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Japanese for Beginners Resource Guide
It is a myth to say that living abroad is the easiest way to learn a language. I lived in Japan for five years. However, I can’t say I really lived in Japan. I worked in an American environment teaching Spanish.
I love languages, and spent what time I could on learning Japanese. My work hours were demanding and not at all in Japanese, so my learning was largely limited to my commute and to my practice in stores and restaurants on weekends.
In addition to my job requirements and time commitments, Japanese takes three to four times as long to learn for an English speaker as a language closely related to English like French or Spanish. It was also very difficult to use reading to learn, like I had in every other language learning experience I had prior. In fact, I learned that in order to have the skills necessary to read the daily newspaper, a person must have the equivalent of a university degree. In short, not easily accessible to non-natives.
Japanese was by far my most difficult language undertaking. In my five years there, I remained at the A2/novice-high level. I am sharing a list of resources appropriate to that level.
There has been much evolution with technology. Here are some great resources to learn Japanese anywhere.Japanese I – MIT Open CourseWare (Free)
https://ocw.mit.edu/courses/global-studies-and-languages/21g-501-japanese-i-fall-2012
Online Japanese Beginner Course (Paid)
https://www.udemy.com/online-japanese-beginner-course
LEARN JAPANESE with Rosetta Stone® (Paid)
http://www.rosettastone.com/learn-japanese/
Nihongo-Pro (Paid)
Paid Online Course
Learn Japanese Online for Free!
Japanese-Lesson.com provides self-study programs produced by
an experienced native Japanese language teacher.
Free Japanese Lessons
http://www.freejapaneselessons.com/
JAPANESE LANGUAGE AND USAGE
http://japanese.stackexchange.com
JAPANESE LINGUALIFT E-TEXTBOOK
- Learn Japanese Language (limited free resources)
http://www.learn-japanese-kanji-hiragana-katakana.com/
Tofugu (Resources)
Japanese 101 (Free + Paid)
http://www.101languages.net/japanese/
Japanese Pod 101
Japanese Pod 101 requires a membership, but it does have a free option which will still give you access to a large number of videos, sound files, lessons and their newsletter, with extra lessons and free daily podcasts. The videos are professional and easy to follow and the forum is active and helpful.
https://www.japanesepod101.com/
MLC Japanese Language School Resources (Free)
Japanese-Online.com (Free)
http://www.japanese-online.com/
IMABI
Learn Japanese
Tae Kim’s Guide to Learning Japanese
- MEMRISE (Resources)
https://www.memrise.com/courses/english/japanese-4
TANGORIN–Online Japanese Dictionary
Tagaini Jisho–Dictionary
A free Japanese dictionary and study assistant
https://www.tagaini.net/download
Jishoo Online Dictionary
ITalki—Online Paid Courses
https://www.italki.com/teachers/japanese
Lang-8
Online learning tool through interaction with native speakers
Bauddha – Online Resources
Here you can find several Translated (English-Japanese) versions of books and literature pieces
Goo dictionary–Online English-Japanese Dictionary
Chokochoko (Blog)
https://chokochoko.wordpress.com/
Blog where you can find resources for learning Japanese and Korean.
Tatoeba—a collection of sentences and translations
English-Japanese Sentence Translator
http://www.excite.co.jp/world/english_japanese/
Japanese Grammar Guide Tae Kim (Book)
http://www.guidetojapanese.org/grammar_guide.pdf
Reshnuu ( Free)
Online portal where you can access many resources like textbooks, everyday sentences, games, school/classes, community lessens etc. in order to learn Japanese language, highly recommended.
MARUGOTO+ (Free)
MARUGOTO+ (MARUGOTO Plus) is a website where users can learn about Japanese language and culture based on the contents of the “MARUGOTO: Japanese Language and Culture”, the official course book of the Japan Foundation, which complies to the JF Standard for Japanese-Language Education.
Visualizing Japanese Grammar , George Washington University
https://www2.gwu.edu/~eall/vjg/vjghomepage/vjghome.htm
TamaTamako’s Nihongo Learning Animations–Let’s learn Japanese!
Through a number of video, animation, audio lessens
GENKI Online (Free+Paid)
A wide range of resources for learning Japanese Language
http://genki.japantimes.co.jp/
Teach Yourself Japanese (Free)
is a very useful site for those early learners of the Japanese language who prefer to study on their own.
http://www.sf.airnet.ne.jp/~ts/japanese/
Tae Kim— Youtube Channel
https://www.youtube.com/user/taekimjapanese
AJALT – Association for Japanese-Language Teaching (Free+Paid)
Wide Range of Resources – Online Courses, textbooks, lessons, instructors and other online resources
http://www.ajalt.org/english/online/
U-Biq Online Japanese Tests
Tools for assessing one’s Japanese language skills
JGram: The Japanese Grammar Database
Wiki – Reviewing the Kanji Wiki
A large database of resources and information about Japanese language
http://rtkwiki.koohii.com/wiki/Main_Page
Japanese Language Lessons
- Anki—App
Friendly, intelligent flash cards
FLUENTU App
http://www.fluentu.com/japanese/
Busuu — APP
https://www.busuu.com/en/a/a/learn-japanese-online
TextBook : An Introduction to Japanese
https://pomax.github.io/nrGrammar/data/pdf/draft.pdf
TextBooks : Japanese Basics 1-2
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0Bwe-DbPMOR1vLUo4WVN2ZmN3Zzg/edit
TextBook: Learning Japanese for Real
A Guide to Grammar, use and genres of the Nihongo World
https://muse.jhu.edu/book/2145
Want to get started in Japanese? Check out the book for travel and beginners here:http://reallifelanguage.com/reallifelanguageblog/2017/01/14/free-japanese-travel-beginners-book/