Interesting what these Japanese people say about why they still can't speak English after learning… - Feed Post by mog86uk
Interesting what these Japanese people say about why they still can't speak English after learning it in school:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3bY6qZLCQsU
I can relate to much of that video, especially the stuff 3 minutes in. I can see myself having a similar problem but for speaking to Japanese people. The way I've been learning Japanese hasn't been focussed around spoken conversation at all. My aims for learning Japanese was just to learn to read and understand it. I've never practiced speaking or conversations... Should be fun to find out what happens if I ever need to speak Japanese next week when I'm there for the first time... :P
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3bY6qZLCQsU
I can relate to much of that video, especially the stuff 3 minutes in. I can see myself having a similar problem but for speaking to Japanese people. The way I've been learning Japanese hasn't been focussed around spoken conversation at all. My aims for learning Japanese was just to learn to read and understand it. I've never practiced speaking or conversations... Should be fun to find out what happens if I ever need to speak Japanese next week when I'm there for the first time... :P
posted by mog86uk
Comments 12
make sure your sentence orders are correct? i tend to sometimes speak a bit backwards sometimes in japanese. and pronunciation to, may be tricky for some words. either way its fun to talk in japanese!
Nice, pls give us a update when you have talked to Japanese.
がんばってください
You're actively learning it, so you're definitely better than my students and some people of the people in the video for sure. As someone who speaks three languages, speaking is a different ball game for sure. It's something you have to hone on its own. You will struggle without question, but that's a part of the process! :)
My worst part was actually self-confidence. I ended up taking part in a speech contest, and then I felt fine speaking, even if it wasn't right necessarily.
I think self-confidence (or the fear of getting things embarrassingly wrong) is probably a big part of the problem for me. I think that's also likely the reason so many Japanese people won't try and use their English to tourists. Never practicing speaking means I'm not confident at all about my pronunciation. Even though I have read up a lot about Japanese pronunciation, there's no way I'll be able to speak without having to think very hard about the sounds I'm making. :S
Although the other big part is that I really think I've forgotten a lot of the basic polite phrases and what contexts you use the various different words like おねがい vs ください vs たのむ, or しつれいします vs ごめんなさい vs すみません... I learnt the basics so long ago and in considerable detail, but I've never practiced them. I've forgotten most of the important stuff like that and now just know tonnes of strange vocabulary like あみのめ and なのはな instead. :D
I have been doing Duolingo sentences recently, which is translating a sentence from one language to another. This has helped me with getting more familiar with sentence patterns, but it hasn't helped me to remember how to use important polite phrases. I'm not sure reading odd bit of Japanese manga like Shin-chan have really helped me a lot with useful polite phrases either. :P
It would have been a good idea if I spent some time going through a basic travellers guide to speaking Japanese over the last couple of weeks, instead of doing the my normal stuff. I don't really have time to think about doing anything like that now though, as I'm always thinking about whether I've got enough sorted out for the trip.
Just speaking my mind instead of trying to phrase all that carefully. I'm not as worried about it as it might sound. I just think it's a shame I'm probably going to get stuck trying to say anything because I haven't spent any time recently on going over the parts of Japanese that would be the most useful for this trip. (Wrote way too much...) ^^;- I think self-confidence (or the fear of getting things embarrassingly wrong) is probably a big part of the problem for me. I think that's also likely the reason so many Japanese people won't try and use their English to tourists. Never practicing speaking means I'm not confident at all about my pronunciation. Even though I have read up a lot about Japanese pronunciation, there's no way I'll be able to speak without having to think very hard about the sounds I'm making. :S
Although the other big part is that I really think I've forgotten a lot of the basic polite phrases and what contexts you use the various different words like おねがい vs ください vs たのむ, or しつれいします vs ごめんなさい vs すみません... I learnt the basics so long ago and in considerable detail, but I've never practiced them. I've forgotten most of the important stuff like that and now just know tonnes of strange vocabulary like あみのめ and なのはな instead. :D
I have been doing Duolingo sentences recently, which is translating a sentence from one language to another. This has helped me with getting more familiar with sentence patterns, but it hasn't helped me to remember how to use important polite phrases. I'm not sure reading odd bit of Japanese manga like Shin-chan have really helped me a lot with useful polite phrases either. :P
It would have been a good idea if I spent some time going through a basic travellers guide to speaking Japanese over the last couple of weeks, instead of doing the my normal stuff. I don't really have time to think about doing anything like that now though, as I'm always thinking about whether I've got enough sorted out for the trip.
Just speaking my mind instead of trying to phrase all that carefully. I'm not as worried about it as it might sound. I just think it's a shame I'm probably going to get stuck trying to say anything because I haven't spent any time recently on going over the parts of Japanese that would be the most useful for this trip. (Wrote way too much...) ^^; - Bleh, the mouse button bounced as I was pressing it down and did a rapid double click on the comment button. It instantly posted that long post twice. I never hit the comment button more than once because I know it duplicates your post, but this time there was nothing I could do to prevent it. -_-
- When I first moved over, it got to where I was being perfectionist about my responses, which meant I would only answer what I absolutely knew, which was fairly little. It was only during preparation for the speech that I figured - having experienced Japanese culture for a while - hey, if I suck, they'll say I did great. If I do good, they'll say I did great. If I knock it out of the ballpark, they'll say I did great. That was the beginning of me being able to express myself, unfortunately I don't really filter it with most people - a lot of people won't talk about something that obviously sucks in frank terms, it'll be beat around the bush stuff, which I can't do.
- You'll be fine! Will you struggle a bit? Of course! Even now, I often put myself in uncomfortable situations. By that I mean, I put myself in situations I know my Japanese is inadequate. I almost have no trouble with everday topics, but there are certain topics that go over my head.
I spoke Japanese much, much better than most people who first come here when I first came, and I was terrified to speak the language. It's just something you'll have to get over. As Arachkid said, you're going to get praised the same (usually) no matter how great or poorly you speak Japanese. - Never underestimate the ability to use the Japanese you do know to hammer out discussions in things you don't really know. Politics, for example - I know the word for PM, cabinet member, and government, but not much beyond that, but can still have a... not entirely horrible conversation about politics.
Just saw you were in Japan! Great! for how long? (should read the other feeds I guess :p)
