こんにちはみなさん！ 私はワルンです、はじめまして。三月から日本語をべんきょうしています。 okay, I seriously hope that made sense - here's what I wanted to say (in the last line) I've been learning japanese since march and I have been self tutored for most. I had a little guidance when learning the writing system but one thing that bugs me about kanji - exactly how many kanji should one learn/be able to recognize for the JLPT N5 exam - thanks to this amazing site I've been able have some reading practice of the 85 kanji(N5 plus a few others). Also, I've made use of 2 books(stage 1 & 2) written by Yoko Masano and Meg Evans named "mirai", they were simply amazing for beginners, if you haven't checked them out, I reckon you should. Now that I've run out of books and am currently relying on this site(entirely) for further improving and learning grammar, do you think I should make use of a book rather than this site alone? if yes, could you recommend one?
I really liked the Kanzen Master（完全マスター） series when I was studying for the old level 3 (never took the old 4/N5). I also like the Nihongo Soumatome（日本語総まとめ） series (the ones with the animals on the covers), but I think they start at N3. For grammar I recommend picking up Donna Toki Dou Tsukau (どんな時どう使う）. It has all sorts of grammar patterns for all JLPT levels with example sentences and explanations in English. "A Dictionary of Beginning Japanese Grammar) (it's yellow) is pretty good too. For kanji, you can try Anki. I used the White Rabbit Flashcards before I found this site, and really like them. Also, just try reading anything and everything you can get your hands on. You'll be surprised how much you can pick up!
Since you are doing self-study, I think maybe Genki 1 can be good for you! If you buy Genki 1 + workbook + answer key, you have the possibility to compare your answers to the one in the answer key. Obviously Genki isn't just for grammar, but i have heard from others who do self-study that they thought the explanations of the grammar points were mostly good and that having the ability to check the answers in the answer key was a plus :)
(+ Once you are done with Genki 1 you can move on to Genki 2 - the answer key covers both books.)
Fine then, Genki sounds good. What does Genki 1 deal with? basic stuff? because I've covered a lot of that. What section of this site is useful for reading practice? I'm kind of new here.
This site's not really geared toward reading, though there are the grammar and vocabulary example sentences. But there are other good sites for reading material, like Reading Tutor, ChokoChoko Great Library, and Aozora Bunko. Eventually, there are the news sites like Asahi shinbun and NHK, and, ultimately, the classical E-texts at Virginia U.
For reading I just go to real Japanese websites and try to read there. If you install rikaichan (for firefox) it is very fast to hover over the words and get reading and meaning. It made reading real Japanese online so much easier.
There are also two books called "read real japanese" and these work great if you are at an intermediate level. I got a lot out of the books, but I figure you will need to be proficient around N3 level of JLPT to get real value out of the books, they are not made for beginners of the language. When I first looked at the books when I was just starting out in intermediate Japanese they were to hard for me, but right now they work perfect for me. I am currently studying for the N2. There is furigana, but the grammar patterns and vocabulary being used in these books works best from intermediate level and upwards.
And the Genki-books starts very easy, but cover all basic grammar. Basically, once you are done with Genki (1 + 2) you can go on to study Japanese at an intermediate level.
also, if you're looking for reading practice, check out some of the resources for that on this site (under the To Go tab) - there are some really great readers on there. My favorite was [i]Breaking Into Japanese Literature[/i], you can check out my review on there ;)
