You want to get as much input as possible when learning a language.
One video that really opened my eyes to how important input is to language learning was this great channel What I’ve Learned:
If you don’t spend a lot of time hearing what ACTUAL Japanese sounds like, no matter how much you study it won’t be authentic. You won’t speak the same way the natives do, you won’t express yourself the same way and you’ll sound… weird.
All the time when I’m answering questions in my classes to my students, I’ll be able to recall specific phrases or words used in context from conversations I’ve had with Japanese people or TV shows. These phrases stuck in my own mind because when you hear native speakers express something, it will sound so natural.
So how do you get more input?
You have to find something that you enjoy consuming. Making your study less like a chore or duty and more something that you just do is the key to success.
I’ve met many amazing Japanese speakers. I’ve also met many terrible ones. Decide for yourself where I fit into the spectrum (but don’t tell me).
The amazing speakers I’ve met always have something in common: they have constant Japanese input in their life. It could be that they watch their animes. It could be that they listen to music. Maybe they spend time constantly watching the big Japanese youtubers. Whatever it is, you want to be doing consistent input.
I’ve mentioned this math before, but if you’re doing 10 minutes a day, that’s over an hour a week and 52 hours a year. Scale up as desired and you could be looking at hundreds of hours of input a year.
What about you, acejapanese?
What do I like to do for input? Well I have the news on my phone and set the region to Japan. I like to scroll through the news while eating breakfast and read every single Japanese headline. I add words that I don’t know to my dictionary and then spend 5 minutes going through all my saved words.
I also have a few Japanese shows that I re-watch quite a lot. My most common is 攻殻機動隊, or Ghost in the Shell. Because I have seen it all already, I turn the subtitles off and listen to the Japanese voices. Research has shown that constant repetition is one of the most important factors in memory formation.
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If you’d like to have personalised Japanese lessons, be they 1-on-1 or group lessons, contact me today via the website’s contact form. You can checkout my youtube channel for examples of what lessons will look like, and I have a professional home studio setup with microphone, lighting and software so that I can display anything on screen including articles, videos and much more.
