Contemporary Writers 6-8
Well no shit in a lit class you're going to have to read and so we were assigned 30 pages of Murakami right off the bat. That's fine with me, but there is no word list so it's gonna be me sitting in a tree with my dictionary. And then once we read it we just talk and talk and talk and that part might be a pain in the ass, but I'm excited to read, I guess.
Japanese Idioms 5-7
Wow, the teacher basically spent most of orientation telling us who should not take this class.
-If you want to learn a LOT of idioms, sayings, and four character compounds (because apparently this class is depth over breadth).
-If you are level 4. (Really she is looking for near level 7.)
-If you want to use a dictionary to look things up instead of listening to her Japanese explanation.
I get that last one, but look, I'm a translator. I'm gonna need to know the English eventually. That's half the reason I'm here is so when I see them if I'm translating I can "solve for English." Obviously that means understanding the Japanese context, so I'm stoked, but…you know.
That said, I'm annoyed that the final presentation for this class is giving a speech on a saying from our own country. Zero interest in doing that research or presenting on that topic. God damn. But whatever, I need to start somewhere with idioms so.
AND THAT'S THAT. In 2.5 hours I have tai chi practice and I have barely thought about tai chi at all in the past three weeks. I feel a problem coming but I have to just face it head on and try to remember how to rotate my hips etc.
Kanji learning through the media 5-6
Feeling really good about this class. Study a list of kanji before class every week and put it into practice using newspapers, magazines, and I think even some TV shows. It's actually a big focus on kanji VOCAB so that is really helpful. I'm stoked.
Japanese Sentence Patterns for Communication (1) 6
I pretty much knew what to expect here since it is just the continuation of the grammar class I took last time. Well, sort of. I flipped through the latter half of book 5 over the summer, so it's technically the continuation to a class I skipped.
This could be good or bad. I'm really excited that we're supposedly getting the scripts for each movie. We're watching Laputa, then either Totoro or Kiki's Delivery Service, and Ponyo. Really hope we do Kiki, as I have not seen that in a while and feel it would be really nostalgic. I love Totoro and all but I don't really need to WATCH it again for a while…
I actually just dropped this to take Writing Correspondence: Letters and E-mails 5-7...which I imaging will be really hard, given that writing letters in Japanese is...hard. I need the business unitsI didn't get to go to orientation since I was screwing around in the Miyazaki class,
Explore the Essence of Japanese Classic Novels 5-6
This class is going to be a pain in the neck, I can tell. For one, there are all these cultural activities that are not really necessary. Like we have to go on mini-field trips or learn to play cards or wear kimono. Are you kidding? I just wanna read a book >< There are also various things we need to memorize, which I suck at. But I think it'll be worth it for the lit survey in Japanese so….suck it up. But damn, I hate reading excerpts XD
Kanji in the Contemporary World 6-8
The first guy teacher I've had at Waseda. This class is going to be hard, but that was on purpose. Looks like we basically cover the N1 kanji? I don't know. I hope that between the two kanji classes I am taking that there will not be m/any gaps left in characters I have covered. I am wellllll aware that just having looked at the kanji and even won points by using them on a test does not mean you have mastered the character, but at least having a basic idea (or having at one time had a basic idea) of all of the daily use characters would be nice. The thing about what you are missing though is that you are missing it, so you can't really identify it…
Intensive Japanese 6
Just the continuation of last time. There were only six kids in class. Would be nice if it stayed that way XD [Update: I guess there are seven.] It seems somehow easier than last semester, but I guess when you use the same textbook (and the textbook is just essays) you're bound to feel like you've improved. I got almost a full score on the pre-test, but it's not like I'm going to mess with my schedule now. I think there is still a lot to learn in this class, esp when it comes to vocabulary.
Critical Reading 5-6
Well, I guess it'll be ok. I like to read essays and whatnot :P
Refining Your Japanese Pronunciation with Ondoku & Shadowing 6-8
This should be and somewhat challenging. I bought the teacher's new pronunciation textbook. We're not technically required to for this class, but it seems like we'll be doing some supplementary lessons out of it since the feedback from the first semester (probably mostly from people who hadn't taken a pronunciation class before) was that they didn't really know much about pronunciation in the first place. And also probably a good warm-up for the class that comes after it.
Eating a parfait and wondering why there are no translation classes.
Listening Comprehension: Improving Accuracy in News Listening 6-7
This class should be pretty good, I think. It's kind of similar to the news class I took last semester except without the discussion time (which honestly was mostly just us and the Japanese students talking about summer vacation plans anyhow…) Anyways, I hope I can keep up. I want to get better at listening to the news…
Reading and Discussing Novels by Contemporary Writers 6-8
Well no shit in a lit class you're going to have to read and so we were assigned 30 pages of Murakami right off the bat. That's fine with me, but there is no word list so it's gonna be me sitting in a tree with my dictionary. And then once we read it we just talk and talk and talk and that part might be a pain in the ass, but I'm excited to read, I guess.
Japanese Idioms 5-7
Wow, the teacher basically spent most of orientation telling us who should not take this class.
-If you want to learn a LOT of idioms, sayings, and four character compounds (because apparently this class is depth over breadth).
-If you are level 4. (Really she is looking for near level 7.)
-If you want to use a dictionary to look things up instead of listening to her Japanese explanation.
I get that last one, but look, I'm a translator. I'm gonna need to know the English eventually. That's half the reason I'm here is so when I see them if I'm translating I can "solve for English." Obviously that means understanding the Japanese context, so I'm stoked, but…you know.
That said, I'm annoyed that the final presentation for this class is giving a speech on a saying from our own country. Zero interest in doing that research or presenting on that topic. God damn. But whatever, I need to start somewhere with idioms so.
AND THAT'S THAT. In 2.5 hours I have tai chi practice and I have barely thought about tai chi at all in the past three weeks. I feel a problem coming but I have to just face it head on and try to remember how to rotate my hips etc.
Friday, August 24, 2012
Spring Impressions, Summer Vacation, and What is Up
First, let me take a minute to revise my thoughts on classes now that they are over:
Intensive Japanese 5:
Still the best class. We had to do a sort of half-assed research project at the end of the semester, but writing the presentation was a valuable experience. Even though the readings were pretty much all about crises (or perceived crises) in Japanese society, I enjoyed them and felt that most of the Japanese I learned here so far was related toour practice of select phrases and discussion of vocab in class.
Empathetic Conversation 4-5: My feelings on this are basically the same as they were before. Good content, hard to internalize. I don't know if some people maybe practiced with their friends outside of class? but if you take this, that is what I would recommend to seriously learn.
Extensive Reading 5-6: The final paper for this class kind of hits you out of nowhere as you struggle to remember what you've been reading over the past semester, but ultimately, reading without a dictionary is good and bad. You sacrifice depth for breadth, obviously, that is the idea. My main concern with it is that you sort of tend to "guess" on kanji/words you don't know, and if you keep guessing wrong, you are essentially "learning" things that are incorrect...
Vocab Building 5-6: Bizarrely, the hardest class. I often got failing grades on the homework assignments. My biggest problem was that I spend so much time doing the Japanese thing (or just screwing around) that I don't really have a background in say, current events, which turned out to be indispensable. I'm trying to work at that going forward...
Honorific Expressions for Communication 5: This class continued to be problematic for me. I have a better foundational knowledge of the categories of keigo, and I can do ok on multiple choice drills (which is how I'm reviewing this summer), but actually applying it on my own is still scary and awkward. Why we also had to do a half-assed group research project is beyond me. Why not spend that time on speaking drills or something instead?
Reading Comprehension Skills for Intermediate and Advanced Learners 5: Overall I did keep feeling that this class was really random, but was happy to have the practice. The grading was very much participation based, with no real homework. We had a final exam, which felt so strange since we were graded on barely anything else.
Enjoy Short Novels: Reading, Listening & Watching Videos 4-5: I continued to really value this class. The readings were the most "fun" out of all my classes, and I guess, that goes for the writing assignments, too. Sometimes the assessments were easy (and clearly just there to have something to grade?) but it was a good way for me to get my feet wet reading fiction in Japanese.
Music of Japan: from Nursery Rhymes to Lieder 4-8: Really happy with this class. I really almost wish I had studied more so I could sing the songs on command, they were that interesting and valuable as cultural touch stones (ok, maybe touch-pebbles, but still).
Developing Discourse Ability in Japanese 5: This class improved as the semester went on. Once we were able to write on our own, I felt more at ease. Some students said they would have rather done more activities like our final presentation, where we wrote about a personal experience, but others said they preferred writing about the dramas we were watching. Some people said it was really hard. For my part, I found it amusing that we spent so much time writing in what seemed at first glance to be a conversation class, but it was fine with me.
Learning Japanese Through Films - Think and Discuss What a Film Appeals to Us 5-6: Once I got over the shock of the class's true identity as series of listening comprehension drills (and made sure to study the vocab), I finally could relax and enjoy it. The highlight was finally watching Departures. I sort of wish we would have had more time to discuss, or that people would have had more to say, but anyways...got to watch some movies and try to have some academic thoughts about them; that made me happy, overall.
The Latest Japan on TV News 5: This was a great class, although the final paper was sort of tedious in that it was multiple parts, kind of almost like a survey. Honestly it kind of highlighted how "unacademic" feeling most of our assignments are. Everything is really casual, which I guess reflects that we are learners of the language, but I need to relearn how to write a proper paper if I hope to go to grad school. Anyways, I digress...uhhh...yeah I continued to like this class and actually made a lasting Japanese friend from the pool of volunteers who came to discuss "news" with us. (We almost always talked about whatever the hell, as none of us were really there to be experts in current events.) I'd like to say this class resulted in me having a news-watching habit, but I don't yet. I'll have to make that on my own.
Japanese Sentence Patterns for Communication (1) 5: This class ended up being just fine. Some of it was review, but that's ok. Gotta have a solid grammar foundation, and unless you are constantly reviewing, even the simple stuff can get shaky.
Here are the main activities of the summer:
Volunteer translation of a document written by the principal of a school in Kesennuma where the tsunami hit really hard last year after the earthquake. The work I am doing is just one part of a bigger document; I'm on a team with Japanese students, so it has already started to become a good way to meet people. Also I'm really impressed that they are managing to translate Ja>En. I'm having a hard enough time...
We're going to Kesennuma soon to meet some of the people involved in the publication and hear some of their experiences first-hand.
I'm also going on a trip to Fukui to experience some organic farming and food production...stuff!
Volunteering at the Tokyo Game Show at the end of the September pretty much right before school starts.
Wondering if I will be able to get a serious boyfriend ever again.
Getting really into seeing (raw) movies at the National Film Center, and loving that I live on the same train line so I don't have to transfer anywhere to get there.
Making pilgrimages to the Waseda Tai Chi club instructor's classroom over the summer break as often as I can (on Sundays). It takes about an hour and a half to get there, so it's good time to read manga or listen to podcasts.
Spending too much time researching grad school etc. to the point where it is disrupting my actual Japanese study.
Other than that I just wrote a new and way more aggressive plan for next semester:
Intensive Japanese 6
Learn Japanese Through the World of Hayao Miyazaki 5-6
Kanji in the Contemporary World 6-8
Explore the Essence of Japanese Classic Novels 5-6
Japanese Newspaper Reading 6-7
Contemporary Japanese through Cinema and News 6
Critical Reading 5-6
Refining Your Japanese Pronunciation with Ondoku & Shadowing 6-8
Reading and Discussing Novels by Contemporary Writers 6-8
Japanese Idioms 5-7
Japanese Sentence Patterns for Communication (1) 6
Honestly this schedule is probably insane. You may recall that I barely tested into level 5 last semester. The idea is that you move up after a semester (hence Intensive Japanese 6), but now is the time; there is only one semester left and I have to make the most of it. I feel like these are the kinds of class I should have been taking in undergrad and that's basically why I'm here, is to make up for undergrad offerings failing me.
The theme of the revised schedule is...READING. Pretty clearly. That is where I need to stop whining and step it up. Speaking will either come or not. I'm no good at speaking in English either, so I don't really expect great things. But the more I read the faster I will progress, so I just want to leap and bound for the next few months.
You may have noticed that instead of doing sentences patterns (2) 5 I'm going straight to (1) 6 next semester. That's quite frankly because there is not that much stuff that seems so difficult in the last half of the book. I am going through it this summer, and maybe I'm not in the most qualified to decide whether I have mastered a concept or not, but I think I'll survive just fine.
As for the other stuff, obviously I don't really NEED a class on Miyazaki movies, but I'm just curious what a class about anime is like. Probably like any other class, well that's cool. If people take it seriously it could be interesting. Also it sounds like we get to read some planning/production materials, so that could be fun.
Taking both the classic and contemporary surveys cuz why not. I hate reading extracts but it's more about collecting the names of the things we should read and then reading them over the summer or whatever...
Obviously that's a lot of classes, just a lot of classes, but one other one I want to mention is that kanji one. Course description basically just says, "We're going to master the daily use kanji (2140)." Yeah, that number used to be 1,945, but they updated it in 2010 to 2,136 when we weren't paying attention. Anyways, I'm kind of hovering somewhere around 1,000 right now and it's annoying me. I know it's more about vocab and actually reading than just knowing the kanji (esp having dropped out of the Heisig method ;P) but at least having studied them all once is a step in the right direction. I'm working on it on my own, but let's nail this jell-o to the wall, shall we?
In any case, I'll be FLYING to my computer on September 18th when registration opens to make sure I get all my classes.
Intensive Japanese 5:
Still the best class. We had to do a sort of half-assed research project at the end of the semester, but writing the presentation was a valuable experience. Even though the readings were pretty much all about crises (or perceived crises) in Japanese society, I enjoyed them and felt that most of the Japanese I learned here so far was related toour practice of select phrases and discussion of vocab in class.
Empathetic Conversation 4-5: My feelings on this are basically the same as they were before. Good content, hard to internalize. I don't know if some people maybe practiced with their friends outside of class? but if you take this, that is what I would recommend to seriously learn.
Extensive Reading 5-6: The final paper for this class kind of hits you out of nowhere as you struggle to remember what you've been reading over the past semester, but ultimately, reading without a dictionary is good and bad. You sacrifice depth for breadth, obviously, that is the idea. My main concern with it is that you sort of tend to "guess" on kanji/words you don't know, and if you keep guessing wrong, you are essentially "learning" things that are incorrect...
Vocab Building 5-6: Bizarrely, the hardest class. I often got failing grades on the homework assignments. My biggest problem was that I spend so much time doing the Japanese thing (or just screwing around) that I don't really have a background in say, current events, which turned out to be indispensable. I'm trying to work at that going forward...
Honorific Expressions for Communication 5: This class continued to be problematic for me. I have a better foundational knowledge of the categories of keigo, and I can do ok on multiple choice drills (which is how I'm reviewing this summer), but actually applying it on my own is still scary and awkward. Why we also had to do a half-assed group research project is beyond me. Why not spend that time on speaking drills or something instead?
Reading Comprehension Skills for Intermediate and Advanced Learners 5: Overall I did keep feeling that this class was really random, but was happy to have the practice. The grading was very much participation based, with no real homework. We had a final exam, which felt so strange since we were graded on barely anything else.
Enjoy Short Novels: Reading, Listening & Watching Videos 4-5: I continued to really value this class. The readings were the most "fun" out of all my classes, and I guess, that goes for the writing assignments, too. Sometimes the assessments were easy (and clearly just there to have something to grade?) but it was a good way for me to get my feet wet reading fiction in Japanese.
Music of Japan: from Nursery Rhymes to Lieder 4-8: Really happy with this class. I really almost wish I had studied more so I could sing the songs on command, they were that interesting and valuable as cultural touch stones (ok, maybe touch-pebbles, but still).
Developing Discourse Ability in Japanese 5: This class improved as the semester went on. Once we were able to write on our own, I felt more at ease. Some students said they would have rather done more activities like our final presentation, where we wrote about a personal experience, but others said they preferred writing about the dramas we were watching. Some people said it was really hard. For my part, I found it amusing that we spent so much time writing in what seemed at first glance to be a conversation class, but it was fine with me.
Learning Japanese Through Films - Think and Discuss What a Film Appeals to Us 5-6: Once I got over the shock of the class's true identity as series of listening comprehension drills (and made sure to study the vocab), I finally could relax and enjoy it. The highlight was finally watching Departures. I sort of wish we would have had more time to discuss, or that people would have had more to say, but anyways...got to watch some movies and try to have some academic thoughts about them; that made me happy, overall.
The Latest Japan on TV News 5: This was a great class, although the final paper was sort of tedious in that it was multiple parts, kind of almost like a survey. Honestly it kind of highlighted how "unacademic" feeling most of our assignments are. Everything is really casual, which I guess reflects that we are learners of the language, but I need to relearn how to write a proper paper if I hope to go to grad school. Anyways, I digress...uhhh...yeah I continued to like this class and actually made a lasting Japanese friend from the pool of volunteers who came to discuss "news" with us. (We almost always talked about whatever the hell, as none of us were really there to be experts in current events.) I'd like to say this class resulted in me having a news-watching habit, but I don't yet. I'll have to make that on my own.
Japanese Sentence Patterns for Communication (1) 5: This class ended up being just fine. Some of it was review, but that's ok. Gotta have a solid grammar foundation, and unless you are constantly reviewing, even the simple stuff can get shaky.
Here are the main activities of the summer:
Volunteer translation of a document written by the principal of a school in Kesennuma where the tsunami hit really hard last year after the earthquake. The work I am doing is just one part of a bigger document; I'm on a team with Japanese students, so it has already started to become a good way to meet people. Also I'm really impressed that they are managing to translate Ja>En. I'm having a hard enough time...
We're going to Kesennuma soon to meet some of the people involved in the publication and hear some of their experiences first-hand.
I'm also going on a trip to Fukui to experience some organic farming and food production...stuff!
Volunteering at the Tokyo Game Show at the end of the September pretty much right before school starts.
Wondering if I will be able to get a serious boyfriend ever again.
Getting really into seeing (raw) movies at the National Film Center, and loving that I live on the same train line so I don't have to transfer anywhere to get there.
Making pilgrimages to the Waseda Tai Chi club instructor's classroom over the summer break as often as I can (on Sundays). It takes about an hour and a half to get there, so it's good time to read manga or listen to podcasts.
Spending too much time researching grad school etc. to the point where it is disrupting my actual Japanese study.
Other than that I just wrote a new and way more aggressive plan for next semester:
Intensive Japanese 6
Learn Japanese Through the World of Hayao Miyazaki 5-6
Kanji in the Contemporary World 6-8
Explore the Essence of Japanese Classic Novels 5-6
Japanese Newspaper Reading 6-7
Contemporary Japanese through Cinema and News 6
Critical Reading 5-6
Refining Your Japanese Pronunciation with Ondoku & Shadowing 6-8
Reading and Discussing Novels by Contemporary Writers 6-8
Japanese Idioms 5-7
Japanese Sentence Patterns for Communication (1) 6
Honestly this schedule is probably insane. You may recall that I barely tested into level 5 last semester. The idea is that you move up after a semester (hence Intensive Japanese 6), but now is the time; there is only one semester left and I have to make the most of it. I feel like these are the kinds of class I should have been taking in undergrad and that's basically why I'm here, is to make up for undergrad offerings failing me.
The theme of the revised schedule is...READING. Pretty clearly. That is where I need to stop whining and step it up. Speaking will either come or not. I'm no good at speaking in English either, so I don't really expect great things. But the more I read the faster I will progress, so I just want to leap and bound for the next few months.
You may have noticed that instead of doing sentences patterns (2) 5 I'm going straight to (1) 6 next semester. That's quite frankly because there is not that much stuff that seems so difficult in the last half of the book. I am going through it this summer, and maybe I'm not in the most qualified to decide whether I have mastered a concept or not, but I think I'll survive just fine.
As for the other stuff, obviously I don't really NEED a class on Miyazaki movies, but I'm just curious what a class about anime is like. Probably like any other class, well that's cool. If people take it seriously it could be interesting. Also it sounds like we get to read some planning/production materials, so that could be fun.
Taking both the classic and contemporary surveys cuz why not. I hate reading extracts but it's more about collecting the names of the things we should read and then reading them over the summer or whatever...
Obviously that's a lot of classes, just a lot of classes, but one other one I want to mention is that kanji one. Course description basically just says, "We're going to master the daily use kanji (2140)." Yeah, that number used to be 1,945, but they updated it in 2010 to 2,136 when we weren't paying attention. Anyways, I'm kind of hovering somewhere around 1,000 right now and it's annoying me. I know it's more about vocab and actually reading than just knowing the kanji (esp having dropped out of the Heisig method ;P) but at least having studied them all once is a step in the right direction. I'm working on it on my own, but let's nail this jell-o to the wall, shall we?
In any case, I'll be FLYING to my computer on September 18th when registration opens to make sure I get all my classes.
Thursday, June 21, 2012
How I Got "Hella Good" at Reading Kanji
Today on the way home from school I ran into a classmate. Actually it's embarrassing because I noticed him and was not sure he would want to talk to me (or maybe I felt for some reason I didn't want to talk to him), so I just kept my headphones on and refocused on the NHK news podcast I was listening to. He caught up to me on the stairs and started waving at me, though, so certainly at that point we were going to have a conversation.
There was the usual, "Do you live this way?" kind of chatter, but he also asked where I got "hella good" at reading kanji. I personally don't consider myself hella good, or very good, or even so-so—yet, but it was nice that someone noticed I am trying. Of course there's no "where," really; it's a time, not a place. The time is...every day.
I told him I just study kanji all the time. Like, in my free time, that is what I do. It's true and I'm going to take it even more seriously because I have a plan that will actually finally take me through all of the daily use kanji by the end of the year. Not that that's the end of kanji, but...I'm ready to at least have a basic understand of the characters everyone should know.
Of course there will be combinations using simple characters that are rare or I just haven't seen yet and I won't know what they mean, and it will annoy me, but even just knowing another word with a given kanji in it helps you look it up faster, since you can input the reading you do know and edit around it.
The other my classmate said to me is that he thinks my ability is "enough." This immediately brought to mind the book I'm currently reading. It's by Daigo Umehara, the pro gramer, and it's about how to continue winning. One of the things he things he says (which is by no means new, but still interesting to hear from the Street Fighter world champion perspective) is that people who rest easy with their current successes will not be able to continue winning.
To apply the thought to my current status: I don't want to just be the best reader in the class (if I am even that). Accomplishing only that does not mean so much, and it only means it until the term ends. I want to read this textbook and the next one, and actually, I'd like to read Umehara's book itself and understand a higher percentage of the words. Someday I'll understand all of them. The way he describes his determination is really inspiring and exactly what I need at a point where I've changed my life around (and will keep changing it in whatever way is necessary) to focus on studying Japanese and translation.
There was the usual, "Do you live this way?" kind of chatter, but he also asked where I got "hella good" at reading kanji. I personally don't consider myself hella good, or very good, or even so-so—yet, but it was nice that someone noticed I am trying. Of course there's no "where," really; it's a time, not a place. The time is...every day.
I told him I just study kanji all the time. Like, in my free time, that is what I do. It's true and I'm going to take it even more seriously because I have a plan that will actually finally take me through all of the daily use kanji by the end of the year. Not that that's the end of kanji, but...I'm ready to at least have a basic understand of the characters everyone should know.
Of course there will be combinations using simple characters that are rare or I just haven't seen yet and I won't know what they mean, and it will annoy me, but even just knowing another word with a given kanji in it helps you look it up faster, since you can input the reading you do know and edit around it.
The other my classmate said to me is that he thinks my ability is "enough." This immediately brought to mind the book I'm currently reading. It's by Daigo Umehara, the pro gramer, and it's about how to continue winning. One of the things he things he says (which is by no means new, but still interesting to hear from the Street Fighter world champion perspective) is that people who rest easy with their current successes will not be able to continue winning.
To apply the thought to my current status: I don't want to just be the best reader in the class (if I am even that). Accomplishing only that does not mean so much, and it only means it until the term ends. I want to read this textbook and the next one, and actually, I'd like to read Umehara's book itself and understand a higher percentage of the words. Someday I'll understand all of them. The way he describes his determination is really inspiring and exactly what I need at a point where I've changed my life around (and will keep changing it in whatever way is necessary) to focus on studying Japanese and translation.
Wednesday, May 09, 2012
Procrastinating on my "late marriage" paper
Yepppp, don't really want to write a paper about the late marriage trend. At all.
Instead here are my basic thoughts about the classes I am taking this semester, listed in the order I have them during the week...
Intensive Japanese 5:
The best class, although I don't want to write this paper. We go through vocab and grammar while reading articles about various things. We make example sentences, discuss the articles, etc.
Empathetic Conversation 4-5: It's a sorrrrt of good class, I guess. I tweeted the other day that the content is good but it's hard to internalize. That pretty much sums it up. Of course knowing the ins and outs of conversation is great, but it's those little things that are trickiest to master.
Extensive Reading 5-6: An utterly pointless class where we spend 90 minutes reading out loud in small groups. I guess I knew that going in. I just wanted an excuse to read so it's ok. Just sort of a grind way to end the day.
Vocab Building 5-6: Ahhh I dunno about this. We're basically going through words we mostly know already (or probably should) and making sure we understand how to use them properly. It's good in its way, but kind of tedious. Also I hate that we have to look up the words ourselves and then get tested on them before we know if we even found the usages she wants to test us on.
Honorific Expressions for Communication 5: I kind of hate this class. I really just want to drill keigo into my head and this is like some light explanations followed by a little practice, the handing out of a homework sheet, and then we spend like a half hour doing group work that...I mean it's just pointless. I don't want to spend hours of time in and out of class writing one example conversation. Spending all that time on one example conversation would be much better spent shadowing in my room with headphones on, which I should have just done to learn keigo like I had planned to ages ago...
Reading Comprehension Skills for Intermediate and Advanced Learners 5: Kind of random. We read the weirdest things like about coal and oil, about weird science 'experiments' (like elementary school kids do), to cuisine theories by some guy who is not Japanese. It's sort of hard to know how/if we have to try to absorb all the vocab, but...I dunno. Honestly I guess I don't really seem to have reading comprehension problems unless I don't know the grammar so...maybe this class was kind of pointless? It's still more reading practice though, so I guess it's fine.
Enjoy Short Novels: Reading, Listening & Watching Videos 4-5: This is actually one of my favorite classes probably. The material is a tad simple but there are still things to learn. It's fun to read and then get to see a video version of the story, and the teacher says really hilarious things. We also get to write stuff like our impressions comparing the movie to the book (which makes up for how awful the film class is, a little bit), or like this first story we read we had to write our own ending before we finished it in class.
Music of Japan: from Nursery Rhymes to Lieder 4-8: Kind of a random fun class. We sing and play patty-cake-type games ;D Some of the more traditional songs have obscure-ish vocabulary but it's not the end of the world.
Developing Discourse Ability in Japanese 5: I thought I was going to love this class, but have come to dread it. Group writing assignments are just not a good idea. Also I kind of don't feel like we're moving quickly enough through what material there is.
Learning Japanese Through Films - Think and Discuss What a Film Appeals to Us 5-6: This class is hands down the worst. It's definitely not about thinking and discussing films. At least so far it seems to be about memorizing tons of random vocab that appear in a movie and getting tested in a really difficult way on our listening comprehension. I wanted to drop this but I missed the deadline. I actually cried when I found out I couldn't drop it—that's how big a waste of time this class is.
The Latest Japan on TV News 5: I like this class more every time I go. Definitely useful even if the in-class vocab explanations are tedious and not super helpful generally. Watching the same news story a million times is not something you get to do usually though, so I sort of wish there were some tips on understanding it as you go...I guess you can only learn by learning. Technically my TV can tape stuff for me if I get a hard drive, I think, so maybe I should look into that at some point.
Japanese Sentence Patterns for Communication (1) 5: I really don't like this class, but I NEED it, so. Just the atmosphere of both the teacher and the students kind of bothers me for some reason. The content is fine, a little hard to remember. I wish there were more example sentences. I just want example sentences that reach to the moon...
BESIDES SCHOOL
...life is kind of whatever. Have not solved my laundry machine issues, but have begun cooking. Frankly cooking is exhausting. When I think of how I only have one burner anyhow so sooner or later things are going to get impossible, it's discouraging, but the idea is to make do and try to have fun, so that is what I'm doing.
I also got a lot of furniture and things, but I don't have curtains yet. My TV is sitting on a badly sagging cardboard box...
Club activities are going ok I suppose. I see the Gundam guys now and then. Honestly I don't have that much time though, so I'm not sure how to best like...interact or be a part of it. Have mostly given up on joining anime club, I think.... Honestly, hanging out with a lot of people at once is just not my style. Four or less is great. More than that and I get kind of tired and alien-feeling.
Writing has been going ok. "Writing." You know what I mean. I feel good about myself when I can fit it in and bad when I can't.
Lately I've been wishing I could just go back to work full-time and study part-time somehow. But what the heck I should take advantage of my time. So far though I just feel really overwhelmed. There are all these loose ends or impending stressers that kind of make me want to just do nothing. So then I end up on FB or the Tw just refeshing like crazy hoping to see something that makes me happy. Or I punk around on YouTube looking at Japanese music from the 70s. I've been renting the same DVDs for 3 weeks now. It's only about a buck per week but c'mon, just watch the movies. I just feel like there is so much I need to do so it's hard to relax. It's one of those line'em up and knock'em down scenarios, but sometimes knocking it down means going across town in a train, not just like, organizing a cupboard (although I should probably do that too).
Also as you might be able to tell I'm not really interested in blogging anymore. Twitter is the spot. It's so much easier to just post an interesting picture as you take it than save them up and try to say something intelligent about them later. I guess it's that "saying something intelligent" that is the trouble. Brain continues to atrophy...
Instead here are my basic thoughts about the classes I am taking this semester, listed in the order I have them during the week...
Intensive Japanese 5:
The best class, although I don't want to write this paper. We go through vocab and grammar while reading articles about various things. We make example sentences, discuss the articles, etc.
Empathetic Conversation 4-5: It's a sorrrrt of good class, I guess. I tweeted the other day that the content is good but it's hard to internalize. That pretty much sums it up. Of course knowing the ins and outs of conversation is great, but it's those little things that are trickiest to master.
Extensive Reading 5-6: An utterly pointless class where we spend 90 minutes reading out loud in small groups. I guess I knew that going in. I just wanted an excuse to read so it's ok. Just sort of a grind way to end the day.
Vocab Building 5-6: Ahhh I dunno about this. We're basically going through words we mostly know already (or probably should) and making sure we understand how to use them properly. It's good in its way, but kind of tedious. Also I hate that we have to look up the words ourselves and then get tested on them before we know if we even found the usages she wants to test us on.
Honorific Expressions for Communication 5: I kind of hate this class. I really just want to drill keigo into my head and this is like some light explanations followed by a little practice, the handing out of a homework sheet, and then we spend like a half hour doing group work that...I mean it's just pointless. I don't want to spend hours of time in and out of class writing one example conversation. Spending all that time on one example conversation would be much better spent shadowing in my room with headphones on, which I should have just done to learn keigo like I had planned to ages ago...
Reading Comprehension Skills for Intermediate and Advanced Learners 5: Kind of random. We read the weirdest things like about coal and oil, about weird science 'experiments' (like elementary school kids do), to cuisine theories by some guy who is not Japanese. It's sort of hard to know how/if we have to try to absorb all the vocab, but...I dunno. Honestly I guess I don't really seem to have reading comprehension problems unless I don't know the grammar so...maybe this class was kind of pointless? It's still more reading practice though, so I guess it's fine.
Enjoy Short Novels: Reading, Listening & Watching Videos 4-5: This is actually one of my favorite classes probably. The material is a tad simple but there are still things to learn. It's fun to read and then get to see a video version of the story, and the teacher says really hilarious things. We also get to write stuff like our impressions comparing the movie to the book (which makes up for how awful the film class is, a little bit), or like this first story we read we had to write our own ending before we finished it in class.
Music of Japan: from Nursery Rhymes to Lieder 4-8: Kind of a random fun class. We sing and play patty-cake-type games ;D Some of the more traditional songs have obscure-ish vocabulary but it's not the end of the world.
Developing Discourse Ability in Japanese 5: I thought I was going to love this class, but have come to dread it. Group writing assignments are just not a good idea. Also I kind of don't feel like we're moving quickly enough through what material there is.
Learning Japanese Through Films - Think and Discuss What a Film Appeals to Us 5-6: This class is hands down the worst. It's definitely not about thinking and discussing films. At least so far it seems to be about memorizing tons of random vocab that appear in a movie and getting tested in a really difficult way on our listening comprehension. I wanted to drop this but I missed the deadline. I actually cried when I found out I couldn't drop it—that's how big a waste of time this class is.
The Latest Japan on TV News 5: I like this class more every time I go. Definitely useful even if the in-class vocab explanations are tedious and not super helpful generally. Watching the same news story a million times is not something you get to do usually though, so I sort of wish there were some tips on understanding it as you go...I guess you can only learn by learning. Technically my TV can tape stuff for me if I get a hard drive, I think, so maybe I should look into that at some point.
Japanese Sentence Patterns for Communication (1) 5: I really don't like this class, but I NEED it, so. Just the atmosphere of both the teacher and the students kind of bothers me for some reason. The content is fine, a little hard to remember. I wish there were more example sentences. I just want example sentences that reach to the moon...
BESIDES SCHOOL
...life is kind of whatever. Have not solved my laundry machine issues, but have begun cooking. Frankly cooking is exhausting. When I think of how I only have one burner anyhow so sooner or later things are going to get impossible, it's discouraging, but the idea is to make do and try to have fun, so that is what I'm doing.
I also got a lot of furniture and things, but I don't have curtains yet. My TV is sitting on a badly sagging cardboard box...
Club activities are going ok I suppose. I see the Gundam guys now and then. Honestly I don't have that much time though, so I'm not sure how to best like...interact or be a part of it. Have mostly given up on joining anime club, I think.... Honestly, hanging out with a lot of people at once is just not my style. Four or less is great. More than that and I get kind of tired and alien-feeling.
Writing has been going ok. "Writing." You know what I mean. I feel good about myself when I can fit it in and bad when I can't.
Lately I've been wishing I could just go back to work full-time and study part-time somehow. But what the heck I should take advantage of my time. So far though I just feel really overwhelmed. There are all these loose ends or impending stressers that kind of make me want to just do nothing. So then I end up on FB or the Tw just refeshing like crazy hoping to see something that makes me happy. Or I punk around on YouTube looking at Japanese music from the 70s. I've been renting the same DVDs for 3 weeks now. It's only about a buck per week but c'mon, just watch the movies. I just feel like there is so much I need to do so it's hard to relax. It's one of those line'em up and knock'em down scenarios, but sometimes knocking it down means going across town in a train, not just like, organizing a cupboard (although I should probably do that too).
Also as you might be able to tell I'm not really interested in blogging anymore. Twitter is the spot. It's so much easier to just post an interesting picture as you take it than save them up and try to say something intelligent about them later. I guess it's that "saying something intelligent" that is the trouble. Brain continues to atrophy...
Saturday, April 07, 2012
First Day of Classes
...was yesterday!
Kicked off with "The Latest Japan on TV News." It's basically a class where you watch the news and the teacher preps a vocab/phrase list to go along with it. So you study that and then each week there is a quiz on the previous week's content. There's one paper to write at the end about a news event and your thoughts on it.
Since all the classes are in orientation mode, they are only meeting for half of a normal period, and then repeating the same info for the second half. I get suppose it's useful if you aren't sure about which classes you will take, but if you registered with confidence it's annoying and makes your schedule really holey for the first week.
The next class I went to was "Developing Discourse Ability in Japanese." This is perfect for me because I actually get quite frustrated speaking. My conversational ability is pretty low on content, consisting of lots of fragments and basic info. This class is for learning how to make people listening to you really be able to imagine what you are describing and react to it emotionally. Like, they'll actually be interested in what you're saying because you're saying more than just, "Yeah, the party was fun." Stoked, even tho it will mean I'll have to talk a lot...
The last class of Friday was "Japanese Sentence Patterns for Communication (1)." This one worried me a bit because the pre-test was a little shakey. I'm considering taking the second half of level 4 simultaneously to review some of those patterns while learning the new ones instead of taking Extensive Reading (I think they meet during the same period, so I'll be able to take orientation for both on Monday and decide.) The other thing that is scary about these grammar courses is that everything depends on the tests (75% of your grade). That is a lot of pressure. If the tests are similar to the pretest I think it might be hard to figure out which pattern the teacher intends us to use...but maybe I'll get used to it through the homework. No matter what I have to take this class, so...
The Gundam Research Association was hanging out after school. I had to ask for directions to the meeting room, and then still got a little lost, but once I found them it was pretty fun. They planned a cherry blossom viewing party, and even though it was really cold we followed through and went to a park. Ate more chips 'n junk than I have in the past year altogether, haha, but it was fun to get try a bunch of different snack foods at once, since I don't usually buy them on my own. When we all got too cold at the park, we went on to round 2 at an izakaya near Waseda station. Everyone got prettttty plastered, but they all seem like basically good guys. Yeah, I'm the only girl :P Most people use Twitter and Facebook it seems like, so it's easy to stay in touch.
In other news, my homestay situation got messed up, so I quickly worked with a housing agency (?) to find an apartment near school. I haven't even moved in yet and I'm already getting teased for living in a boring neighborhood, but...I kinda feel like I'm lucky to have found such a sunny clean room within walking distance of school at such short notice, so I will just deal with whatever neighborhood it is for now. If I need to break the lease later, I guess that's just life. Sucks that they are all two years in Japan, though (just like phone contracts, which...yeah I have a phone now, too! Can't figure out some of the functions, but it's an iPhone so for the most part I'm used to it already. 4S, ftw!)
As for why my homestay got messed up, well, it seems like just a misunderstanding. I thought I got across the fact that I did not want to share a room. My understanding of 'share house' was that I would be able to share a house with a Japanese family, but if more people show up and the rooms are split with curtains, that is just not a comfortable scene for me. I feel bad to cancel, but I feel like we worked it out in a fair enough way.
I have a lot more stuff to think about like buying a fridge and laundry machine, futon, cooking supplies etc. I do want to try to cook! The latest issue of Tabeyoubi is all about things you can do with just a frying pan, which is perfect for my house haha.
Other random news, uhhh I joined the student co-op so I can get discounts on textbooks and cafeteria food. Today is Saturday but I'm still going to campus to take a tour 'n hopefully buy a book.
I'll try to post some picture next time so it's not as boring :P
Kicked off with "The Latest Japan on TV News." It's basically a class where you watch the news and the teacher preps a vocab/phrase list to go along with it. So you study that and then each week there is a quiz on the previous week's content. There's one paper to write at the end about a news event and your thoughts on it.
Since all the classes are in orientation mode, they are only meeting for half of a normal period, and then repeating the same info for the second half. I get suppose it's useful if you aren't sure about which classes you will take, but if you registered with confidence it's annoying and makes your schedule really holey for the first week.
The next class I went to was "Developing Discourse Ability in Japanese." This is perfect for me because I actually get quite frustrated speaking. My conversational ability is pretty low on content, consisting of lots of fragments and basic info. This class is for learning how to make people listening to you really be able to imagine what you are describing and react to it emotionally. Like, they'll actually be interested in what you're saying because you're saying more than just, "Yeah, the party was fun." Stoked, even tho it will mean I'll have to talk a lot...
The last class of Friday was "Japanese Sentence Patterns for Communication (1)." This one worried me a bit because the pre-test was a little shakey. I'm considering taking the second half of level 4 simultaneously to review some of those patterns while learning the new ones instead of taking Extensive Reading (I think they meet during the same period, so I'll be able to take orientation for both on Monday and decide.) The other thing that is scary about these grammar courses is that everything depends on the tests (75% of your grade). That is a lot of pressure. If the tests are similar to the pretest I think it might be hard to figure out which pattern the teacher intends us to use...but maybe I'll get used to it through the homework. No matter what I have to take this class, so...
The Gundam Research Association was hanging out after school. I had to ask for directions to the meeting room, and then still got a little lost, but once I found them it was pretty fun. They planned a cherry blossom viewing party, and even though it was really cold we followed through and went to a park. Ate more chips 'n junk than I have in the past year altogether, haha, but it was fun to get try a bunch of different snack foods at once, since I don't usually buy them on my own. When we all got too cold at the park, we went on to round 2 at an izakaya near Waseda station. Everyone got prettttty plastered, but they all seem like basically good guys. Yeah, I'm the only girl :P Most people use Twitter and Facebook it seems like, so it's easy to stay in touch.
In other news, my homestay situation got messed up, so I quickly worked with a housing agency (?) to find an apartment near school. I haven't even moved in yet and I'm already getting teased for living in a boring neighborhood, but...I kinda feel like I'm lucky to have found such a sunny clean room within walking distance of school at such short notice, so I will just deal with whatever neighborhood it is for now. If I need to break the lease later, I guess that's just life. Sucks that they are all two years in Japan, though (just like phone contracts, which...yeah I have a phone now, too! Can't figure out some of the functions, but it's an iPhone so for the most part I'm used to it already. 4S, ftw!)
As for why my homestay got messed up, well, it seems like just a misunderstanding. I thought I got across the fact that I did not want to share a room. My understanding of 'share house' was that I would be able to share a house with a Japanese family, but if more people show up and the rooms are split with curtains, that is just not a comfortable scene for me. I feel bad to cancel, but I feel like we worked it out in a fair enough way.
I have a lot more stuff to think about like buying a fridge and laundry machine, futon, cooking supplies etc. I do want to try to cook! The latest issue of Tabeyoubi is all about things you can do with just a frying pan, which is perfect for my house haha.
Other random news, uhhh I joined the student co-op so I can get discounts on textbooks and cafeteria food. Today is Saturday but I'm still going to campus to take a tour 'n hopefully buy a book.
I'll try to post some picture next time so it's not as boring :P
Thursday, March 29, 2012
Just mentioned this blog on FB
Well, it seems like I'm here so I should try to say something about it. Finally I'm studying abroad in Japan. The gist is that I'm doing a year of intensive Japanese at Waseda University in Tokyo, the 別科日本語専修課程. So I'm called a bekkasei (which means...special course student lol).
Yeah so for those not following along I quit my job back in November for the immediate purpose of going back to school, but also for other reasons. It was a hard decision but I (think?) I'm very happy to be where I am now.
That said, I'm extremely nervous about my homestay which kind of starts next week. I've met them before and even stayed with them before, but I dunno. I'm just nervous like that. I think I'm more suited to living alone, and probably having people are all the time and sharing their space will really stress me out, but I need to force myself to speak Japanese and sitting around alone on the Internet is not a good way to do that.
I'm really stressed out about my part-time job because as much as I love writing I just don't know if I'll have the energy for it. Or more precisely, if I choose to have the energy for it, I could choose to put more energy into my studies, which seems like the correct course of action. Seriously just breaking my head over this one. For multiple reasons.
Let's talk about school, though. I had general orientation on Tuesday and it was boring, but went better than expected, i.e. I met some people who were nice. The act of speaking Japanese to non-native speakers was not as painful as anticipated. I think the challenges for Asian learners are different enough that I don't cringe so much as I do when talking to other white kids, maybe? That's kind of racist, but I can be less judgmental somehow around Asians, sorry :O
Yeah, if I'm going to write here I might as well be honest.
So the orientation went ok and I learned a bunch about MORE PAPERWORK etc haha. I'm still in tax hell as well, so it's just no end to the unpleasant paperwork.
Yesterday I took the Japanese placement test. They use the J-CAT. It was hellish and I guessed a lot, but I came out a Waseda level 5, which means like...upper intermediate. I need to choose classes based on this level, but it's very difficult. I need to take 11 classes because most of the classes are only 1 credit and only meet once a week. The intensive course I tested into is 3 credits and meets twice a week.
Here's the list I have so far, but I may change it:
Intensive Japanese 5
Empathetic Conversation 4-5
Extensive Reading 5-6
Vocab Building 5-6
Honorific Expressions for Communication 5
Reading Comprehension Skills for Intermediate and Advanced Learners 5
Enjoy Short Novels: Reading, Listening & Watching Videos 4-5
Music of Japan: from Nursery Rhymes to Lieder 4-8
Developing Discourse Ability in Japanese 5
Learning Japanese Through Films - Think and Discuss What a Film Appeals to Us 5-6
The Latest Japan on TV News 5
Japanese Sentence Patterns for Communication (1) 5
So that is the total amount of credits I am allowed to take. I could take one less class, but it seems like I should try to take as many as I can? I dunno. Also, I think this will be extremely difficult, but I think I made the mistake of underestimating myself in college so I'd rather work myself to the bone here than waltz through...
Here is my idea of what to take second semester:
Intensive Japanese 6
Japanese Sentence Patterns for Communication (2) 5
Hesitant Expressions, Responding to and Commenting in Japanese 5-6
Kanji Learning Through the Media 5-6
Communication at Workplace 5-6
Learn Japanese Through the World of Hayao Miyazaki 5-6
Contemporary Japanese Through Cinema and News 6
Listening Comprehension: Radio News, Note-taking, and Summarization Exercises 6
Critical Reading 5-6
Japanese Idioms 5-7
Learning Japanese: Reading Out Loud 5-8
Natural Expressions in Japanese 5-6
I kind of feel like it's do or die.
Yeah so for those not following along I quit my job back in November for the immediate purpose of going back to school, but also for other reasons. It was a hard decision but I (think?) I'm very happy to be where I am now.
That said, I'm extremely nervous about my homestay which kind of starts next week. I've met them before and even stayed with them before, but I dunno. I'm just nervous like that. I think I'm more suited to living alone, and probably having people are all the time and sharing their space will really stress me out, but I need to force myself to speak Japanese and sitting around alone on the Internet is not a good way to do that.
I'm really stressed out about my part-time job because as much as I love writing I just don't know if I'll have the energy for it. Or more precisely, if I choose to have the energy for it, I could choose to put more energy into my studies, which seems like the correct course of action. Seriously just breaking my head over this one. For multiple reasons.
Let's talk about school, though. I had general orientation on Tuesday and it was boring, but went better than expected, i.e. I met some people who were nice. The act of speaking Japanese to non-native speakers was not as painful as anticipated. I think the challenges for Asian learners are different enough that I don't cringe so much as I do when talking to other white kids, maybe? That's kind of racist, but I can be less judgmental somehow around Asians, sorry :O
Yeah, if I'm going to write here I might as well be honest.
So the orientation went ok and I learned a bunch about MORE PAPERWORK etc haha. I'm still in tax hell as well, so it's just no end to the unpleasant paperwork.
Yesterday I took the Japanese placement test. They use the J-CAT. It was hellish and I guessed a lot, but I came out a Waseda level 5, which means like...upper intermediate. I need to choose classes based on this level, but it's very difficult. I need to take 11 classes because most of the classes are only 1 credit and only meet once a week. The intensive course I tested into is 3 credits and meets twice a week.
Here's the list I have so far, but I may change it:
Intensive Japanese 5
Empathetic Conversation 4-5
Extensive Reading 5-6
Vocab Building 5-6
Honorific Expressions for Communication 5
Reading Comprehension Skills for Intermediate and Advanced Learners 5
Enjoy Short Novels: Reading, Listening & Watching Videos 4-5
Music of Japan: from Nursery Rhymes to Lieder 4-8
Developing Discourse Ability in Japanese 5
Learning Japanese Through Films - Think and Discuss What a Film Appeals to Us 5-6
The Latest Japan on TV News 5
Japanese Sentence Patterns for Communication (1) 5
So that is the total amount of credits I am allowed to take. I could take one less class, but it seems like I should try to take as many as I can? I dunno. Also, I think this will be extremely difficult, but I think I made the mistake of underestimating myself in college so I'd rather work myself to the bone here than waltz through...
Here is my idea of what to take second semester:
Intensive Japanese 6
Japanese Sentence Patterns for Communication (2) 5
Hesitant Expressions, Responding to and Commenting in Japanese 5-6
Kanji Learning Through the Media 5-6
Communication at Workplace 5-6
Learn Japanese Through the World of Hayao Miyazaki 5-6
Contemporary Japanese Through Cinema and News 6
Listening Comprehension: Radio News, Note-taking, and Summarization Exercises 6
Critical Reading 5-6
Japanese Idioms 5-7
Learning Japanese: Reading Out Loud 5-8
Natural Expressions in Japanese 5-6
I kind of feel like it's do or die.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
