にほんのホーストファミリのてがみ

こんにちは、山田さん。
わたしのなまえはエミ·ウイリアムスです。プリンストン大学の学生です。アメリカのサウスカロライナからきました。ざっしと本をよむのが好きです。プリンストン大学は小さい大学ですが、とてもいいです。私のじゅぎょうはおもしろいですが、むずかしいです。たくさんべんきょうするので、このセメスターはいそがしいです。でも、たのしいです。日本二いくので、日本語をたくさんべんきょうします。日本のりょうりが大好きです。山田さん、りょうりをするのが好きですか。私は日本のりょうりをべんきょうしたいです。そして、日本でショッピングするのが好きです。いっしょにショッピングしましょう！らい年のなつに山田さんとあうので、私はうれしいです。よろしくおねがいします。
エミ·ウイリアムス

Pronunciation Exercise Cycle 2: どうでしたか？！

So... Now is the time to reflect on PE Cycle 2. How did I do?

I said that I would complete two extra shadowing exercises during this cycle. I did listen to the extra shadowing exercises, but I did not record and submit them. I will do so tomorrow without fail.

I also said that I would attend the Japanese table at least once. Although I have had a conflict every week, I have finally managed to arrange my schedule so that I am able to attend! I will be attending this week. I would really like to meet Makino Sensei.

I said that I would listen to Japanese music while I worked. I have been able to do this, but I have found that listening to music doesn't really help me get a sense of word pitch or prosody, really, which are the two areas of pronunciation in which I am the weakest.

PE Cycle 3 Goals:

In order to help my prosody and pitch issues, I have resolved to listen to the textbook CDs instead of listening to Japanese music. I think this will be much more useful for me, particularly when it comes to plain form questions... Which are so difficult to say with correct pitch.

Also, I will attend the Japanese table at least twice. And I will take a picture with Makino Sensei! ^_^

Thirdly, I will be really ambitious and I will do ALL of the extra shadowing assignments to make up for my slacking in that area. Yay!

わたしのあきやみ

こんいちは！I hope everyone's break was fantastic. Mine was awesome.

What did I do? うちへかえりました。 わたしのこうこうにいきました。でも、べんきょうをしませんでした。そして、テレビをみました。おとうさんのりょうりをたべました。ともだちとえいがをみました。

Also, I decorated my dorm room with Christmas lights. Christmas がだいすきです！Here's a picture:

すごいですね！

That's all for now! I hope your fall break was awesome, too!

Pronunciation Exercise Cycle 1: どうでしたか？！

Well, it's the night before fall break officially begins for me. I'm packing for my flight home tomorrow. Doing some laundry. Tidying up my wreck of a room.

And now I'm going to reflect on my shadowing exercises. What did I do?

Well, I realized that I never outlined specific STEPS, per se, that I was going to take to fulfill the goals I enumerated on my previous pronunciation exercise post. So I will tell you the steps that I did take to improve my Japanese pronunciation.

1. I sang the "ぼくはくま" song several times.
2. I watched Japanese TV on a few occasions.
3. I studied my butt off for the midterm oral exam and managed to write memorize a super-long and complicated dialogue.
4. I have been faithfully doing the lab activity homework and completing the shadowing exercises.

Here is what I intended to do, but did not do:

1. I planned on attending the にほんごのテーブル this week. But unfortunately, midterm stress and a desperate need to study didn't allow that to happen. -_-
2. I also planned on doing some extra shadowing exercises. This did not happen because currently, I am struggling to do the minimum amount of work for all my courses, let alone extra work.
3. I planned to find some rad Japanese music and jam out to it while I did work. This did not happen, but I am not giving up hope.


Now, I am supposed to tell you how I thought my midterm oral exam went today.

... Well...

I don't think it went badly. Ko-san and I had a very elaborate dialogue planned out. We went to Sato-sensei's office hours and rehearsed it. Sato-sensei said that the character of Suzuki-san would be a very shy character who would only jump in at a few random times. It seemed as though this portion of the exam would be low-key.
However, Shibata-sensei was a much more aggressive Suzuki-san! I was a little intimidated, plus I was running on four hours of sleep. I suppose I should have worked harder on my grammar patterns. But I did my best, and that's all I can hope for! I hope Ko-san and I receive a good grade for all of our hard work.
^-^


Now, I will tell you what my goals are for Pronunciation Exercise Cycle 2.

1. I will attend にほんごのテーブル at least twice during the next cycle.
2. I will do at least two supplementary shadowing exercises.
3. I will listen to some Japanese music in my free time or while doing work.

I don't think these are unreasonable goals.
I will also continue to watch a little Japanese TV. And do my homework, of course.

I can do this!

じゃあ、また。

More にほんご-ness! ^_^

こんにちは！It's a beautiful day. NOT. It's so gross and rainy today.

I'm supposed to be writing about my weekend, but I had such a つまらないせんしゅのしゅまつ that it's pretty pointless to talk about it here. たくさんべんきょうしました。However, I still didn't do awesomely on the exam that I studied for. -_-

I can talk a little bit about my usual day, though. I hope this is of more interest. まいあさごぜんしちじにおきます。This is much too early for me, but I must go to class! そして、シャワーをあびます。わたしはいつもシャワーをあびます。そして、ウィートマンコーレジであさごはんをたべます。いつもあさごはんをたべます。My favorite breakfast food is blueberry muffins, but breakfast burritos come in a close second.

After breakfast, I run to class. ごぜんはちじにじゅぎょうがあります。そして、 おんがくをききます。おんがくがだいすきです！

Shadowing Exercises >_< .

こんいちは！　It's a beautiful day outside. I'm in a good mood... Until I remember that my first shadowing exercise is due at midnight tonight. [Cue sad, dramatic music]

Just joking. I'm not too depressed by the prospect of shadowing exercises. However, I do have a confession: I'm terrible at them! I was so discouraged yesterday by the tongue twisters. I hope that I begin to improve soon...

And on that note, here's my multi-part goal for these pronunciation exercises:

I want to improve my tone. It's such a huge part of speaking authentic-sounding Japanese, so I will work to that end.
I also want to improve my fluency. Japanese sentences are pretty modular, and it's hard for me to smoothly speak a single sentence when I'm trying to focus on its individual parts. No more stopping and starting!
Finally, I want to improve my "reaction time," if you will, when speaking Japanese. I want to be able to speak and reply to others naturally, and I think the best way to do that is to practice over and over, to drill it into my head.

Enough lofty aspirations for one blog post! It's time to go out and enjoy the day with a Snapple from Late Meal. ＾▽＾

にほんのこうこうです。

2006 ににほんへいきました。まいにち、にほんのこうこうにいって、とてもたのしかったです！しょくどうのひるごはんはおいしかったですよ！わたしのクラスメートはフレンドリーでした。よかったです！

このビデオはおもしろくて、いいです。みてください！




This post was added to the blog on 1/10/12. I placed it here to intersperse the videos with the other posts!

にほんご Introduction

こんいちは！

エミウイリアムスです。いちねんせいです。アメリカじんです。せんこうはかがくです。セネカのしゅっしんです。

どうぞよろしく。^_^

Emmy Williams in a Nutshell

はじめました。

ウイリアムスです。いちねんせいです。にほんごがだいすき！どおぞよろしく。

... And that's about all the Japanese I can use for now! I hope that'll do for an introduction.

Welcome to my blog! My name is Emmy Williams, and I'm a freshman taking Japanese 101 at Princeton University. I'm originally from South Carolina, but I was born in Japan. If everything goes according to plan (although, when does that actually happen?), I'll be majoring in chemistry here at Princeton.
In my spare time, I like playing piano, singing, and taking long walks on the beach. Just kidding! I'd rather take a nap than a long walk on the beach.

I am so psyched to be learning Japanese! You see, my father is a professor of Japanese language, and I don't speak it nearly as fluently as I'd like to.
(Think about how cool it will be in the future to speak Japanese with him in front of my friends. It's like a secret code!)

I have been to Japan many times and even attended school there, so I really don't have an excuse for not speaking it. I LOVE everything about Japan: the food, the people, the culture. So hopefully I'll learn to love the language as well.

I'm particularly excited to be able to expand my Japanese vocabulary. I don't know very many words in Japanese, particularly verbs, and that significantly stifles my language ability.

So far, the most difficult aspect of Japanese 101 for me is its fast pace. I hope I'll be able to keep up. Fingers crossed!

I hope y'all enjoy reading about my adventures in Japanese 101. I'll try not to be too awfully boring.

じゃあ、また！

^_^