I have just started teaching Japanese in the U.S. for my friends. I am a native Japanese speaker but I realized how it is difficult to teach my own language systematically. I am actually novice as a teacher. But I promise I will do my best to explain. If you are interested in Japanese, please feel free to contact me, leave the comment. I am living in Charlottesville VA U.S. I can be your language partner.
I am going to teach Japanese on this blog for learners who can speak English.
Japanese, unlike the other foreign languages that you are likely have studied, is not a member of Indo-European family, and is not related to English. Nor is it related to Chinese, even though it has borrowed a large vocabulary from Chinese. It is pretty much a language by itself.
In some ways Japanese is simpler than English, in the other ways it is more complex. For example Japanese is extremely regular in its grammatical forms; the exceptions to the grammatical rules of formation can be counted on your fingers. On the other hand, syntax and sentence structure can become very complex, and idioms are numerous. Even native Japan speaker should keep learning. And also we should care about cultural difference, we have kind of seniority system. That is because, I think, we had a lot of natural disasters. We believe senior has better knowledge. So some times, we follow the senior’s opinion, even when we know the senior person should be wrong. We some time choose harmony of group or society rather than right decision. So, we have different form of language to senior person. But English basically does not have such form and we can discuss our opinion with freely at any age.
On this blog, I will use ‘Basic Japanese Grammar’ written by Everett F Bleiler. And also I might write about the grammatical problem that I would face during teaching.
If you are familiar with Japanese culture, it is good. Anime, Electronics including camera, Game, History, whatever, these are your strength to learn Japanese. Tell me if you are interested in something. Tell me if you have something what you want me to post. Your feedback is important!!
Like learning other languages, you need to practice speaking, but also go back to Grammar periodically.
Again, Japanese grammar, though different from your past experience, is not really difficult. I hope that understanding grammar will make your travel more pleasant when some of you come to Japan in the future.