Why do japanese learn English so quickly?

[Silverpoint]

When you start to become a little more proficient with kanji it makes everything so much easier. I was helping an English friend a few days ago with his Japanese homework and he had one of those 'all hiragana' textbooks. I still find it slow going trying to read a page of hiragana. Once you start to understand kanji you can read at 10 times the speed because the everything becomes clearer - sentence structure, meaning, word breaks etc...

 

[Maciamo]

When you start to become a little more proficient with kanji it makes everything so much easier. I was helping an English friend a few days ago with his Japanese homework and he had one of those 'all hiragana' textbooks. I still find it slow going trying to read a page of hiragana. Once you start to understand kanji you can read at 10 times the speed because the everything becomes clearer - sentence structure, meaning, word breaks etc...

I agree with that. The first thing I studied in Japanese were the kanji. Even now, my kanji level is higher than my vocabulary (i.e. sometimes I can read the kanji and know the individual meaning, but not the whole word) or grammar.

 

[Kinsao]

I really want to learn kanji. My class (which starts in about an hour from now, wahay!) unfortunately does not cover kanji, so I intend to try and learn them myself from good study guide or some such. I will feel more confident to learn, when I am also learning the speaking in parallel.

 

[Gaijinian]

I agree with that. The first thing I studied in Japanese were the kanji. Even now, my kanji level is higher than my vocabulary (i.e. sometimes I can read the kanji and know the individual meaning, but not the whole word) or grammar.

Same here.

 

[GoldCoinLover]

And how was her grammar ? Didn't she confuse past simple and present perfect, mistake in irregular tenses, confuse some prepositions or add "the" where it's not needed ? These are all typical mistakes of Spanish speakers. If you can't tell, the you are not ready to become an English teacher.

Btw, Eikaiwa means "English conversation" in Japanese.

Hehe, I honestly forgot what simple and present perfect, mistake in irregular tenses, and prepositions meant. I want to be something other than a english teacher in japan...eventually. But I'll probably start as one. Maybe I can brush on my english, I am going to take english classes as one of my last classes in my senior year of highschool Which I will take soon. Apparently at nova, you can teach without prior teaching experience, just need to be a native speaker. By the way no, her english was perfect. Whenever I go to that mcdonalds she is working there. Maybe shes lying, but I think it took her longer than 2 years..

 

[lexico]

[A] Mexican lady the other day, she said after 2 years she could speak english fluently.

Well, she also could have had years of English back in Mexico, but only 2 yrs of exposure in a mostly English speaking environment. Hey, I've learned/studied English for almost 10 yrs, and 2 yrs was barely enough to get me fluent enough in campus English.

I am going to take english classes as one of my last classes in my senior year of highschool Which I will take soon. Apparently at nova, you can teach without prior teaching experience, just need to be a native speaker.

Although people talk about the critical age limit of around 12 before which learning a foreign language close to a native speaker is possible, a lot of people also argue that having a good, conscious understanding of one's own language makes a huge impact on understanding & performing in the newly learned language. Hence I would like to suggest that you take you English class (which I assume is geared towards grammar for English composition for writing academic essays) rather seriously and spend a decent amount of time, work, reflection and research in order for you to 1) get a good grasp of your Japanese 2) be able to convey your understanding of English to your future Japanese students of English.

I may be only one case, but my extensive studies in Korean phonology (sound studies), morphology (word formation), syntax (sentence), and historical linguistics (language history) in high school contributed greatly to my understanding of English as well as teaching English to students at all levels. So if I may extend the analogy, a good grasp of your first language both in performance (as a native speaker) and its grammatical properties would help you in those two areas. Knowing one, pointing out the difference by comparison, and also learning to be fluent in the new language will give you all the tools you might need to become a good langauge instructor. Go talk to your English teacher for guidance, get the book beforehand, and stay ahead of your class always; you won't regret it !

 

[Maciamo]

Hehe, I honestly forgot what simple and present perfect, mistake in irregular tenses, and prepositions meant.

It is unthinkable for a continental European not to know what these things mean in their respective languages. I believe that one just cannot be a teacher (even a bad one) without knowing this. Although all French, German, Italian or Spanish speakers know very well since the age of 9 or 10 what an article or a preposition is, the name of all tenses and other grammatical elements not found in English, it would be unthinkable to become a foreign language teacher in Europe without a 4-year university degree in that language, which means knowing also the literature and history of that language, and reasonably well also the antique language it comes from (especially for languages deriving from Latin, as there are plenty of Latin texts surviving).

Sorry but I am just shocked when I hear American people who go and teach English in Japan and hardly know the basics of grammar of their own language. (I am not talking about you, as you are not in Japan, but people I have met, and like whom you may become as I see it come).

 

[Ma Cherie]

Perhaps it's not that the teachers don't know basic grammer rules, it could be more to the point that they forget basic grammer rules. This seems to be true when people begin writing English (I know we're talking about speaking it) :sorry: it's easy to forget basic grammer rules. And English seems to have so many rules. :? Besides, I ran into quite of foriegners who've lived in English speaking nations and still cannot produce a complete sentence. At any rate, I think when it comes to grammer rules I think it comes from the fact that the rules seem to change when writing and speaking. Or so it seems.

 

[Maciamo]

Perhaps it's not that the teachers don't know basic grammer rules,
it could be more to the point that they forget basic grammer rules. This seems to be true when people begin writing English (I know we're talking about speaking it) :sorry: it's easy to forget basic grammer rules.

And why would French, German, or Italian speakers not forget them so easily ?

And English seems to have so many rules. :?

If Europeans like English it is justly because it has much less rules and grammar than other European languages. No subject-verb or noun-adjective agreement, no masculine-feminine-neutral, almost no conjugation, not so strict syntax (e.g. you can drop the "that" in relative sentences), flexible syntax (Japan's history, the history of Japan, japanese history...), no declensions, etc.

At any rate, I think when it comes to grammer rules I think it comes from the fact that the rules seem to change when writing and speaking. Or so it seems.

But so does it in every language. That's why school teach how to write properly.

 

[Ma Cherie]

There are alot of grammer rules in English. (At least I think so) I think the reason why German speakers don't easily forget grammer rules is because one, there probably aren't as many and two, German is logical language anyway. A friend of mine tried to teach me German, and everything seems to fit together. ☝ You often point out that European schools put more emphasis on language, I also think this could contribute to the fact that Europeans don't forget grammer rules as much. The only argument I could come up with as to why so many Americans forget or simply don't know grammer well is because there isn't alot of emphasis on language.

Or we could just be stupid like that. :sorry:
(kidding)

 

[Maciamo]

There are alot of grammer rules in English. (At least I think so) I think the reason why German speakers don't easily forget grammer rules is because one, there probably aren't as many and two, German is logical language anyway.

German has much more grammatical rules than English. That's a fact. But have you studied German yourself ? It is not because German grammar is more logical than there are less rules. German has a lot a rules, but fairly regular and logical. French has a lot of rules, but very irregular and illogical. English has few rules and because they are quite flexible, it seems that they are not logical (if fact they are among the most logical, which is why I like English).

You often point out that European schools put more emphasis on language, I also think this could contribute to the fact that Europeans don't forget grammer rules as much.

If something differentiate European schools from American ones, it is first and foremost the maths level (a 12th grade in the US is commonly recognised as a 9th or 10th grade in Continental Europe by student exchange organisations), and the general knowledge (history and geopolitics). Then come foreign languages and the mother tongue's level. In fact, because English is so much easier to learn from a grammatical point of view to become functional in daily life, the mother tongue's course don't take as long as for German, French, Italian, Spanish, etc. So English speakers can spend more time on literature, or learn at a more relaxed pace. Because mother tongue classes are the main subject with maths in primary/elementary school, I think that this slower pace also influences the pace of other subjects, which in the end result in a big gap between the US and EU highschool levels.

So it's not necessarily because the average of intelligence is lower in the US (although it has been proved that children from poor families and immigrant families perfom less well at school, and the US has more poor and immigrant families than Europe), but because the academic exigencies are lower from the start - partly because there are too many hours dedicated to English compared to what's necessary, which slows down the pace.

 

[lexico]

Is English grammar simple or complex ?

How does that affect native speakers and language learners ?
Wikipedia on English Language: Grammar

English grammar is based on its Germanic roots, though some scholars during the 1700s and 1800s attempted to impose Latin grammar upon it, with little success. English is just slightly inflected, much less so than most Indo-European languages. It compensates for this by placing more grammatical information in auxiliary words and word order. Unlike most other Indo-European languages, nominal groups (nouns) in English do not carry gender.

Wikipedia on English Grammar

English grammar is the study of grammar in the English language. Grammars of English can be either prescriptive or descriptive. Prescription sets rules for language, while description simply describes the way a language is spoken; this article attempts to be primarily descriptive. It is important to understand that experts disagree about many parts of English grammar: what follows is just one analysis among many.

The grammar of English is in some ways relatively simple, and in others quite complex. For example, word order is relatively fixed because English is an analytic language and this aspect of grammar is therefore relatively simple. The verb system, on the other hand, is quite large and complex, like those of many other Indo-European languages.

I think the different levels of grammatical awareness between native English speakers when compared to native speakers of other Indo-European languages have two distinct causes.

First, English in general has little grammar if we restrict the narrow application of grammar to syntactic rules expressed in single noun/verb forms. Limiting the discussion to synthetic verb forms in the active voice only for sake of brevity, a French verb (in the active voice) for example can express by itself the following.

- person: 1st, 2nd, 3rd
- number: singlular, plural
- tense: present, simple past (preterite), imperfect past, simple future (depending on mood)
- mood: indicative, imperative, subjunctive, infinitive, participial, or gerundive
- aspect: perfect or not (imbedded in tense, non-periphratic verb forms)

As a result, a single French verb can have as many as 45 forms (not including the infinitive and the two participials) conveying all these verbal meanings.

English in comparison cannot express all the grammatical meanings pertaining to the verb except in the two synthetic forms of the present and the simple past, resulting in 3 forms (e.g. have, has, had).

- person & number: (1st+2nd+3rd plural merged) and (3rd singular) only in present tense*
(*with the exception of the be verb)
- tense: present and simple past
- mood: (indicative, imperative, subjunctive**, and infinitive variously merged), participial, or gerundive
(**with subjunctive present for the be verb as an exception)
- aspect: not expressible except in infinitive and participial

With analytic phrasal verbs (periphrases: several words conveying the grammatical meaning) conveying the following in addition,

- tense: progressive (=continuous) in all active tenses (18), but not with passive future, not with the three tenses of passive perfect (aspect)
- aspect: perfect or not
- voice: active, passive, or reflexive

the ratio of possible verbal forms between French and English increases from 45 : 3 to 90 : 24. Hence it can be said that the expressiveness of the single, unassisted (non-periphrastic) English verb lacks the verbal conjugation at a complexity 3/45 = 6.7% of that of French. Taking the multi-word (analytic) English verb, English verbs as a whole shows only 24/90 = 26.7% of the verb complexity of French.

English nouns, adjectives, articles, and determiners lack gender and case with the exception of pronomial declension which hardly accounts for 1% of the paradigm across all nominals, i.e. noun equivalent words. Therefore it can be safely said that English lacks declension. Even if we take into account usage frequency involving the pronouns, the figure is less than 5% of that of French.

What is lost in word inflection, English needed not make up for every detail in multi-word, analytical words although there are plenty of phrases of all sorts following productive rules of word formation. Hence the relative simplicity of English grammar is both misleading and gives the effect of complexity by some sort of surprise factor. Several facts of English and written English:

1) Analytical verbs are learned with relative ease, and can be improved upon even when one form is used only partially correct whereas an erroneous French verb might throw off the listener/reader completely. The greater redundancy of English makes it easier for the learner and instructor.

2) Auxiliary devices of conjunctions (if) co-verbs, auxiliary verbs, and modals are used extensively to make up for some of the lost verbal conjugations which might make it rather unclear to the language learner as well as the native speaker how to handle/explain them.

3) The conventions of written English (=English grammar taught in English speaking areas) have been artificially forged after the model of the classical writers and the culturally more advanced Latinate language conventions; hence grammar of written English learned in school can often be discrepant with the spoken form.

4) English grammar was also molded after the classical languages, causing the awkward forcing of prescriptions to "correct" the English language, and this has left scars both in the grammar books, learners, and instructors alike.

See the higly interesting discussion of Prescriptive and Descriptive Grammar: A history of linguistic prescription in English in Wikipedia.

Secondly, the American attitude towards grammar must be mentioned although I have not the experience to compare. Therefore I would like to simply raise the topic of the British emphasis on proper form versus the American emphasis on casualness (=disliking formalities) and communicative pragmatism. The difference seems to be more than subtle, resulting in perhaps over 90% of Americans that I've met saying they disliked grammar and composition, perhaps out of a mild form of political correctness to be more natural as language users and to be more descriptive in applying language studies to teaching and learning.

 

[Kinsao]

As a result, a single French verb can have as many as 45 forms (not including the infinitive and the twp particlples) conveying all these verbal meanings.

Wow.

I didn't know that.

When it's analysed, French then sounds complicated... but somehow I don't find it to be difficult... I don't know why, maybe it's some kind of genetic tendency :?

I think German is difficult... I never progressed very far to learn it, but it seems to me to have many rules compared with English, even if they are logical.

 

[Maciamo]

As a result, a single French verb can have as many as 45 forms (not including the infinitive and the twp particlples) conveying all these verbal meanings.

I didn't know that.

When it's analysed, French then sounds complicated... but somehow I don't find it to be difficult... I don't know why, maybe it's some kind of genetic tendency

In fact, French has 7 simple tenses and 7 composed tenses with 6 persons, then 2 imperatives with 3 persons and 6 other tenses with just one person (see example). In total, a single French verb can thus have : (14x6)+(2x3)+(6x1)= 96 forms per verb. I admit that 4 tenses (28 forms) are hardly ever used nowadays though. Primary school students spend a ridiculous amount of time memorising all those forms for all the hundreds of irregular verbs. That is why such sites as the one in link above exist (over 8000 verbs conjugated). Compare to that, learning 2000 kanji just seems like amusement (especially that Japanese children learn them over 12 years, while French-speakers learn them in less than 6 years).

But what I find most annoying in French are the silent subject-verb and noun-adjective agreements (especially that unnerving Latin rule that a past participle agrees with the subject with some verbs and the object with others, but only if the object precedes the verb ! So one must think everytime one wishes to write something as it is completely unnatural and not rendered in spoken French).

I think German is difficult... I never progressed very far to learn it, but it seems to me to have many rules compared with English, even if they are logical.

It's difficult to judge the difficulty of a language if you have not reached some fluency in it, or not learned several other languages to compare. I'd say that German is easier than Dutch or French, but more difficult than English, Italian or Japanese.

 

[Limonette]

My German teacher complained that us students didn't even know English - she had to teach us English grammar so we could understand German, like the difference between a noun and a verb, etc. True!

 

[Ma Cherie]

My German teacher complained that us students didn't even know English - she had to teach us English grammar so we could understand German, like the difference between a noun and a verb, etc. True!

Alright there is something seriously wrong with that, I understand that lots of students don't know grammer all that well, but how in the helll could the students not know the difference between a noun and a verb? For goodness sake, I was drilled with that stuff in the third grade. I don't know, maybe I was fortunate enough to have good teachers. There's no point in learning another language if you hardly know your own.

 

[JerseyBoy]

It seems there are many teachers/educators in various fields on this forum.

I think learning multiple languages at the early age can be more attainable if you live in the regions where many different languages are spoken. EU countries are one of the good examples of this as you can go to the next country by train or car without immigration issues. I think many Japanese parents do not like to finance the overseas study for their children as they prefer their children to focus on the entrance exam for high school or university. When I was in Japan, I sensed many parents felt studying in overseas is a distraction from their goal which is the success entry into the prestigious high school or university.

Fortunately, my folks were a little more open minded (or I rather changed their minds as I set up a plan to study, live, and work overseas). I did a home stay with one family in California for a summer and I listened to English/American programs (VOA, BBC, and a few ones available from the Japanese satellite broadcast service), while reading various books (from Dickens to current best seller books).

In general, the English education in Japanese schools is focused on reading and understanding instead of listening and speaking. I think that is the reason some people go to the language schools to compensate for that deficiency in the official education programs. I did not take the route as I went to US for higher education.

I am not a perpetual student who loves to study for the sake of knowledge. I am a pragmatist who learns things I can use for my personal objectives and goals. Even though I am not going to the graduate school, I consider myself competent enough to learn things I want to learn without going to an educational establishment where I park myself in the classroom. I am a self learner.

Since we are talking about mastering the foreign languages, I would like to ask your opinion on self learning language programs such as Rosetta Stone. Even though I am not in a need to learn new languages (so far English and Japanese are serving me well in my profession), I am interested in picking the other one up as a hobby. I am leaning toward French or German.

 

[Yokan]

My German teacher complained that us students didn't even know English - she had to teach us English grammar so we could understand German, like the difference between a noun and a verb, etc. True!

are you meaning as in like the french, cause we have different ways of saying stuff in french. For instance

I am big - je suis grand [for a boy] je suis grande [for a girl]

french....why i hate school XDDDDDDD [and maths]

 

[Mike Cash]

My German teacher complained that us students didn't even know English - she had to teach us English grammar so we could understand German, like the difference between a noun and a verb, etc. True!

Your teacher was right. Did she also teach the difference between nominative case and objective case pronouns? ("we students"....not "us students")

 

[gaijinalways]

while the majority of the foreigners (Western and Asian) I have met that were really wanted to learn Japanese managed to become fluent with just 2 or 3 years ?

I am amazed if that is the truth. Most foreigners, especially the ones who are not Chinese or Korean, take much longer than 2 years to become fluent in Japanese (reading, writing, speaking, listening).

I can only imagine that my former classmates now speak both at a higher level than my English now (which already surpass some so-called "native speakers", but that is not very difficult given the quality of education in some Englsih-speaking countries).

You would need to specify which countries you are comparing the English speaking countries to. Unless you're talking about Finland, which recently ranked 1# in the world for comparable subjects, that would hardly appear to be true.

In spite of the fact that I was never really gifted for languages, being mostly a scientific in my orientation in all my schooll years then studied economics, I managed to learn 7 languages at a fluent or conversational level.
Yet I could say it took time with Japanese mostly because I was not very motivated to learn it once I got the basis.

I am impressed if you can juggle 7 languages. I barely juggle 4 now, and my Chinese has fallen below the conversational level.
My apologies for being slightly picky, but even though I think your English is quite good, I don't think I would rate it in the native category. The two errors displayed above I caught just skimming your post.
Probably better would be "having mostly emphasised science in my studies" or "having a mostly scientific orientation in my studies" and "once I got the basics"
But to be honest, the errors are minor and don't impair the communication of either of your points.

I think that in Europe, because of the close proximity of countries to one another, it is much easier to be exposed to and learn other languages as you could go to several countries just in one weekend! Also, all/most of the education systems in especially Western Europe expose students to more languages than most equivalent public schools in England, North America, Australia, and New Zealand.
[It's difficult to judge the difficulty of a language if you have not reached some fluency in it, or not learned several other languages to compare. I'd say that German is easier than Dutch or French, but more difficult than English, Italian or Japanese.

I believe it depends on the languages that you already have some knowledge of, and the similarity of your native language to the language(s) that you are studying. For example, when Koreans learn Japanese (or vice versa), it is relatively easy as the grammar is pretty much the same, a lot of the kanji is the same (Hangu is a relatively modern concept) just the pronunciation is slightly different. So for yourself, knowing a Romance language makes it easier to learn almost any related Western European language.

So judging the difficulty of a language is somewhat 'colored' by the languages that you are fluent in or have familarity with. And also when you are speaking of fluency, remember that mastering all parts of a language means being able to master the four main skill areas (reading, writing, speaking, listening), which speaking of the first two for Japanese, I would think reading and writing would be much more difficult to learn than German for most people, unless you already have a ready base (like Koreans and Chinese people do) in kanji.

If something differentiate European schools from American ones, it is first and foremost the maths level (a 12th grade in the US is commonly recognised as a 9th or 10th grade in Continental Europe by student exchange organisations), and the general knowledge (history and geopolitics). Then come foreign languages and the mother tongue's level.

I am wondering here, and maybe you can help me out. I have noticed in Hong Kong, China, and Japan, like Europe, they study some concepts in mathematics much earlier than the States. What I did notice was, the depth wasn't the same. In other words, Americans study more concepts within the related disciplines, i.e. geometry, algebra, trigonometry, etc.
I would hazard a guess that it's the same in Europe. My Japanese students and Chinese students that I have tutored in math were always amazed that I knew 'tricks' or shortcuts that they had never studied in school (and perhaps never will, in school that is).
JerseyBoy
It seems there are many teachers/educators in various fields on this forum.
I think learning multiple languages at the early age can be more attainable if you live in the regions where many different languages are spoken. EU countries are one of the good examples of this as you can go to the next country by train or car without immigration issues.
This emphasises my above point about exposure to languages, wherein the EU countries win hands down over many other areas in the world, perhaps excepting some parts of Africa.

 

[Himiko]

窶堙懌?堋ｾ窶堋｢窶堋｢窶堙娯?堙遺?堙懌?堋ｦ窶堋ｨ窶堙昶?堙や?堋ｯ窶堙遺?堋ｩ窶堙≫?堋ｽﾂ｜ﾂ｜ﾂ｜

WOAH. 窶堙昶?堙ｱ窶堋?窶堋ｳ窶堙ｱﾂ。I just read the ENTIRE thread. This is heavy stuff. ☝
But I just want to say:

English is very hard compared to Japanese. Isn't that the root of this whole thing?

And to whomever started this thread, I have one thing for you:
If you want to learn a language fluently in a year (maybe two years), set-up a program that works! Listen; I am currently learning 55 words a month. That's only 2-3 words a day, and then a quiz at the end of each week. Very stress-free.

Of course, I realize that that statement is not going to be held so very true, as I have been 'scantily' studying the language 4 years before now. But I've just gotten serious about it this year, and I've learned 10 times as much as those previous years combined.

So, if you're to take one thing from this post, Find a learning program that really works for you and it'll be a lot easier.

 

[gaijinalways]

Find a learning program that really works for you and it'll be a lot easier.
Thanks Himiko, I'm still looking for that, but I'm still trying.

 

[Hachiro]

Boy when I first read the thread title I thought for sure that there was going to be comedy at the least..........Great attention getter.......carry on......as I back out of the way.........interesting conversation by the way.......very informative

 

[godppgo]

Wow it seems there are quite a few language experts/educators on this forum. A few people mentioned about reaching fluency in Japanese in 2 or 3 years. I don't see why this is not possible however, the challenge would be to maintain and improve after you have reached a certain fluency level.

Myself started learning English when I was 13, I've noticed a great improvment during my high school years. I studied engineering during university and somehow my English sorta stopped improving or was improving at a very slow pace. I blame it on all those technical/scientific engineering books I spent most of my time reading.

So my point is: Reaching fluency in Japanese is one thing, having the chances to use it and making Japanese part of your brain is the big challenge.

 

[gaijinalways]

Reaching fluency in Japanese is one thing, having the chances to use it and making Japanese part of your brain is the big challenge.

I would state you have define 'fluency'. If you mean speaking like a near native, some people will never reach that level, including especially pronunciation and idomatic usage-wise. But as to reaching high levels, I have seen people take anywhere from 5-10 years. Of course, the closer the langauge is to your native tongue, this will speed up the process of learning and possible mastery.

It's very true about the second part of god's statement. You really need to absorb a language in as many different ways as much as possible.