Tag Archives: immersion

“Don’t Give a Pluck, Guitar Samurai: “.ooooo1% is better than 0”

15 Saturday Dec 2012

Posted by in Deliberate Practice, Guitar, Mind, Reading, Samurai Time Management

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One of the nice things about signing up for Silverspoon, an internet Japanese immersion service, is that you get daily servings of corny motivational phrases.   After a while they start to rub off on you, and you start to believe that you can accomplish things.  (Motivational reps–resistance if futile 🙂 )  Yes, I am not completely fluent in Japanese.  (I’ve been doing/not doing Silverspoon my own way so it’s not really an issue for me.)  Yep, just having a hell of a lot more fun doing stuff in Japanese, writing more (in so-called English), and otherwise tripping the light fantastic.

Talk about life long learning. I love that there is a book dedicated to teaching seniors how to play The Ventures. But why wait until you retire to do what you want to do?

Talk about life long learning. I love that there is a book dedicated to teaching seniors how to play The Ventures. But why wait until you retire to do what you want to do?

 

A recent “casualty” of the corny motivational Silverspoon phrases has been my guitar playing.  I haven’t gone anywhere near my Jamplay.com  account in months.   It will expire at the end of the year.  (Check around Christmas time to New Years–they often have discounts if you are interested.  Follow the link on the bottom right of this page.)  I was doing the usual response:  avoiding thinking about guitar or silently beat myself from it.

Then I got one of the 100’s of emails I get from Silverspoon that said:  “.000001% is better than o.”  That little phrase motivated me to pick up and tune my Fender and do a little Jamplay.  Luckily, I had created Anki cards for my guitar lessons and was reminded to go to beginner lessons by Steve Eulberg.   I like his lessons not only because they are clear but also because he is cheerful, hopeful, and teaches you how to keep on learning.  I’ve been doing ten minutes before I get to bed.  I’ve been learning about the logic of chord progressions and playing them. More importantly, getting to the lessons means that I end up with a guitar strapped around my neck and often just end up playing around.

I can’t promise you that I will keep on playing.  It’s a one day at a time thing.  However, I can take the opportunity to provide you with some pithy “take-aways” from guitar to help you with any skill you want to take on:

  • don’t wait for the right materials.  Don’t fret about the “right materials” or method.  You need momentum.  Use the “crappy” materials while you find better stuff.  Jamplay is actually excellent but I found myself fretting about the dozens of materials instead of actually picking up the guitar.  Luckily, I had created an
    If you make the happiness decision then maybe you can experience more creativity in your life. Self-loathing and criticism aren't going to help you. I finally got around to getting out my Japanese guitar books. Learning through love. Trying to make the happy decisions. Two birds no stone.

    If you make the happiness decision then maybe you can experience more creativity in your life. Self-loathing and criticism aren’t going to help you. I finally got around to getting out my Japanese guitar books. Learning through love. Trying to make the happy decisions. Two birds no stone.

    SRS flashcard deck out of many of the lessons and that gave me ideas of where to begin.  Continue.

  • have some fun once the “heavy lifting” has begun.  Once I had my guitar and stumbling through a lesson, I also had the guitar in my hands and ready to play around.
  • just a little bit keeps the conversation going–when you are learning a skill or  learning a language.   A little bit each day keeps the skill in play even if not perfected.   I started thinking about chord progressions after a short re-exposure to one of Steve Eulberg’s lessons.   Light the matches until you can burn the candle.
  • put your money where your mouth is–pay for a service.   The fact that I paid X dollars for Silverspoon keeps me going.  The fact that I have to decide whether to renew Jamplay got me back to the guitar.
  • cross-pollinate your interests and “leverage” your interests.  I want to know more about music.   I could bash myself and note that I don’t know every band that Eric Clapton was in or I could just have fun.  Lately, I have been making Japanese
    This is a reference manga for the manga series, "Beck." The manga is about a 90 lb. weakling who joins a rock band. (I didn't end up following the manga or the anime.) The music guide gives background to all the characters and all the real-life music influences that run throughout the manga. If I read this, not only will I know more Japanese, I will also know more about rock and roll music history. Amazon Japan Link.

    This is a reference manga for the manga series, “Beck.” The manga is about a 90 lb. weakling who joins a rock band. (I didn’t end up following the manga or the anime.) The music guide gives background to all the characters and all the real-life music influences that run throughout the manga. If I read this, not only will I know more Japanese, I will also know more about rock and roll music history.

    flashcards about Happy End and Harumi Hosono, some of my favorite old style rock groups.  Two birds rocking and rollin’.

A New Year is approaching but don’t wait until then.  Give it .00000001%!

The Things I Carry: A Day in the Life of a Silverspooner

10 Monday Dec 2012

Posted by in Deliberate Practice, Mind, Reading, Samurai Time Management

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I am on day 572 of 595 in Silverspoon, an internet service designed to help people immerse themselves in Japanese and become fluent.   I like the fact that there are limited days.  These past weeks I’ve passed over opportunities to immerse in English media because in the back of my mind, I am always thinking, “I only have x days left.”   Time limits good.  Goals with time limits are powerful and effective.  The “race” is on.

Some of the things I carry: headphones, Heisig cards, One Minute Study Method Book, and kanji cards designed for Japanese fifth graders. Music or podcast is usually always on. Depending on my mood and travel conditions, I may pull out any of the other materials.

Tim O’Brien wrote a very powerful book about the Vietnam war called The Things They Carried.  The novel reads more like a poem describing the different objects, memories, and stories that the soldiers carried on their tour.   In a completely different vein, I just want to take a minute to describe some of the things that I carry as I try to immerse myself in Japanese.

A quick word about the methodology of Silverspoon, or at least how I interpret it.  When I log on to Silverspoon, everyday I open up a link and follow the day’s “sprints.”  This could involve anything from making monolingual (Japanese-Japanese) flashcards about a mouthwash ad to just doing flashcard repetitions in various time configurations.   These pushes are followed by “chillax” periods where you may have Japanese in the background but you aren’t consciously pushing on the language.

The pushes are punctuated throughout the day, which is a smart way to work because of the way memory and Spaced Repetition Systems work.   It is better to space out studying over the day than drill to kill.    As the memory of a new learned fact begins to “decay”, you get the opportunity to revive this fact and move it closer to storage in long term memory.

1分スピード記憶勉強法　　(Study Method with One-Minute Speedy Memorizing) uses a matches to candle metaphor  for this process.   A fact learned with your short term memory is like a match.   If you don’t do anything eventually the fact will just extinguish it.  However, if you repeat it again, you can use it to light another “match”  and then another until finally all the last match can light the candle of long term memory.   A candle burns longer and is more dependable than a match.

On the back of these cards are Japanese definitions, sample sentences, and a humorous strip to reinforce the words. A lot of times the vocabulary is beyond my grasp. I give it a read and throw the card away. My thinking is that I will have other opportunities to have fun with this word. I stop looking at these cards when it feels like a chore.

Fun illustration from １分スピード勉強法。　Short term memory expires quickly. However, through repetitions the memory can cover the distance to light the candle of long term memory.

Most of the “heavy lifting” in Silverspoon comes in the morning, when I make new flashcards and to the longest repetitions.   There are flashcard repetitions throughout the day, but they are interspersed with a lot of “chillaxing”  (or in my case, work and child care).

The nice thing about Silverspoon is that you get links to Japanese content that I wouldn’t have thought of before. I also do a lot less to almost no movie or anime watching than Silverspoon recommends.  I just don’t have a lot of time, so the links are really helpful.

But in the meantime, I have the things I carry:

  • iphone and a Bose Headphones:   Lately, I’ve been pushing a little bit by taking fifteen or less minutes to listening to japanesepod101.com lessons on my 40 minute walk to school.  The rest of the time I listen to Japanese music.  Lately, I’ve discovered a Japanese podcast called ラヂオ版　学問ノススメ　Special Edition.  I discovered it by doing an iTunes search for Kenichiro Mogi  (茂木建一廊）、a Japanese brain scientist, author, and former television host.  I don’t understand most of the interviews but I listen for the tone.   Besides “chillaxing” I use the iPhone for the spare moments on line or waiting for the elevator to keep the matches lit.  I always keep a few iPhone windows always open to anki, surusu, Japanesepod101 and random Japanese  websites.
  • a wallet full of cards:  just in case I have a spare moment and don’t want to seem completely rude I have Heisig flashcards and a Japanese 5th grade cards that have

    I bought these cards for a $1 when the Asahiya Book store closed. 🙁 They come in a book that you can tear up. On the front of the card is the stroke order and some Japanese mnemonics to remember how to write it, in addition to the Japanese and Chinese readings.

    mnemonics on the front and sample sentences on the back ….

  • a man bag with at least one Japanese book in it:   I pull this out when I can get a seat on the subway or when I am waiting at a doctor’s office.  Right now, I just read for fun and skip over words and kanji I don’t understand.   Really, relaxing and having fun with target language material is the ultimate “repetition.”  Reinforcing through fun.  Exposure to new material without that high stakes, “gotta study” feeling.
  • If I can’t get a seat on the subway or the trip is very short, I pull out the Midori flashcard app on my iPhone.   However, I’ve realized (even though it’s been drilled over to me by the likes of AJATT since Day 1) that studying single vocabulary words without the context of sentences is one of the least productive things to do.  However, it’s nice to keep moving when I have a few minutes.

Stay in motion. You learn the things that you carry.   What’s in your wallet?   What are you trying to learn?   What do you carry?  What could you carry?  What would be fun?   Keep in touch and let us know.

One Minute Review: Enjoy Yourself to Learn a Foreign Language

24 Saturday Nov 2012

Posted by in Deliberate Practice, Mind, Reading

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I’ve been dipping into this book by Masami Utsude about adding speed to your learning methods. He recommends learning English by watching and reading materials that you enjoy. Good advice for learning any language!

As part of my Japanese immersion project, I have Japanese books stashed all over the place: in  my man bag, by my bedside, by the computer, etc.  At the Writer’s Room, where I spend 45-60 minutes each morning studying or working on my writing, I have several books.  At the top of the pile is １分スピード記憶勉強法：　Study Method with One-Minute Speedy Memorizing by Masami Utsude.   I dip into this book every now and then because it is simply laid out, has a lot of pictures, and is inspirational.

A whole section is devoted to learning English,  but these methods and ideas can be applied to any language–for fun and profit :).  Here are some of my dash of soy sauce translations of some of the best ideas.  [I put brackets around where I mistranslated “English” into “foreign language.”]

Guarantee Improvement While Having Fun!:  One Minute English Study Method.“楽しいながら確実に上達!「１分スピード英語勉強法」”　　

Unless the text is completely compelling, these days I am choosing Japanese books with pictures. 1分　has a lot of fun pictures. This one emphasizes that it is more fun and easier to learn a foreign language through quick and repeated reviews.

Utsude argues that one of the main reasons Japanese people don’t learn English is because they don’t give themselves enough opportunities to read, speak, and hear English.   The best way to actually review is to read, speak, and hear materials that you enjoy in a foreign language.

The Shortcut to Learning a [Foreign Language] is Repetition“英語上達の近道は｢くり返し」増やすことに尽きる”　　

Utsude explains that you wouldn’t expect to become a better swimmer by reading a book and getting into a pool once.  To become better you need hundreds of hours of actual practice.  Utsude was writing about English but you can fill the blank above with any language or skill you want.

What are the Two Walls that Keep (Japanese) People from Learning a [Foreign Language]?日本人の英語勉強を阻む｢２つの壁」とは？  

  1. Your Environment:   Are you surrounding yourself with good materials in your target language?  Ajatt.com recently echoed this sentiment by explaining how learning a language is a lot easier when you modify your infrastructure: “So any issues an able-bodied, sound-minded adult is going to have with learning (getting used to) a language will be entirely due to infrastructure, not linguistics, not biology.”
  2. Your Self (自身）  Are you clear and confident in your goals and motivation for learning a foreign language?

In Order to Remember/Review Your [Target Language]  Relax and Surround Yourself With Materials You Like ラクにくり返しをして記憶するための一番コツは、あなたの「好きなこと」「得意なこと」と英語を結びつけてしまうのです。


It’s the infrastructure issue all over again.  Masami Utsude urges his readers to “review” while having fun learning from English dramas, movies, newspapers, etc.  It’s the reason that I am reading Japanese books about learning.  I have a natural motivation that keeps me motivated and moving forward.  No birds.  No stone.

 

How to Smoothly Read [Foreign Language]  Books 英文がスラスラ読める効果的な方法

  1. Read the Table of Contents First–It Gives You a Road Map and Gives You a Native Experience of the Foreign Language
  2. Relax and Read without a Dictionary
  3. Read the Titles
  4. Make Sure You Are Reading the Genres You Enjoy

Getting The Most out of Watching [Foreign Language] Television and Movies「好きなテレビドラマー映画を楽しんで観る」がコツ　

  1. Watch without subtitles.   Even if you don’t understand just enjoy the atmosphere of the movie and let it fill your heart.
  2. Repeat scenes that you love over and over again.
  3. Let yourself feel like you are part of the movie or drama.  “Shadow” the dialogue and repeat what they say.

 

1分スピード記憶勉強法　has a lot more great ideas about learning foreign languages.  If you are a follower of AJATT or antimoon, these ideas are not new.  In a way, that’s why I chose the book–because it affirms messages that I already understand and know.   Reading about these methods reinforces both the positive advice and Japanese itself.

In learning a foreign language there is a time for pushing and a time for relaxing into the language.  Both are important.  I push by making new flashcards, reading definitions of Japanese words in Japanese, and studying flashcards.   I relax into the Japanese by listening to Japanese music, television, movies and by random channel and web surfing.   I’m not “fluent” yet but I consider it a milestone that I just read Japanese books for fun now.

Don’t give up on your dream of learning a foreign language.  Take a minute to have some fun.

 

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Power Your Morning! Samurai Disappearing Acts

26 Friday Oct 2012

Posted by in Deliberate Practice, Mind, Reading, Samurai Time Management

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Greet the morning with what you want to make happen–in your mind or your “practice.” Thirty minutes a day for your life. Photo source: unprofound.com.

Hello, I am back!   I have been in the all-consuming depths of teaching and all the work and preparation that this entails.   Additionally, I am in the final months of my Silverspoon Japanese immersion experience.   Every morning, I wake up and get suggested “sprints” for Japanese immersion.    Silverspoon usually includes scheduled “chillax” periods where I can do other non-Japanese related stuff while having Japanese in the background. It is usually in these 5-10 minute breaks that I play around with the blog and write.   Lately, by the time it is time to have a “chillax” period, it is time for me to leave and go to work.

Lately the Silverspoon mornings are “packed.”  Yesterday, I flipped through a Japanese book, did sentence and kanji flashcard repetitions, and made new flashcards from “Scuzzy” sentence packs that I chose fun sentences from.   After a little more flashcard reps,  shuffled through Japanese websites using Khatzumoto’s url shuffler.  Fun stuff, but the time ran out and I had to leave the Writers Room and head to work.  (There’s not a lot of time for writing these days, but in 74 days I will have my own schedule “back.”  Right now I am creating a rich Japanese environment of websites, flashcards, and just plain old fun immersion experiences that will be there for me for a lifetime.)

My copy of Furuichi Yukio’s book on how to incorporate mornings into your life. For coolness factor he adds an English subtitle: “The early bird catches the fortune.”

This all reminds me of a Japanese podcast that asks listeners to “Power Your Morning.”  I used to go my favorite coffee shop that opens up at 7 a.m. and then get to the Writer’s Room and only have 15 or 20 minutes to write, study, and do “me.”  Now I am making my coffee in the Writer’s Room and getting an extra half hour every day to write, study Japanese, and play it forward.

It was a shock at first but I am enjoying the benefits of the morning and I think you can, too:

  • You start the day with a “win” towards your “goal.”  If you can do it in the morning, it might slip into the rest of the day.  If you are too “busy” then you will get your win in for the day.
  • The morning can be the most free from outside distractions.
  • There is an after-burn.   The idea you are trying to work on in the morning might kick around for the rest of the day.
  • Your mind and body might get used to showing up on a daily basis and help you produce more constantly.  Creating, learning become a habit.
  • When you “disappear” in the morning before most people are awake you don’t have to explain or justify yourself.   You just go into your mad scientist lab and create your own Frankenself.

I wasn’t into the book a month ago, but I might give it a whirl again. I left the $2.00 Book off sticker. You don’t have to bust the bank to have a Samurai Mind.

This morning I am shaking it up.  Silverspoon is saying I should be watching anime all day.  I am watching “My Little Monster” but only for five minute stretches, while working in writing and a little exercise (also in five minute) stretches and then I have to go to work.   I am designing the precious time that I have in the morning.

Design your morning.  Power your morning.  As Bob Marley says, “Wake up and live!”

 

 

Samurai Swimming: The Importance of “Treading Water”

18 Tuesday Sep 2012

Posted by in Deliberate Practice, Guitar, Mind, Samurai Time Management

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Sometimes you have to bookmark or tread water with your skill. If you can’t do all guitar all the time, do five minutes. Photo by sudyasheel. http://bit.ly/UChtLh

The other day I was minding my own business and paying attention to @ajatt’s twitter conversation when a rockin’ young ma twitterin’ man named @Mikeylovesrock asked, “Could someone create an @ajatt method for guitar fluency? :p I’d be much obliged.”  I told him that maybe he is the man that everyone is waiting for. Khatzumoto didn’t know Japanese when he began his immersion experience.   Now Khatzumoto has a cool blog helping people all over the world learn Japanese through fun and immersion.

Later on, I suggested some of my posts where I mention guitar.  I also sent Mikeylovesrock a link to Rittor, a Japanese music publication company.   I have a great book from them called (roughly), 100 Hints for Becoming Better in Guitar.

@mikeylovesrock graciously conceded that he would give it a shot when he finished learning Japanese.  I let a few hours pass, thinking about the fact that even Khatzumoto began from nothing and I replied, “fair enough … but what is one thing you could do in guitar? keep strings tuned hold guitar five minutes/day.”  Why wait?

The Importance of “Treading Water”

“Relax your mind and float down stream.” When you are treading water, a relaxed attitude will help you “float” better.  Photo by Jim:  http://bit.ly/S1Kvpd

Even if you have a big learning project underway, I think it is important to “tread water” in the other skills you want to develop.  Why?

  • Your mind loves a challenge and progress is made in minutes of doing rather than not doing.
  • The next skill can become a motivator for continuing and progressing with the on-going learning project.
  • A little bit a day lays the groundwork for more each day and gets your mind thinking like a guitarist/pianist/speaker of French/coder etc.
  • Because it’s just plain old fun.

Tips for “Bookmarking” or Treading Water on a Future Skill

  • use your current learning to shore up future learning–i.e. play around with the guitar books written in Japanese
  • keep the instrument(s) of your future skilled out and “tuned”-take the guitar out of the case, keep it tuned, and just touch it for five minutes
  • have a place in your notebook for future goals, dreams, and skills in your notebook and find fun ways to keep reviewing them in your notebook…create ways to keep bumping into your desired skills
  • if you can’t do five minutes, do one minute.  If you can’t do one minute, do one second.  If you don’t physically pick up your skill, hold it in your mind.  A friend of mine says he practices guitar scales and patterns in his mind when he is too busy being a dad.   Guilt and self-hatred don’t count.
  • create an online flashcard deck for your future skill….even if you just put one card it in the deck it counts

The nice thing about giving advice to other people is that sometimes it spurs you to follow your own advice.  🙂  I blew the dust off my flashcard deck for guitar and landed on Jamplay.com lesson based on an AC/DC song called, “You Shook Me All Night Long.”  For five minutes, the bright lights shone on me as I had my Angus moment.  Of course, this was a four day weekend.  Let’s see if we can sustain the five minutes during the stress of the school year.  In the meantime, stay “tuned.” 🙂

Samurai Online Learning: How I Use Japanese Pod 101

08 Saturday Sep 2012

Posted by in Deliberate Practice, Mind, Reading, Samurai Time Management

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First of all, a disclaimer.   I have a sponsored link to Japanese Pod 101 on this website.  The occasional link to this service, if you think it fits your needs, might one day help me to pay my web-hosting fees and buy more Japanese books fuel a mighty financial empire. Click JapanesePod101.com – Learn Japanese with Free Daily Podcasts 🙂 The other disclaimer is that I have no authority to judge whether this service will make me fluent or not.  Otherwise, I would be writing to you in Japanese and getting ready to learn Spanish through Japanese materials.   These techniques are just the way, I have played with to learn more Japanese everyday.  It might help you think about any online learning materials or courses that you might be interested in picking up in the future.

Here’s the cheatsheet:

  • treat every lesson like a game and find something to challenge you–use your headphones for good!
  • play the money game
  • find the sweet spot–lessons at the level where you are challenged but still finding some comfort or review of material you already know
  • you can also go back to fundamental or basic lessons for review or go a few levels above you to just overwhelm your mind
  • use self-tracking tools–progress bars and other tools are great ways to keep track and also get the game factor going
  • find something to like about every online host or teacher
  • take it all a little bit at a time . . . . turtle power activate!
  • on the other hand, sometimes its good to add velocity to your game … go through the lesson and move on
  • don’t forget that the real game is the language/skill/game …. listen to real Japanese, listen and play real songs…what is great is when deliberate practice and real life reinforce each other

    There are 1,000’s of lessons on Japanese Pod 101. I prefer music and immersion but sometimes it’s great to get a little grammar. At the free level, you can listen to the lesson or watch the video. The basic level includes the PDF, and the Premium level includes a line by line transcript with audio, sample sentences with audio for new vocabulary, and a host of other features. It’s not the end all and be all and may result in “lessonitis” but it can also be fun.

Treat every lesson like a game and find something to challenge you

As a busy teacher and dad of two, I don’t have a lot of discretionary time.  I get my so-called exercise by walking to the writers room and school.  In those 35-40 minutes of walking I often listen to Japanesepod101.com lessons on my iPhone.  Most lessons are 15-20 minutes and include a short Japanese dialogue, vocabulary explanation, grammar explanation, and then a repeat of the dialogue. There are also line by line audio transcripts.  With a quick click I can listen to small chunks of the dialogue.   There are also sample sentences for the vocabulary and I repeat the sentences I hear out loud.  (If you have headphones and a phone you can get away with looking like a weirdo. Maybe 🙂   When I am at a desk or cafe and not negotiating traffic (do be careful), I read the PDF and count the lesson as finished. If I am not in the mood to do a lesson, I don’t push it.  I listen to fun Japanese podcast or music instead.

Play the money game

There are all kinds of pricing structures on Japanesepod101.com and there are sales and discounts throughout the year.  But I like to think in terms of, “I’m going to get $1,000 worth of value out of this $____ investment.  This is true with any online learning service.  I’m old enough to remember when Space Invaders moved into the pinball arcade.  Part of the fun was seeing how long you could make your quarters last.

Find the sweet spot

Play around with levels and hover between being completely lost and easy mastery.  These days I alternate between upper intermediate, lower intermediate, and beginner lessons (they also have absolute beginner lessons).  They also have some video lessons on animals that I’ve found fun to throw into the mix.  The advantage of Japanesepod101.com is that they love grammar and love explaining it.   With the higher level lessons I just listen through to get exposure to the grammar points but I don’t try to memorize the grammar points.    The lower level lessons help me solidify some grammar points that I have already been exposed through flashcards, immersion, etc.

Hit the Bars: use self-tracking tools–progress bars and other tools are great ways to keep track and also get the game factor going

I do go for long periods without studying Japanesepod101, because I am busy or doing more interesting stuff in Japanese. When I get back into it,progress bars are a low-tech game to keep you moving forward.

Sometimes it’s fun to just see a little bar moving forward, piling it up like monopoly money.  Yes, it’s a game but so is professional basketball.  Touchdown!  Japanese Pod 101 has progress bars that fill up as you finish lessons within each level and season.

Slow Down and Hurry Up!

There is no need to force feed yourself lessons in order to be virtuous or feel accomplished.   On the other hand, I sometimes like to speed up and get through a lesson, get a little exposure to the grammar and move the heck on.  What’s nice about Japanese Pod 101 is that as you go up in levels, the grammar and cultural points are explained using more and more Japanese.

Don’t forget that the real game is the language/skill/game

As I watched my daughters learn to speak, I noticed that they didn’t take any online or traditional course work.  Shame on them! 🙂  They listened to us singing and speaking to them, watched cartoons, sang songs, repeated what we said or just “babbled” in language practice.  Now my oldest daughter has to explain to me what she is saying in Japanese.   This is ajatt (Language is Like A Video Game) and antimoon stuff.   The pixie dust and nitty gritty of real life. 　Keep it real, よ！

Push, Relax, Have Fun, Repeat: How I ‘Read’ Japanese News

20 Friday Jul 2012

Posted by in Body, Mind, Reading, Samurai Time Management, Uncategorized

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Here’s a quick little Samurai success formula to take on whatever you want to do or  know more about in life:

  • Push.  Find little windows where you can push yourself to learn a little more and push.   Write down a new word, concept, do push ups until you are tired.
  • Relax.  Congratulations on pushing yourself.   Take a few breaths or a nap.  A relaxed learner learns more than a self-loathing ball of nervousness.
  • Have Fun.   Find a fun angle on what you are trying to learn, do, or accomplish.  Find a comic book version of what you are trying to learn.  Zumba!  (WTH!)
  • Repeat.  Go back to the seat of the crime and take a fresh samurai stab at it all.  Be persistent like water, grasshopper.

Yesterday’s Yomiuri. A foreign newspaper can seem scary, but it can also be a game. You can look at pictures can’t you. Any goal has opportunities for pushing and having fun.

Case in point–the Yomiuri News.   Yomiuri Shinbun is kind of like the Japanese Wall Street journal.  It’s the most interesting newspaper lying around my father-in-law’s house.   I already know a lot of kanji and a lot of Japanese vocabulary, but if I try to read every page my eyes start to swim in desperation and confusion.

But all is not lost.  My vocabulary has increased since doing AJATT but what has also changed is my attitude.  I’ve begun to take on Japanese newspapers.

Bad stuff happening in Syria and the ongoing mess at the Fukushima nuclear power plant.

Yomiuri is the best paper in the house and I’ve decide to at least open it every day.   Push.  I scan the headlines and pictures for things that interest me.   Have fun.  I find a story that interests me and find one word or more that I don’t understand and look it up with my iPhone app, Midori. At the touch of a screen I instantly add it to my flashcards.  This word will be with me for a while.   Push.  I start to feel like it’s turning into homework and I Relax.   I like reading the small ads at the bottom of Yomiuri hawking all sorts of diet, sports, business, and self-help books.  I enjoy the language of promises and I also like the bite-sized、digestible bites they come in.  Have fun.  The newspaper comes again the next day and I Repeat.  PRHR! (Like a cat with spelling issues.)

The ads are like little candies. Small and chewy!

I’m hoping to PRHR through more of I want to learn:  financial and investment literacy, Spanish, and playing guitar.    Today Yomiuri, tomorrow the world.

Life is an SRS: Create your Learning Environment

13 Friday Jul 2012

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One of the more fun lessons I’ve gotten from ajatt and other sources is that you become what you surround yourself with.   If you want to learn Japanese, surround yourself with Japanese people, music, and experiences.   Maybe it works for other things as well.  If you want to be rich, surround yourself with rich people, or at least with books and audio that explore ethical and fun ways to create wealth.  Life itself is an SRS.

Signs signs every there’s signs. Walking around is just one big kanji and vocabulary review.

An SRS is short for spaced repetition system.  A spaced repetition system usually involves creating flashcards.   Using various online and offline computer programs these cards come up in an algorithm based on how successful you’ve been at remembering the various facts.   The harder to remember facts come up sooner, while the easier facts come up at increasingly longer intervals.  An SRS is an excellent way to consciously push your learning further.

I guess I could sit at my computer and look at flashcards all day, but maybe walking around the park and realizing that the sign I thought was some kind of haiku years ago actually says, “Let’s clean up.  Dog poop is the responsibility of the owner.”

When I first came to Japan, I thought these signs were haiku. This sign means it is your responsiblity to clean up your dog’s poop.

There are a thousand opportunities to learn.  The conscious pushing of study opens up more possibilities but the random discovery of real-life experience “cooks in the flavah.”

Use this symbiosis between conscious effort and environment.   Yes, you can push but also think what’s around you.  Khatzumoto often says something like, “You learn the language that’s on your walls.”  You don’t want to be hermetically sealed off but you want to think about your environment.  It’s the reason that the Dali Lama didn’t attend Chico State, the party college of California.

Some random, unsolicited hints for a better Samurai Repetition System:

  • Stop watching television or be more selective about the content and amount of time you watch
  • Hang out with the kind of people you would like to become – come on you funky line dancing hipsters – come to Samurai Juan
  • Read the books you want to become
  • Create little opportunities for adventure—eat somewhere different, talk to someone new—you might not know where you want to go unless you occasionally stray off the beaten path .
  • Pray and meditate.  I’m going out on a limb here.  Your thoughts are part of your environment.  If you are not a prayer person at least imagine good things for people.

Let me know how it goes and thank you for making samuraimindonline.com part of your learning environment.

 

The Power of Morning and Evening: Samurai Slumbering–Samurai Rising

15 Friday Jun 2012

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A passageway from a temple to garden in Nagasaki. Morning and evening are key transition times.

A Japanese self-help book, a samurai self-help blogger , and a Japanese immersion website meet at a bar and talk about the best time to “do it.”  Morning and night.

Morning and night might be one of the best times to set your intentions, embedded knew knowledge, and change your life.

Anchors Away!

Khatz talks about the importance of morning and evening as anchors:

I’ll just say that in terms of just outward behavior patterns, those two “anchor points” do tend to set pattern for the rest of the day. Broadly speaking, the rest of one’s day often seems to run off of the inertia from these two times of day.

Focus your energy on managing your immediate environment, the 3-foot wide country that is you — especially at these two critical times – and you may well find that other things just naturally fall into place.  —All Japanese All the Time

Khatz has been lightly hammering the idea of anchors in my daily “sprints” or suggestions for immersion.  Basically, I take this to mean that the morning and the minutes right before sleep are the most key moments of the day.   The morning sets the tone for the day and the minutes before sleep set the tone for the dream scape.

I’ve been experiment with this in many ways.   When I walk out in the mornings I often listen to japanesepod101.com podcast lessons.  Yesterday, however, I felt the pull to listen to Japanese music.  I follow whatever method or activity seems to be the most fun at the time.  In the middle of a work day, I usually work through at emergency room like atmosphere at a school.   As I get ready to sleep, I may read the supporting materials to the jpod lesson (if I’m interested) or listen to an non-jarring podcast.  These days I “listen”  to Tokyo FM’s Tokyo Midtown Presents, a pleasant and interesting program about different design concepts.   The voices are so pleasant that I never consciously listen to the content before sleep.  Does it work?  Who knows?  But I am enjoying Japanese, so why stop?

Power Your Morning (and Night), Furuichi Style

Yukio Furuichi, author of １日３０分を続けなさい！人生勝利の勉強法５５　Learn to Win  My (My take with a dash of soy translation:   Keep going 30 minutes a day!  55 Study Steps to Winning in Life) also writes about the power of morning and the evenings.

Furuichi’s Reasons Why Studying in the Morning Pays Off:

  • There are fewer interesting television shows in the morning.
  • There a less distractions such as phone calls, social outings, etc
  • From his experience, the rate of learning seems to be higher in the morning than in the evenings
  • If you “git ir done” in the morning, you’ve got a huge part of your studying done for the day

Furuichi’s Hints for the Evenings:

Buddha at rest. You have to sleep in order to wake up.

  • Get at least six to seven and a half hours of sleep
  • If you don’t get enough sleep you become less effective when you study
  • While you are sleeping, memories get arranged and fixed
  • If you can’t sleep, have something by your bed you can study.  After you are tired (usually around 30 minutes) you should be able to sleep.
  • Napping helps but don’t go for long naps because they throw off your biorhythms.

Samurai at Rest/Samurai Rising

If morning and evening are such powerful anchors, why limit using them to whatever you are studying?   (Keep in mind that by studying I mean that you take on what you want to move forward in your life.)  What are the thoughts and intentions that you go to bed with at night?   I’ll be the first one to admit, that I often wake up with internal grumbling?  But why not wake up thinking about what you want in your life?  What you want for the world?   Why not rise up singing?

It’s the same with the evening.   Instead of taking your worries to bed with you, what about going to bed with appreciations and your dreams for the yourself and the world?

Sun up.  Sun down.  Samurai at rest.  Samurai rising.

Review Your Notebook, Change Your Mind: Samurai Mind Shift

25 Friday May 2012

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Little pieces floating back to the edge of consciousness.  Samurai reviews old pages.  Review your notebook, change your mind. Continue reading »

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