The Plan for MIA Japanese

Going to use the Perfectionist Path 1.0 that Matt (Matt Vs Japan) and Lucas (Yoga MIA) have now-retired – like Apple has retired the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus, which will not be receiving the upcoming iOS 13 upgrade.

Stage 1 – Getting Started

• Read all Stage 1 articles, and the Theory sections of Stages 2, 3 and 4
  • The articles aren’t all up yet, so I’ll not do this step for now.
• Re-read Stage 1 articles at the pace of one article a day, and after finishing, read Stage 2 articles at the same pace (ongoing)
  • The articles aren’t all up yet, so I’ll not do this step for now.
• Create an immersion environment and begin immersing with audio (ongoing)
  • Got lots of dramas with native subtitles queued up from Netflix and other places on the Internet, to complete this step. I’ll watch without subtitles – the subs are only there to make subs2srs decks with, like BritVsJapan does.
• Obtain an SRS and learn how to use its basic features
  • I use the desktop version of Anki, together with the MIA Low Key Anki setup.
• Gain an in-depth understanding of the phonetic system, and do training to become able to accurately perceive all the language’s sounds.
  • Gain an in-depth understanding of the phonetic system
    • I’m considering using the “Pronunciation” series (Lessons 33 to 57) of Dogen’s Japanese Phonetics course. Lessons 1 to 4 form the Introduction.
    • A free option would be the Japanese pronunciation series by Fluent Forever, under the section “Essential Videos To Start Learning”.
  • Do training to become able to accurately perceive all the language’s sounds
    • I’m using the Japanese Pronunciation Trainer by Fluent Forever, available here (select “English -> Japanese” under “Choose your trainer”).
    • A free option would be to go through Wasabi’s Japanese Pronunciation Lessons and train yourself to distinguish the sounds.
• Learn the writing system (Japanese: Hiragana and Katakana. Chinese: Pinyin and/or Zhuyin – also known as Bopomofo. Korean: Hangul)
  • The Japanese Pronunciation Trainer by Fluent Forever also teaches you Kana, the Japanese writing system.
  • A free option would be the “Learn how to write Hiragana” and “Learn how to write Katakana” animated Web pages by easyJapanese.org.
• Learn and SRS (audio-based bilingual sentence cards) basic grammar and vocab (1K cards)
  • I got Japanese Level Up’s JALUP Beginner Anki deck, which includes 1,000 sentences already arranged in an i+1 order along with native speaker audio.
  • A free option would be to use the Core 2K deck on Ankiweb.
  • MIA also provides the i+1 JLPT Tango N5 and N4 Anki decks featuring native speaker audio, with instructions on how to get them in this Patreon post.
• Through sentence mining, make ~2.5K audio-based bilingual sentence cards
  • I’ll complete this step by running Morphman for Anki 2.1 (using the Japanese option) on subs2srs decks that I’ll make after watching dramas in full. I’m using the recommended MIA settings provided here.
• (Optional) Continue to learn grammar and vocab from a pre-made deck alongside sentence mining. This can count towards the ~2.5K bilingual sentence cards.
  • I’ll do this step just like the one above.

Stage 2 – Incubation

• Re-read Stage 2 articles at the pace of one article a day, and after finishing, read Stage 3 articles at the same pace (ongoing)
  • The articles aren’t all up yet, so I’ll not do this step for now.
• Continue to immerse with audio (ongoing)
  • Going to keep getting lots of dramas with native subtitles from Netflix and other places on the Internet, to complete this step. I’ll continue to watch without subtitles – the subs are only there to make subs2srs decks with, like BritVsJapan does.
• (Japanese only) Learn pitch accent theory
  • I’m considering using the “Pitch Accent” series (Lessons 5 to 32, then Lessons 58 and later) of Dogen’s Japanese Phonetics course. Lessons 1 to 4 form the Introduction.
• Through sentence mining, make an additional ~2K audio-based bilingual sentence cards.
  • I’ll complete this step by running Morphman for Anki 2.1 (using the Japanese option) on subs2srs decks that I’ll make after watching dramas in full. I’m using the recommended MIA settings provided here.

Stage 3 – Survival Level

• Re-read Stage 3 articles at the pace of one article a day, and after finishing, read Stage 4 articles at the same pace (ongoing)
  • The articles aren’t all up yet, so I’ll not do this step for now.
• Begin to immerse with written materials in addition to audio (ongoing)
  • Will start reading and consider looking at books from Amazon Japan at this point.
• Through sentence mining, make ~2K bilingual sentence cards, switching from audio-based to text-based cards (ongoing)
  • Will start mining from reading
• Adopt a parent, and start shadowing (ongoing)
  • Will consider emulating the speaking style of one of the native speakers I’ve seen from the media I’ve watched at this point
• (Japanese/Chinese/Korean) Go through Production RTK 1+3 / RTH 1+2
  • I’m going to use Japanese Level Up’s RTK Mod Anki deck, which includes kanji from both RTK 1 and 3, while removing a lot of the less frequently used characters.

Stage 4 – Functional

• Re-read Stage 4 articles at the pace of one article a day, and after finishing, read Stage 5 articles at the same pace (ongoing)
  • The articles aren’t all up yet, so I’ll not do this step for now.
• Continue to immerse with both audio and written materials (ongoing)
  • Will consider adjusting immersion media at this point
• Make the Monolingual Transition
  • I’m going to use Japanese Level Up’s JALUP Intermediate Anki deck, which includes i+1 dictionary definitions to help ease the learner along the monolingual transition.
  • Will use the online monolingual Japanese dictionary by goo.
  • MIA has also developed a smoother way to go about the monolingual transition in Japanese in this video.
• Begin to output (ongoing)
  • Will consider looking for people to have a conversation with in places like HelloTalk, iTalki, and Interpals at this point
• Through sentence mining, make ~3K monolingual text-based sentence cards. This should bring you to ~10K sentence cards total
  • Will continue mining from reading

Note: I won’t touch on Stage 5 for now.

Stage 5 – Fluent to Native Level

• Re-read Stage 5 articles at the pace of one article a day (ongoing)
• Continue to immerse (ongoing)
• Continue to make text-based monolingual sentence cards through sentence mining, but at a further reduced rate (ongoing)
• Begin to make clozed/production cards to learn specific cultural knowledge (ongoing)
• Continue to output, and get corrected (ongoing)
• Study the history of the culture your target language is associated with
• Study the grammar of your target language using resources meant for natives
• (Japanese only) Study Keigo
• (Japanese/Chinese only) Study classical Japanese/Chinese