Tips to Speak Japanese Fluently – Teacher YUKI

2024/07/23

Many people work hard to study Japanese every day and feel confused and wondering, “When will I be able to speak fluently?”. 

Language is like a mixed martial art. To develop your comprehensive language skills, you need to train the 4 skills: Reading, Writing, Listening, and Speaking. 

Listening and speaking skills are especially important in conversation. This means the key is to how much you can output what you learned and practice them.

Here are some tips to be fluent in Japanese.

How Long Does It Take to Speak Japanese Fluently?

It is said that it takes about 3,000 hours to master a language to a business level completely. 

If you are immersed in the Japanese environment for 10 hours per day, you will be fluent in about 10 months.

What Is the Effective Way to Speak Japanese Fluently?

If you want to improve your conversational skills as quickly as possible, studying abroad and living in a language environment is the most effective way.

Those who have lived abroad probably know that your ears will get used to the language.

How Many Japanese Words Should I Remember?

The number of words normally used in Japanese is said to be 30,000 to 40,000. However, Japanese people use 1,100 to 1,300 words in daily life (called basic words). 

You should first aim to increase your vocabulary. Once you have memorized the basic vocabulary and grammar, you can start outputting as consciously as possible.

Four Ways to Become Fluent in Japanese Without Living in Japan

Due to time and money constraints, it may be difficult to move to Japan right away. In such cases, let’s take a look at other ways to improve your conversation skills.

Now, I will introduce 4 ways to practice input and output at the same time efficiently at home.

Shadowing The Movie

Shadowing requires you to accurately capture every word and its pronunciation on the film, so you can intensively train your speech perception process. 

Once your speech perception is trained, you can do it instantly without thinking. 

You can free up working memory resources for comprehension, improving your listening skills, and then improve your output power with practical phrases.

Online Lessons

Having a real conversation with a native Japanese person is the best way to improve your skills.

You can have flexible schedules, early mornings to late nights, and no need to prepare textbooks, you can easily feel closer to Japan. 

Your motivation will be maintained as the lessons will follow the curriculum under the guidance of the teacher. Recommended for those who want to achieve their goals by the target time.

There is a saying that Rome wasn’t built in a day, but the more you practice steadily, the more your conversation skills will improve.

However, if you find it difficult to stay motivated alone, try taking online lessons. At our school, native teachers will teach closely with you to help you achieve your goals.

Read the Japanese Article and Summarize It in Japanese

This is an exercise in paraphrasing a sentence in your own way without significantly changing its meaning. 

When you can’t think of the right expression right away, that will strengthen your vocabulary and expression.

You will acquire the ability to compose sentences that are easy to understand. 

Write a diary in Japanese

It is important to keep writing a Japanese diary every day and make it a habit, so instead of trying to write difficult things, start by creating a few simple sentences using the words you already know. 

A Japanese diary allows you to express in English what you experience, what you feel, what you think, and other things that are in your head. 

You will acquire the ability to create sentences about things.

Note

Even if you memorize and get to know more vocabulary and grammar patterns, sometimes it can be difficult to have a free conversation.

If you want to improve your conversational skills as quickly as possible, living in a language environment is the most effective way.

Please try making some time to interact with native Japanese speakers online and offline if possible.

Teacher YUKI wrote this article

Qualifications:Completed 420-hour Japanese language teacher training course
I started my career at a Japanese language school in Bolivia and have been teaching at Nihongo online school since 2019.

Experience:I myself am interested in foreign cultures and languages, so I find it very stimulating to meet students from different backgrounds and share lesson time with them.
I am always happy when students are able to express themselves well in the Japanese they have just learned, and I feel happy to be teaching.

In the future, I would like to be able to teach Japanese through Japanese anime, manga, and traditional culture as well. I would also like to constantly research how I can learn Japanese more efficiently, using my own experience in learning foreign languages.

I try to explain words and sentence patterns using a variety of examples so that students can easily understand under what circumstances they are used. I also provide many opportunities for students to speak up, so that they can learn in a participatory manner with a focus on output.