掲示板 Forums - Fastest way to learn how to read jp

So I’m gonna be a hs senior this year and I’m gonna take a gap year and I’m planning to go to a 美容学校 in Japan after (prob モード学園 or ビューティーアート schools) (⁠ﾟ⁠∀ﾟ⁠⁠)

I can speak and listen to Japanese fluently no problems because my mom is Japanese but because reasons I never really was able to learn to read and write much. Don’t really need to learn to write so that’s gonna be like a side quest or sum

Basically my goals are to be able to not be left behind because the reading and be able to pass the 美容師国家試験 (⁠ง⁠ ⁠•̀⁠_⁠•́⁠)⁠ง

So basically I want to get to that level of reading in 2 yrs. Pretty much spending summer break studying so far besides hanging out with family and friends sometimes (´༎ຶོρ༎ຶོ`). Also took as many free periods I could my senior year so I could study reading.

Also I took a mock N3 test and passed, got 100 in the listening section, got like 80–90 on the others because I couldn’t read much and did it based off context (⁠╥⁠﹏⁠╥⁠). Still haven’t taken a mock N2 or N1 yet

I do have a past 美容師国家試験 question book for studying so if you ask I could send pics of that if needed

Any advice or anything is appreciated
(⁠人⁠ ⁠•͈⁠ᴗ⁠•͈⁠)

_(:3 」∠)_

I think It's difficult to give you advice if we don't know your starting point.

For more general advice, I suggest you start going through the 漢字検定 lists. Adding a "word helper schedule" to your kanji schedules helps. What those do is automatically add X number of words that use the kanji you're learning. You can also go through the dictionary and pick up a few words for each new kanji. *Don't try to learn all readings though*.

The idea is to learn readings in the context of words. For example, I recently learned 秩 and find it much easier to remember that it's the first character in 秩序, than to memorise its reading by itself. After I get used to the character, I won't need think of the word anymore. It's more of an intermediary step. Same thing with mnemonics.

※ As soon as you're comfortable with a kanji, you should probably take out its vocab from your SRS rotation (hide them from your helper schedule).

※ Since you're not really learning anything else, it might be a good idea to write new kanji a few times. Should help with memorisation. Keep in mind you're not trying to learn how to write them from memory.

So this is the more "structured" part. Now for what I think matters the most: you have to read... A LOT... there's really no way around it.

I think 少年漫画 is a good starting point, since they usually have a lot of furigana. I'd also recommend Graded Readers (probably the higher levels). I agree that watching Japanese content with subtitles helps, but it shouldn't be your main source of reading practice. It doesn't really work that well for me, since I end up relying on the audio too much.

※ Your goal should be to start reading light novels and then move onto actual books. It might be frustrating at the start, but it's by far the fastest way to learn how to read.

※ I'd also suggest having a custom kanji schedule where you "dump" any kanji you encounter when reading. Anything you see enough to think "I should really learn this one..."

You can also try to tailor your reading practice to the requirements of the 美容師国家試験, but I'm not sure how feasible that would be. Again, it's hard to say without knowing much about your current reading abilities :D

TLDR: Learn kanji paired with vocab (spaced repetition). Read as much as possible (kids content → teens → actual books).

That's all I've got. Good luck! :)

I also recommend the kanji kentei or the 教育漢字.
Since you already know a lot of words, I also think it's better to learn like a native.

Native mostly just "associate" kanji with words. Like, they realize that the words they used for ages is written with that particular kanji.
And that how they learn the meaning/reading of a kanji. Like in renshuu, don't study the definition of kanji.

In that case, for example, the readings tell you the meaning directly. If you look at the JP def, it's the same: ひらく. That's the base meaning/image. As long as you can read hiragana and you know enough words, there's no need to bother with english translation. Unlike most of us, you won't really need to study additional words or the definition of kanji. We do that because, unlike you, we're starting from scratch. Japanese on the other hand just "realize" the existence of a kanji for a particular word. And after, they forced to submit kanji drill each week for years too (they hate it but it's effective)

And that's why, in you case, I would recommend writing but targeted writing. Since you won't be as busy as us. Like for similar kanji (待、時、持) or kanji you're struggling with. Or reading, you're struggling. Write words that you know and contains a specific reading you're currently struggling with.

Also, you should try to clear the 教育漢字 with the primary school readings first (marked with a 小 in the dictionary). Because those are the most important. After those, it's really depend on each person. But by that point, you should focus more on kanji that appear in 美容学 (Don't know if it's that a thing but anyway). Because I'm 99% sure they will a few that won't be even in N1.

Ah and for reading, I don't think you need to bind yourself to Graded Readers. Just read whatever you want with furigana. That's how japanese learn new kanji. Because they already know a lot of words and simply associate those words with kanji by seeing multiple times. I've seen a study where it was estimated that Japanese kids learn roughly like 40% of their kanji from mangas, games, novels, hobbies, etc. outside of school (or something like that). The only exception are the 教育漢字 since they are forced to do kanji drill during the whole primary school (and almost all of them hate kanji drill because of that ) .

That's it for now, I guess? Don't hesitate to come back if you have any questions =p
頑張ってね～

PS: You don't need to study everything too btw since you knowledge is all over the place. Just focus on the problematic one. You could also try 漢字検定DX, a japanese app for kanji, if you want. It makes you work on things that renshuu don't really make you work on (対義語, 類義語, 同音・同訓異字, etc). Like they are dedicated exercise for that and that really help to understand how kanji have similar or opposite meaning. It's also easier to study in context since it only used simple sentence ("羽がぬける" give the reading of はね for example). But it's not a SRS unlike renshuu ; ;