Steps to learn Japanese

This is how I plan to approach learning Japanese
please tell me if there is an error in my plan or
you recommend something else. Please note that I am
unable to take a class (there are none in my
vicinity) and I will be unable to hire a private
mentor or tutor for at least a few months (I can
postpone learning Japanese but I don't think I will
require one for a while), however, If there is any
specific time that you believe it would benefit me
most to have a tutor please say so. Currently I
know very little Japanese which includes, some
basic pronunciation, a little bit of grammar, and a
few phrases. I appreciate all help.
1. Learn the Hiragana and Katakana alphabet - I
will do this by using the book Japanese Hiragana &
Katakana for Beginners by Timothy G. Stout
2. Learn some of the basics to get a solid
foundation in Japanese - using Eriko Sato's
Japanese Demystified
I don't know if I should switch 3 and 4 or
postpone one or both of them
3. I will start learning Kanji – with
Remembering the Kanji, Volume 1: A Complete Course
on How not to Forget the Meaning and Writing of
Japanese Characters by James Heisig and any other
recommended books for learning Kanji
4. Further strengthen and review basics – with
An Introduction to Modern Japanese by Osamu
Mizutani & Nobuko Mizutani
5. (I'm not sure if I will be ready yet)
Genki's Integrated Course in Elementary
Japanese(Genki 1) and a Japanese-English dictionary
or English-Japanese Dictionary(I've heard good
things about Kodansha's Furigana Japanese
Dictionary)
6. At this point I think it will be crucial to
be able to put sentences together properly (if not
before) – with A Dictionary of Basic Japanese
Grammar by Seiichi Makino and Michio Tsutsui
(commonly called yellow; its sequels are
intermediate – blue and advanced – red)
7. After this I honestly have no clue, but I
really want to get to an advanced level (maybe get
a vocab-builder and just continue learning Kanji?
Or Genki 2?)
Thanks again for all of the help.

If you're going to use Heisig - which I think is valuable - it's most useful to do it up front, move it to your second position. While going through Heisig, try to study Japanese grammar only with audio and phonetic scripts (ro-maji and kana).
I don't have an opinion on which of the mainstream audio courses is your best introduction, but you might consider those if money isn't a problem. They are expensive.

In any case, definitely throw the free resource Erin's Challenge WEB版「エリンが挑戦！にほんごできます。」サイト閉鎖と新サイトのご案内 | WEB版 エリンが挑戦！にほんごできます。 into your mix, it'll at least add a very useful audio component. (You also may want to start with Genki as your first text for the same reason, it has accompanying CD material. Don't buy the version without the CD even if it would save a few bucks.)

All in all you've got a pretty well thought out plan. Check out Anki - powerful, intelligent flashcards ... I write my own cards, but you can find shared decks for all the books you plan to use as well as general vocab-building shared decks.

Audio courses

SomeCallMeChris said:

If you're going to use Heisig - which I think is valuable - it's most useful to do it up front, move it to your second position. While going through Heisig, try to study Japanese grammar only with audio and phonetic scripts (ro-maji and kana).
I don't have an opinion on which of the mainstream audio courses is your best introduction, but you might consider those if money isn't a problem. They are expensive.

In any case, definitely throw the free resource Erin's Challenge WEB版「エリンが挑戦！にほんごできます。」サイト閉鎖と新サイトのご案内 | WEB版 エリンが挑戦！にほんごできます。 into your mix, it'll at least add a very useful audio component. (You also may want to start with Genki as your first text for the same reason, it has accompanying CD material. Don't buy the version without the CD even if it would save a few bucks.)

All in all you've got a pretty well thought out plan. Check out Anki - powerful, intelligent flashcards ... I write my own cards, but you can find shared decks for all the books you plan to use as well as general vocab-building shared decks.

Click to expand...

Thanks for replying! When you say mainstream audio courses I assume you are talking about Rosetta Stone and Pimsleur. Honestly I don't want to spend so much on one single resource; I've only recently heard of Pimsleur and I should probably look into that more, however, I know a lot of people who use Rosetta Stone and they don't say positive things about it and I have tried it and didn't care too much for it. Admittedly I may have already been influenced by the bad things I had heard about it. Are there any common audio courses I'm not thinking of?

There's also Assimil and Michael Thomas that are often mentioned. I haven't used any of them, and you certainly don't have to; however, my listening abilities lagged behind for a long time. To avoid that, just make sure you find things to listen to that you can understand early on.
If you use Erin's Challenge and the Genki CD, you should be able to find other things after that that you can follow.

SomeCallMeChris said:

There's also Assimil and Michael Thomas that are often mentioned. I haven't used any of them, and you certainly don't have to; however, my listening abilities lagged behind for a long time. To avoid that, just make sure you find things to listen to that you can understand early on.
If you use Erin's Challenge and the Genki CD, you should be able to find other things after that that you can follow.

Click to expand...

Yea, Erin's challenge seems just like the types of vids I would watch for Spanish class, so I'm optimistic about those. I read up on pimsleur, Michael Thomas, and assimil. The best is probably pimsleur but it is $250 for 1 of them! That seems a bit outrageous. Does anybody recommend a particular one? Honestly I think it would just be best to use Erin's challenge until I can get a tutor who can help.

You could try this free podcast. Japanese at all levels, enough episodes to keep you busy for months:

Learn Japanese online. With our podcast, learning Japanese is easy. | JapanesePod101.com

My feeling about those audio courses is that if the price tag bothers you, then don't buy them. Money isn't the same for everyone ... $250 is a lot of money to someone making $10 an hour, and not much at all to someone on a $200,000/year salary with bonuses for performance. If it sounds like a lot of money to you, then it's probably not worth it.

Have you checked your local library? Many libraries have audio courses for languages - mine has Michel Thomas and Pimsleur, and they've been a big help.

I suggest that you don't buy books for hiragana and katakana as those were really easy topics. You can memorize that in a week. You can search for free lessons over the internet, just type learn hiragana and katakana for free. I guess there are tons, so you don't need to bother buy books for those two. I hope this helps...

If I may put in my 2 cents on audio programs
I LOVE Assimil. I like that the dialogues start at a slow pace then begin to speed up as you gain more confidence in the language. I have the programs for Japanese, French, German, Italian and Spanish. The French one is the most updated, though. (The Italian one still mentions lira. But I guess this isn't so bad for practicing large sums). I also tried Michel Thomas. It's great but I found it a little fast at the start.

Another audio program I tried was Living Language Platinum -- I have this in Italian. It comes with 3 books, a notebook, audio CDs and you also get access to an online tutor who is a native speaker. The course says it covers basic to advanced. But at best, I think it's only at B1 level (if judging from the European language standard).

baskerville said:

If I may put in my 2 cents on audio programs
I LOVE Assimil. I like that the dialogues start at a slow pace then begin to speed up as you gain more confidence in the language. I have the programs for Japanese, French, German, Italian and Spanish. The French one is the most updated, though. (The Italian one still mentions lira. But I guess this isn't so bad for practicing large sums). I also tried Michel Thomas. It's great but I found it a little fast at the start.
Another audio program I tried was Living Language Platinum -- I have this in Italian. It comes with 3 books, a notebook, audio CDs and you also get access to an online tutor who is a native speaker. The course says it covers basic to advanced. But at best, I think it's only at B1 level (if judging from the European language standard).

Click to expand...

Is Living Language Platinum a subscription?